“If I think more about death than some other people, it is probably because I love life more than they do.”

And who is the eloquent author of this prose you may ask? The feminine half of Brangelina I'm afraid. But I agree with Ms Jolie's sentiment when it comes to one of life's essentials- cycle training. It's not great to think for too long about how to evade death (answers on a postcard) but in relation to cycling on London roads it's sort of sensible to mull over it.

There's been a little too much press about how many female fatalities there have been due to cycling accidents, read here if you're feeling morbid. Apparently we're curb huggers. This sufficiently riled my feminist core ("it's not because we're bad cyclists, its only because men are stupid and run red lights!" etc...) and encouraged me to seek out some lessons. Luckily Camden Council are oh so kind and gave me some for free! They even have a cycling officer, Michelle, who kindly booked me a 2 hour slot for 'level 3 advanced road user training'.

I had a session with my female instructor Irina (completing the girl power theme) last week and she was brilliant. I felt slightly fraudulent to claim I was advanced but we went through 5 different 'controls' in the park and Irina said she was happy for me to go on the roads. As we were pulling out onto the main road I was silently celebrating this breakthrough when my mental whooping was struck dumb by my new bestie's revelation- "Sorry I'm out of breath, I'm just soooooo pregnant". Followed by "I'll cycle outside of you to act as a bit of a protector". Of course you will. It's always helpful to have a guardian foetus with you on any ride.

My ambitions to preserve life were now threefold- the perfect incentive to concentrate.

We rode my journey to work and she was excellent at keeping me calm in all situations and conveying instructions in an almost telekinetic jedi fashion while we rode. The fact that we had time to have a light discussion of the situation in Israel/Palestine I think reflects just how comfortable I was feeling (international affairs is my comfort topic). Learning the shortcuts was useful too.

I would thoroughly recommend training to EVERYBODY. Man, woman, beast. Perhaps not for anymore of the unborn though...