SEE FIONA LOONEY

Iassume that every family watches Ireland’s Fittest Family in the same way mine does: through gales of laughter and imagining at every turn, bump and drop how we would fare across the various obstacle and assault courses. If you’re like us, the answer would be Very Badly Indeed.

This used to annoy me because there was a time when we — almost — could have been contenders. Admittedly, we are probably afflicted with too many girls in our family, and we lack one of those butcher’s dogs Dads who are the foundation of most of the fittest families. But The Boy has the kind of high metabolism and skinny frame that lends itself very well to dangling in mid-air over a lake for prolonged periods and back when he was still playing GAA, he actually was pretty fit.

But then, like Father Jack before him, he discovered drink and girls and the arse fell out of his fitness. And the girls weren’t unfit: they just lacked a bit of co-ordination — yet another of my fabulous genetic legacies — and while they would both be very good at going for a walk, going for a walk across a lake with crocodiles in it (I assume that will be in the final) would be a different matter.

More crushingly, though, neither of them has even the remotest interest in sport or any sort of competition that doesn’t involve a red carpet and crying at the end.

So back then, I was always going to be the secret weapon. I’d be the mother who, when we posed for our hero shots at the start, everyone would feel sorry for and genuinely fear for her safety. ‘Look at that dumpy oul’ wan,’ the nation would say as one. ‘She’s going to drown.’ Only instead of drowning, I’d burst out of my general dumpiness and display the sort of strength, stamina and tenacity that would have Davy Fitz swooning at my muddy feet.

But that was years ago. Now, even the most hopeless mammies — and it’s always the mammies who are most hopeless in Fittest Family — are younger than me. I might still be fitter than the rest of my family put together but my 10k time is gradually getting slower. I have to accept now that my window for greatness has closed and it’s all the fault of my femaleheavy sport-averse family. If anyone wants to make Ireland’s Most Useless Family, we’d be a shoo-in.

Still, a girl can dream. I have yet to watch an episode of Ireland’s Fittest Family without sizing up the challenges and wondering how I’d do. I’d be comfortable enough running around carrying small trees, and I don’t think climbing under nets would faze me too much. But I would literally never get over any of the walls, unless they were willing to install a stair lift just for me. And since the rest of my family would be perched on the top, talking over me and arguing about Mercury Prize and Golden Globe nominations, they wouldn’t hear my calls for help to lift me up.

I may be over-thinking this. The programme is fiercely popular because it’s a great spectacle and not because everyone watching it is seething at not being in it. One of its greatest charms is that sporty families tend not to be very charismatic, apart from the Brogans. You get the sense, with the fittest families, that they would actually rather spend the rest of their lives hanging tough over a moat than ever have to speak on television again, and I love them for that. I also like the fact that some of them have bonkers names. This year there was a Sabian, which is a warrior’s name and there’s a Ticey in the final. I don’t know what Ticey is short for but I’m guessing Enterprise.

Anyway, I’ll be tuning in this evening to see how Ticey gets on, though to be honest, it’s the Mahonys I’ll be rooting for. They’re from Wexford and they’re Davy Fitz’s family, which gives them a head start in my favours because I’ve a fierce soft spot for the Wexford hurling boss and I always enjoy watching him almost rupturing an artery spurring his teams on. But also, the Mahonys’ own secret weapon is a mammy who doesn’t appear to be hopeless at all and is only a year younger than me. And if Joanne Mahony can make it all the way to the final this year, then why not me next year (other than all the reasons outlined above?)

So go Joanne Mahony. In a way, you’re doing it for all of us. But really, you’re doing it for me.