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

I'M actually slightly glad the two consecutive bank holiday weekends are over, but sure I'm in the minority. My training didn't alter; only it had to be squeezed into a shorter day to fit around the opening hours and trying to catch glimpses of the royal wedding — with our coaches being foreign and male the 'wedding' certainly wasn't important enough for a change in timetable. They and support staff also reduced their hours meaning much of the hard training had to be done alone and with no massage or physio available to help with recovery. Having either been in education or full time training these extra days off are yet to benefit me, but I'm sure one day I will fully appreciate them.

Three weeks later and the sofa saga is over at last! After finding a willing 'handy man' I discovered that the sofa was a mere 0.5cm too wide. After convincing him his suggestion to 'just push it' wasn't ideal, the simple removal of one skirting board did the trick. So after all the panic I still had another whole skirting board to play with, my measurements weren't so far out — maybe I am a builder's daughter after all!

April has been a great month for spectator sport and especially of the equine variety. Having attended my first Grand National, followed by a few days at Badminton Horse Trials I rounded it all off with racing at Goodwood last weekend. Unfortunately I've obviously left my gambling skills back at Cheltenham a month ago but thanks to this remarkable weather and great company I thoroughly enjoyed my day out in Sussex.

By now I'll be out in Hungary for my second World Cup of the season. It's been a long gap since my first pentathlon back in February so I'm looking forward to racing again. After this big block of hard training I'll be hoping to see a significant improvement on my last performance.