PE did you love it or loathe it??

Once a week we had PE with the boys in the hall. They delighted in shouting out who was ‘on the rag’ obvious in our skimpy knickers, to the best of my knowledge no one ever reprimanded them for it.

I loathed it. I went to a Catholic convent school and the P.E teacher used to crack our ankles with a hockey stick. I was absolutely useless at everything, apart from tennis
We had tennis courts in the summer and I spent all my free time there, when I was in sixth year.

Scottish country dancing was also part of the PE programme. I once was thrown out of the class by the same teacher, for mistakenly thinking, Strip theWillow was actually called Strip the Widow. I had no idea why she was so angry, I was quite naive!

Neither of my parents were sporty. They loved ballroom dancing though which I reckon is pretty good exercise, they would push back the furniture at weekends and put the old 78s on the record player, Glen Miller was a favourite, and cut up the rug.
My dad also loved hiking/rambling.
But sport left them cold.

JackyB

I don't know why I was so useless and uncoordinated as my parents were both very sporty and great dancers. My mother who went to school in the 20s and 30s, was captain of all the teams and was a brilliant swimmer and won lots of medals for diving, loved tennis. My sister excelled at everything that was on offer: fencing, rugby, trampoline....

Much the same in our family. My parents loved sport and were good at it. I can remember them winning tennis tournaments in their 40s and my father played cricket into his late 40s.

My sisters and I were always very active, we all did a lot of (non competitive) swimming and I did athletics and I was always racing around. But none of us had any interest in sport in the way our parents were.

In hockey, I kept right out of the firing line!!

Winter it was hockey and Summer it was tennis. Hated both but especially hockey, trailing up and down a muddy field and some of the more 'butch' girls really took it seriously and could be almost lethal.

But dad bought me a super racket for tennis - 1966 and he paid a stupendous 36 shillings and sixpence. It didn't make me play any better.

P

JackyB, one of my daughters really excelled at sports, she swam and played hockey and netball to a high level, we traveled all over the country with her for many years, and I was either in a boiling hot pool, or by the side of a freezing cold hockey pitch.
Really weird, I was rubbish

I don't know why I was so useless and uncoordinated as my parents were both very sporty and great dancers. My mother who went to school in the 20s and 30s, was captain of all the teams and was a brilliant swimmer and won lots of medals for diving, loved tennis. My sister excelled at everything that was on offer: fencing, rugby, trampoline....

I never thought about whether I liked or hated something. I just got on with it.

I wasn't very good at sports and only once made a team - I was left wing in the under 12s hockey team for one match. I was less than average in the gym and not well coordinated. A little bit better at throwing and catching, Badminton etc.

The worst part was walking down to the games field on a Wednesday afternoon in our hockey shorts. We had to pass the secondary school boys who were gardening right by the fence and they always shouted rude things.

LovesBach

Allira

LovesBach 😀
I shouldn't laugh, poor you.

We had very brief cold showers which were a form of torture!

I suppose no showers at all might be slightly better than freezing ones, Allira - and I didn't add that after the swimming ordeal, we would arrive back at school for double maths - my least favourite subject. How I hated Wednesdays!

There was no soap allowed either, just a pointless 10 second dash under a cold shower!

Babs, I enjoyed school on the whole, but I was not good at PE, we wore the skimpiest of PE kit, and had to do cross country around the town, which I found massively embarrassing after, at only eleven I started my periods.
But I fought her all the way, taking my grievances to the headmistress, she absolutely hated me, and it was mutual.

Allira

LovesBach 😀
I shouldn't laugh, poor you.

We had very brief cold showers which were a form of torture!

I suppose no showers at all might be slightly better than freezing ones, Allira - and I didn't add that after the swimming ordeal, we would arrive back at school for double maths - my least favourite subject. How I hated Wednesdays!

Sara1954

I hated it so much, I absolutely loathed the ghastly, sadistic teacher, I had many a run in with her.
Thirty years later, we moved house to a small lane, one of our neighbors invited us for drinks to meet the residents, and who should be there………
I still couldn’t bring myself to speak to her, and didn’t for all the years we lived there.

Good for you. I would have had to walk out if the two sadists who took great pleasure in humiliating us in front of our peers were there.
I was a shy child after puberty and though I excelled at academic subjects the constant humiliation in PE destroyed any confidence I had. It took years to claw back the confidence I had. Certainly my school days were not the happiest days of my life. I couldn’t wait to leave.

Not many happy memories of school games here. I thought netball a waste of energy (all that running up and down), hockey was penitential (freezing in aertex shirts and shorts while games mistress was entirely clad in sheepskin plus we had a twenty minute walk each way to the field), gymnastics was only for the few - the only thing I liked and was any good at was tennis. I suppose that in some way it was good for us but it felt like a waste of time to me. Plainly not team spirited!

I hated it so much, I absolutely loathed the ghastly, sadistic teacher, I had many a run in with her.
Thirty years later, we moved house to a small lane, one of our neighbors invited us for drinks to meet the residents, and who should be there………
I still couldn’t bring myself to speak to her, and didn’t for all the years we lived there.

LovesBach 😀
I shouldn't laugh, poor you.

We had very brief cold showers which were a form of torture!

Gymnastics - torture. Too short to leap over horse, fell often, terrified of knocking teeth out. Couldn't climb a rope. Hockey in freezing field, changed in dirty barn, no toilets, no showers. Swimming - three to a tiny cubicle, guess whose underwear always ended up on wet floor, train journey back to school, teeth chattering, wet hair. Hated every single second.

Loved it, especially outside games.

I loved PE and Games and excelled at nearly all of them. Even kept them up after leaving school. The PE teacher liked and encouraged me and knew I'd always turn up even for Hockey which I wasn't very fond of. She always waited with me after matches till my Dad arrived to collect me. I was a pretty good all rounder at school, not terrible at anything really.

I was never very fond of PE or games. The exception was netball, which I quite enjoyed. I hated cross country running (though once out of sight of the school, resorted to walking - I detest running, always have, always will. Hockey was just an excuse for the bullies to thwack your ankles, ditto rounders, when the ball was frequently aimed towards the face. I was a victim of a ball hitting my teeth once. I wore a brace, too, but luckily, wasn’t badly injured. No, my memories of PE are not good ones, overall.
The showers were torture in themselves, too.

NonGrannyMoll

Loathed everything about it - the navy-blue bloomers, the s/s aertex shirts that meant you froze half to death outside, the aimless running about, the COMPETITIVE SPIRIT (Lord, save me from ambitious sports people) and of course the PE teachers. I swear they were vetted for the slightest trace of empathy before being offered the job - definitely a warning sign against their suitability for building character in little girls!
Oh, and I forgot about the days of the month when girls need to be treated extra gently (which acted as a red rag to a bullish PT mistress).

I wish you'd met our lovely PE teacher! We thought she was wonderful. The other one not so 😃

Lord, save me from ambitious sportspeople.
But without ambition and competitiveness they wouldn't actually achieve much, or reach the top of their game!

I still find all sports incomprehensible

But so many people don't.

I was 14 before someone told me that as I only have sight in one eye I cannot judge distances. Apart from loathing anything involving balls I didn’t give a damn who won any game and PT was humiliating, stupid and a waste of energy.
I still find all sports incomprehensible.

I enjoyed athletics and was in the athletics team as a discus thrower. Apart from that I was not very good at games. I now know I have dyspraxia..

It never bothered me not being wanted in teams. I was generally seen as an oddball in all aspects of my education. I just shrugged and got on with what I wanted to do.