Guest Post – How To Survive Sports Day by Katy Birchall

Today, 7th January, marks the release day of The It Girl Team Awkward (The It Girl 2) by the hilarious Katy Birchall!

Happy Book Birthday Katy!

I loved the first book in the series published by Egmont, The It Girl.  It made me laughed so much my sides hurt.  Reading all about Anna who when she is not setting a girls hair on fire with a Bunsen burner loves nothing more than spending weekends reading comics and watching csi and probably eating milk bottle sweets.  She is a bit of a geek and you also see her hanging upside down at one embarrassing point in the book in front of EVERYONE!

You can find my full review here

I simply cannot wait to find out what Anna has been up to since I last left her!  I can imagine she will have me laughing with in seconds especially if this fab guest post by the author Katy Birchall is anything to go by!

I present to you – How To Survive Sports Day by Katy Birchall…

If everything Anna does is going to be seen by more than 10 million people, then she’s determined to find something that she’s really good at. Everyone else seems to have a ‘thing’ – especially the new girl at school, who’s been distracting Connor with their shared love of art. Luckily the school sports day is looming, and Anna is limbering up!

What could go wrong?

How to survive Sports Day by Katy Birchall

In the second book of The It Girl series, Team Awkward, Anna has to face one of her biggest fears: Sports Day. It is the most dreaded time of year for the athletically-challenged and nothing strikes more fear into the heart than the words ‘on your marks’. ARGH.

So, as someone who can relate to this, I have decided to offer you my top tips on surviving Sports Day:

1. Throw up all over your Headmaster/mistress during assembly that morning. 

I never managed to achieve this but my brother did and it had highly successful results. He spent Sports Day reading books and sipping Calpol in his cosy bed while I was enduring the torture of hurdles.

(Seriously, what is the point of hurdles?? Why am I jumping over these stupid things whilst running? WHERE AM I RUNNING TO?!)

2. Hide behind a tree.

And if you are caught by a teacher, simply pretend that the tiny mark you handily have on your leg from when you misjudged a doorframe last week, is actually from hitting that stupid pole when you attempted high jump and thus you can’t possibly partake in further activities.

(This is obviously not a story told from experience. No, a friend did that. I never hid behind a tree or anything when I was 11. That was my friend. Yeah, a friend of mine. Who told me exactly what happened. So, yeah. A friend. Definitely not me. Let’s move on.)

3. Tell a teacher you have urgent government business to attend to.

And then when they tell you off for making it up, say something like, “OK, well, if you’re happy to deal with the consequences of me missing this urgent appointment then so be it. I’ll let you handle the phone call from 10 Downing Street.”

(The seed of doubt you plant in their mind will blossom and soon enough they will be ushering you away from the track. Just to be sure, at some point during the day when they’re watching you, put a finger up to your ear and nod as though you have a radio in there, like they do in the Secret Service.)

4. Switch round the ‘CAR PARK THIS WAY’ signs.

You can’t have Sports Day if there are a load of cars parked on the track, can you? Mwahahahahahahaha!

5. Realise that it doesn’t matter where you come in the race; that what is really important is whether there is an ice cream van present and if it sells Twisters.

Sure, Sports Day sucks and everyone knows that athletics is completely pointless but the best option is just to go along with the silly rules anyway and not care in the slightest if you come last. Nobody else does. Have a great day in the sunshine with your friends, dig into a picnic and laugh about your ridiculous friend hiding behind a tree.

I mean, who does that…?

You can buy The It Girl and The It Girl Team Awkward here or here or why not visit your local independent bookshop 🙂

A huge thank you to Katy for making me laugh out loud whilst putting this post together!

About Katy Birchall

Katy Birchall is the author of The It Girl series. She also works at Country Life magazine as their Deputy Features Editor. Katy won the 24/7 Theatre Festival Award in 2011 for Most Promising New Comedy Writer with her very serious play about a ninja monkey at a dinner party. Her four pet Labradors are the loves of her life, she is mildly obsessed with Jane Austen and one day she hopes to wake up as an elf in The Lord of the Rings. She grew up in Essex and currently lives in Brixton.

You can find out more about Katy on her website – www.katybirchallauthor.com

Or why not follow Katy on Twitter using @KatyBirchall

Want to know more about The It Girl Series?

I have featured some previous posts…

The It Girl Extract

10 Things I’ve Learnt Since Being An Author

Or find out more about The It Girl 3 in this exclusive interview with, It Girl, Anna Huntley here

Also check out this hilarious video!

You can buy The It Girl and The It Girl Team Awkward here

Another huge thank you to Katy for yet another brilliant guest post!  You never fail to make me laugh 🙂

Also a huge thank you to Alice at Egmont for asking me to feature this and sending me the book for review and of course to laugh 🙂

Happy Reading