While my colleagues are struggling to master steep descents, and while we are practising our teaching skills in Sospel, the big guys, the elite mountainbikers were in Saint Raphael for their first stage of the Coupe de France.

I could have been there....of course....well, I could have been in the starting line-up, just for the experience and to defend the club's colours. It was my club who organised the event, but I had to still watch from a distance. The hand, still the hand, but all is well, considering. The weather was gorgeous, the wind fierce, the dust hurt the eyes and the number of flat tires was immense, but the athmosphere was old-fashioned. Our french world-and olympic champion was there, of course, and after playing cat-and-mouse during the first 8-km lap, he quickly established his dominance. After almost two hours of race, he was the first to raise his arms. Mission accomplished....can I go home now to the missus, who is just 10 minutes away, cause you're riding in my back yard...kind a thing.

In Sospel, the sun was beating down; I even had a headache at the end of the day. Unable still to ride on a mountainbike, although on the road the pain was bearable, I watched from the sideline. Extremely frustrating!! I was not a happy camper that week. I fulfilled my contract, taught my two sessions to gain experience, was present during the 30 other sessions and mastered the orientation skills on foot, while my colleagues hunted down the marks by bike. I did well, I must admit. While the grand majority of my colleagues opted for 0 points, I had 10 and 8 at the end of the two exercises...On foot!!

What else do I want? I still have the slight impression that lots of my friends and colleagues think that I am on an extended holiday. The sun, a couple of training weeks and then a few weeks off, a broken hand, but heh, with a broken hand you don't have to work.....All sort of things must go through peoples minds.

Well, it's not a holiday! I work; I teach english and am a student teacher at the BMX club. There's two days filled for you. I study hard, another two days and am very pre-occupied to have my dutch diploma legalised in France. The last thing alone can fill my week....My weekends are always filled with some kind of cycling thing; just to gain more experience. True, I do not have to wake up to an alarm clock.....but that is as much holiday feeling I can thing of. Just to set the record straight a bit. No hard feelings.....Happiness is the biggest joy of all. Not the money that comes with working 5 days a week. I'm still one of the happiest people around, cause I can live my passion!!

See you next time.