Heather Fell, Olympic modern pentathlete silver medalist, writes about her life 'on and off' the track.

ONE would think that a week at home in Devon would be far more laid back and relaxing than a week in the city of Bath. I love coming home to Dartmoor, but it's by no means for a holiday as training intensity is quite often increased.

Last week consisted of some tough training sessions courtesy of Tavi running club and Kelly College swim squad — including a 4.30am wake-up to get in the pool. I have to admit I only made one such crazily early rise, and for a valid reason. It meant I'd swum for two hours and done my run all by 8.30am. Therefore I had the rest of the day to drive up to Cheltenham for a day at the races — completely guilt-free.

Another weekend, another competition. This time it was my annual trip across the Severn Bridge for the Welsh Open, a high standard fencing competition held in Cardiff. Some of you may know, fencing was the final sport I learnt for pentathlon, and in the past has been the one needing the most work. I expect I'm not alone in getting more enjoyment from the things I'm natural at, especially when lacking skill with the epee results in several painful bruises! However, several years of perseverance has paid off, I now really enjoy fencing. Or so I thought! In my last two training sessions at Plymouth fencing club all acquired skill vanished, leaving me rather worried and frustrated. Luckily this was only temporary. It was still evident in my pool fights, but slowly throughout the direct elimination I rediscovered my fencing feet. Each fight was substantially more challenging, yet I was fairly comfortably defeating competitors ranked far above me. I succeeded my expectations by far and made it into the final eight, where I lost to a more accomplished Hungarian fencer.

It was an incredibly beneficial competition for my fencing development, and another satisfying weekend.