Skiing, team bonding and more shirt number issues

GOLFERS are a strange breed, but I have now decided that they have nothing on skiers. I do enjoy my golf, but I have to confess I spend the summer season waiting for snow to start descending on the Alps.

This year, though, I came across a new breed of skier – one for whom looks came before anything else. I freely admit that breakfast at 8am is the worst part of the holiday for me - and as all the golfers who have tried to get me to play before elevenses will know only too well, I'm not a morning person.

True to form, I awoke from a drug induced coma on the first two mornings at 7.58am and managed to be tucking into my porridge at 8.01, washed and dressed. Thus it was something of a revelation to discover another member of the party set her alarm for 5.30 each morning in order to do her hair before breakfast.

Fortunately, her room wasn't above mine, or there would have been more than a little frostiness across the cornflakes – and the hairdryer would have developed a mysterious fault before the next day! This scenario brought back memories because I have come across golfers who like blow-drying their hair at absurdly early times before, as I have usually been paired with them during county week.

Although I always enjoyed the matches and competitiveness, once again, the worst part of the event was being told to be at breakfast by 7am – made worse by the fact that my room-mate was usually a snorer, so I'd only have gone to sleep by the time they got up to wash their hair.

On one occasion, I was promised a non snorer, which would have been marvellous had it not been for the fact that she didn't know she was pregnant at that time, and so spent all night being sick! Consequently, my county match record is far more successful in the afternoons than the mornings.

Team bonding is also an interesting issue. When skiing, people staying together in the chalet tend to ski together. On one morning, it was a bracing -20?, but Miss Coiffeur didn't wear hats because they would flatten her hair. I was dressed for a Polar ice trek, including a hat which would have made Davy Crockett proud. Goldilocks, on the other hand, with her hair progressively stiffening with the wind chill on the first chairlift, soon learned the lesson, pride comes before frostbite!

A glance round to note how she had become a delicate shade of slightly undercooked lobster was enough to ascertain that she wouldn't be joining us on the second lift – and I was right.

Team bonding is also a strange concept in golf. People who have spent all year wanting to beat each other are suddenly expected to start rooting for each other instead. Golf is by nature a solitary sport.

I can remember one member of our county team being knocked out of the county championships by someone, and then not speaking to her for the next two years, which was always conducive to good team morale. Even more bizarrely, I beat someone convincingly to earn my selection into the team and a prima donna informed the county captain she wouldn't play if her beaten friend didn’t play instead of me! We'll call that 1-0 to me then!

Personally, I can't remember who I've even played over the years, never mind whether I've won or lost to them – with two noticeable exceptions. I trust both people who beat me in the finals of the county championships on the 18th are twitching every night where I'm still sticking the pins into the dolls!

Still, my experience of skiing with Barbie did remind me that nowadays there is a new category of sporty women. Throughout my sporting life, I've met some pretty butch and frightening ladies. However, the Americans have changed all that. Golfers now emerge onto the fairways as if they've just stepped out of the salon. I might still run for the hills if confronted by Dottie Pepper or Christina Kim, but by and large, they look as if they'd be more worried about breaking a nail than missing a putt.

At least I'll still be instantly recognisable in this perfectly manicured world. I'll be the scruffy urchin who inevitably catches at least one shot fat on the practice ground before going out to play, and ends up with a face and front full of mud for my troubles. I'll also be recognisable for the age of my shirts. A good proportion of shirts I play in still bear the remnants of school day name tags, but there are several good reasons for this.

Firstly, they still tuck in, unlike today’s mini versions. They also aren't made out of body hugging lycra, which for real shaped people, isn't terribly flattering.

All my new shirts seem to have numbers on the back, which offend half the ladies' section. Anyway, the retro look is bound to come round again, when I'll be the height of fashion. Now, where did I put that hairdryer...