Playing for England was a massive honour and when I was in the team, that was all I wanted to focus on.

Playing for England was a massive honour and when I was in the team, that was all I wanted to focus on.

A French player, Sylvain Marconnet, broke his tibia skiing in 2007 and missed his home World Cup. For me the risk of breaking something versus the reward was never worth it.

Zara [Phillips] skis very well but is happy to take it easy around me. She will often wait for me when I'm on my snowboard but she can really whizz around if she needs to. I only snowboard if I'm on my own with Zara; if we're with other people who want to go a bit quicker, I will stick with skis.

I started going on ski trips at senior school. I can't remember exactly where but we skied in the Tirol in Austria a couple of times and also went to Val d'Isère in France. When I was 15, rugby took over and there wasn't time to ski any more. I didn't ski again until I was 33.

I vary my days between skiing and snowboarding - I can go fast down pisted runs but still struggle in the bumps on a snowboard.

I think when you go skiing you have to buy into the après, so it has to be lively for me. There is such a unique atmosphere in ski resorts that it's all about having fun once you get off the mountain and, as a couple, we embrace that.