Was I really a traitor???

Every year, early in February, the Marong Cup race meeting is held in Bendigo.
This is a major fundraiser for the Catholic schools in Bendigo, as we get half of the ticket sales, provide bucket loads of volunteers to help run the day and generally build community.

Apart from the nags having a few runs, the ultimate blue ribbon event is the School's Relay, an event held between races later in the day.

For this event, each school enters a team of 6. That is two teachers, two parents and two kids.
The idea is to start with a full cup of water, run 50m, then pass it to the next runner and so on until the final runner reaches the finish line.
It is good to finish first, but it is first with the most amount of water in the cup who gets the ultimate glory. They also get a prize, which for the life of me I can't tell you what it was this year, as it is the participation that is valued, not so much the physical prize.
The bragging rights as the winner is often valued the most.

Anyway, my current school quickly got a team organised well before race day which suited me as I ran for them last year. However, the school where my wife works was struggling to get two teachers, so the night before I just told her I'd run for them.
No problem with that.
Or so I thought.

When I rocked up to the track I was greeted with a lot of good natured ribbing from parents and teachers and children from my school who had already heard that I was running for "the opposition".
The St Kilian's team who I ran for crossed the line in 2nd place, but due to the extreme heat on the day most of our water must have evaporated during the race, so we were relegated to a spot further down the field that we didn't even bother to care about.

We raced, we had fun, we bonded.

All teams bonded, schools with schools, teachers, parents and kids- it was great.

Each school will get a cheque soon for anything upward of $5 000, so the day is a great way to build community and raise funds at the same time.

Here's a shot of the St Kilian's team who I ran for, I'm not sure if St Francis of the Fields will allow it to happen next year!