Last Sunday saw Corpus Christi’s annual Tortoise Fair take place. The event, this year attended by thousands of students and residents of Oxford, centres around a thrilling and surprisingly fast paced inter-collegiate tortoise race.
Corpus JCR voted to donate all proceeds to Oxford’s Mind Your Head campaign.
Worcester College triumphed in this year’s race, with Zoom and Shelly taking first and second place respectively. The duo had previously come second and third last year.
“Zoom had a lot of pressure on him with a name like that”, explained one observer, “but he handled it well.”
Hopes of a home victory were dashed as the race officials announced Foxe, Corpus’s entrant, had been “disqualified for assaulting another tortoise”.
Corpus Christi President, Richard Carwardine, acted as head official and took charge of the proceedings.
Worcester’s Tortoise Representative revealed to Cherwell, “Any talk of a steward’s inquiry is just hot air… The competition just wasn’t that good to be honest”.
“It’s disappointing that he let his frustrations out in the race”, explained Corpus Tortoise Keeper Arthur Harris of Foxe’s actions. “But hopefully next year it’ll be his year.”
Second year lawyer Aled Jones revealed a potential source of Foxe’s problems. “Unfortunately Foxe’s partner Oldham died over the summer”, he explained. “It was terribly sad.”
The competition, which some sources have claimed traces its origins back to the 1920s, also saw the debut of Hope and Faith, tortoise siblings of around five years in age. The Oxford-based sisters faced competition from reptiles as old as eighty and based as far away as London.
Alex Doody, a first year at Exeter, expressed his admiration for the participants. “They were so quick”, he said. “They were like Tort-athletes… One of them was like Usain Tortoise Bolt!”
Corpus Christi college itself was shell-shocked earlier this year when Oldham, the Corpus Tortoise, died in late August.
The tortoise had a long battle with ‘fly-strike’, whereby a wound in his carapace became infested with fly eggs and maggots, weakening him severely.
The news was broken in an email from the JCR President to all Corpus student. “Oldham, one of our favourite tortoises died over the summer… I don’t really know how to handle the news.
“This will be discussed at the first JCR meeting of term and if anyone needs to talk to someone please look towards the peer supporters, who are there for these moments.”
