WHEN she was six years old, Nina Shead was a motorbike stunt rider.

In 1977 her whole family was touring the country as the Mohicaneers, wowing audiences with death-defying leaps and loops.

Nina, her two brothers and their three cousins were the Mini Mohicans.

From the tender age of three she was performing stunts on a bike, standing on the seat and riding with one leg in the air.

Her granddad Cecil Yeates started the troupe with his sons Roy and Tony and daughter Pearl, Nina’s mum, in the 1960s.

Nowadays, Nina is a happily married mum-of-four, and works packing car parts in Milton Park near Didcot.

Her memories were reignited when she spotted a photo of herself from 1977 with the Mini Mohicans in our Remember When column in September.

“It was quite an upbringing,” she said. “Very interesting.

“Some people just don’t believe it when you tell them, but when I was growing up it was the norm.”

As for her own daughters, Avril, 21, is a home carer, Shannon and Thia, 19 and 17, both work in the Co-op and 12-year-old Georgia goes to Didcot Girls School.

But if they had wanted to go into motorbike stunt riding?

“I think I would have been ok with it,” said Mrs Shead.