SHARELLE MCMAHON BACK TO BASICS

Sharelle McMahon’s brown Mitsubishi was a back-breaker — literally.

The former national netball captain fractured her back while pushing the car across one of Melbourne’s major intersections.

McMahon was a year 12 student and injured junior netball star at the time. Her recuperation was interrupted when the Lancer, dubbed “Sir Lancelot”, ran out of fuel at the Victoria Market intersection.

“I had to get out of the car and push it across,” McMahon recalls “and I re-fractured my back doing it.”

If the Lancer episode was a lowlight a rental car tour of Ireland when McMahon was 23 remains her favourite driving memory.

McMahon represented the country 118 times and is probably most famous for clinically nailing the winning goal in the 1999 World Cup final against nemesis New Zealand.

These days her life is only a touch less hectic courtesy of son Xavier, five, and almost twoyear-old daughter, Ruby.

McMahon has also graduated from the Lancer — and subsequent new Daewoo Lanos — to a top-of-the-range Nissan Pathfinder Ti all-wheel drive. She’s a big fan of the rear DVD screens — nothing like a movie to keep the kids entertained on long hauls — but rates the seat heaters as the can’t-do-without feature.

“When I first got the Pathfinder I thought it was big but it only took a few days to get used to it,” she says. “Now I love the space in the back.”

Growing up on a farm, McMahon was driving well before she could go on the road and her father bestowed the nickname Fangio on her for her speed around the local sports oval when she was learning to drive.

Her earliest memories of motoring are of the family’s 1970s-era blue Ford Falcon.

“I remember the Falcon was huge. We used to go to a lot of sports events and we’d play around the car.”

McMahon recalls her parents having a couple of moments in the Falcon, and is hence a fan of the Pathfinder’s sensor-based safety.

“I think when I was younger a car was a way to get around but now I’m a mum the features I’ve experienced in the Pathfinder make it more of an emotive thing … you’re always worried about them (her children).”

McMahon’s tip for happy motoring is to plan your itinerary around peak hour.