WHEN Catherine Belso takes to the stage at this weekend's Miss Great Britain pageant, one of her supporters will know just what she is going through.
The 25-year-old's mum Barbara will be in the audience, watching proudly as her daughter follows the path she trod in the 1960s and 1970s.
Catherine, of Drove Road, Gamlingay, said: "In a way I am doing this for her. She has got her pompoms out - she is ecstatic!"
Barbara, 60, competed all over the country in regional and national competitions, including Miss Great Britain, coming fourth in Miss United Kingdom in 1964. She said: "I never actually won but I did OK and earned quite a living from it.
"I am thrilled for Catherine. It is bringing a lot of good memories back. Catherine has put an awful lot into it and she is very excited. I have been trying to calm her down and tell her this is fun. That is what I was always told by my mother."
Catherine was named Miss Cambridge when she won a Miss Great Britain heat featuring the usual categories - bikini, evening dress and answering questions on stage.
She said: "I cannot begin to tell you how nervous I was. I am the kind of girl who puts a sarong on when she gets off a sunbed."
Tomorrow (Saturday, 25 February) she will be one of 50 competitors at The Grosvenor House Hotel in Park Lane, London, vying to become Miss Great Britain 2006.
Former Big Brother contestant Orlaith McAllister will be representing Belfast.
Catherine said the contest was not outdated.
"I would say it is making a comeback, just like 1960s clothes did," she said. "This is the first year it is really going to come back.
Next year it will have a greater profile."
She said some competitors were hoping it could be a springboard into modelling or acting - the winner gets 12 months of modelling work and a part in a Hollywood film. She hopes it will raise her profile as a freelance personal trainer, based at Fitness Express at Quy Mill.
Catherine has already proved she's a winner - last June we reported how she had fought back against a bout of meningitis that nearly killed her.
24 February 2006
Cambridge-news