Outside Edge (27/12/09)

If you thought an hour and a half's brisk stroll through the mud would compensate for the Christmas Dinner, think again. The British Nutrition Foundation suggests you should have walked for at least seven hours to burn it off, while Professor Jo Doust recommends an 18-mile walk for men and 24 miles for women – seems a bit unfair, that, after spending all day cooking it. Or it's four hours' mountain-biking, six hours' horse-riding or a trek up Mount Snowdon to compensate for the 2,000-calorie blow-out. According to one of the scare stories doing the (very) rounds, four roast potatoes is the equivalent of your average daily calorific intake. More haste, less spud.

20.1m

Viewers who saw England lose to Portugal at Euro 2004, the second highest TV audience in the last decade after 'Only Fools and Horses' in 2003 (21.3m). England matches made up six of the top 10. Should have gone out instead.

Robbins' breasts of the week

Tiger Woods has not sent every sporting wife deep into the bunker. The WAGs of NFL's larger than life characters have come out in force with a campaign called "Off the Market", designed to strengthen relationships between pros and their better halves. Tia, the significant other of New York Giants' Fred Robbins – aptly, a defensive tackle – proposes private pole-dancing classes and even pole installation in the home, and a forthcoming function will include a gift bag from Tenga, who make "adult toys for men". Tia said: "Our men can use this product on the road. That will help them stay straight at home." Either that or the boys' toys will make them a lot less "straight".

Good week for

Lionel Messi, first Argentinian footballer to be win the Fifa World Player of the Year award, at the age of 22... Rome, to be awarded a Formula One Grand Prix through the city's streets à la Monaco... and Michael Rock, a 22-year-old law student at Manchester University, beat Michael Phelps by more than a second in the 200m butterfly in Manchester.

Bad week for

Ravi Bopara, England cricketer accused of ball-tampering by former England all-rounder Dermot Reeve in a domestic match for Auckland in New Zealand... Child fitness levels in Britain, falling at twice the global average according to Essex University... and women ski-jumpers, lose appeal in Canada's Supreme Court to take part in Vancouver's Winter Olympics.

Palm sprees of the week

It seems Dutch teenager Laura Dekker has had enough. She was banned from trying to become the youngest person to sail solo around the world, aged 14, after a court in Utrecht put her into care when she sailed to England on her own. Now she's jumped ship again and, sensibly gone to the Caribbean island of St Martin instead, leaving her boat at home. No one knows how she got there but she took £3,000 out of her account, so perhaps she took the easy option and flew. Geoff Holt, 43, of Southampton, trying to become the first quadraplegic to sail across the Atlantic, was held up by fuel problems and light winds but is back on course. Edge wishes him the best of luck.

a.tong@independent.co.uk