By Community Correspondent Aakash Balani. Felt lonely on the 14th of February? Tried hard not to look at the date that day? Well, if you did then the odds are that you celebrated 16th February with great gusto. Because 16th February was Pancake Day.

Pancake Day, unlike Valentine’s Day, can be celebrated by all, and not just people in relationships, cooing over each other over silly things like love. Pancake Day does not make single people miserable about their existence, unlike another day. But as good as it is, why do people celebrate Pancake Day?

For the slightly more sophisticated amongst us, who are more aware of this day as Shrove Tuesday, please bear with me while I don’t be as boring as you, and go on and continue calling it Pancake Day. ( I jest).

Shrove Tuesday is a day of celebration, because it's the last day before Lent. Throughout the United Kingdom and across many Commonwealth countries people gorge themselves on foods that traditionally aren't allowed during Lent. Pancakes contain fat, butter and eggs which were forbidden during Lent, and as their expiry dates ended before Lent did, it made sense to mix them all up and Voila! You got a pancake.

Pancake based competitions are held all over England. Oh no, not eating competitions, where 23 stone lard bags, stuff their faces, while people encourage them to do so. I’m talking about Pancake races whose object of the race is to get to the finishing line first whilst flipping a pancake in a frying pan a pre-decided number of times. The pancake must be intact when the finishing line is reached so the skill lays not so much in the running of the race but in flipping and catching the pancake.

According to tradition, in 1445 a woman of Olney (where?) heard the shriving bell while she was making pancakes and ran to the church in her apron, still clutching her frying pan. They clearly didn’t have Health and Safety breathing down their neck back then. The Olney pancake race is now world famous.

In Scarborough people skip on Shrove Tuesday and in Ashbourne, Derbyshire, the world’s oldest, largest, longest and maddest football game. The game goes on for two days and involves thousands of players. The goals are three miles apart and there are only a few rules. But, gouging is still not allowed.

Well, anyway, this amazing Day shall fall on the 8th of March next year, so make sure you don’t miss it. Before I go, an amazing Pancake fact to knock you off your feet: The world's biggest pancake was cooked in Rochdale in 1994, it was an amazing 15 metres in diameter, weighed three tonnes and had an estimated two million calories.