People are always intrigued when I tell them I'm banned from driving company cars.

The explanation is simple - I crashed them too many times.

Five times in total, and three (what I like to call 'car related incidents') in a month.

Strictly speaking none of them were real crashes.

They were:

* being hit by part of a brake disc that fell of a lorry on the Widnes-Runcorn bridge, breaking the front bumper.

* reversing my former editors car into a parked car while working for the Guardian's sister paper the Runcorn World.

This was in Constables Close. In front of a traffic policeman. After I'd just called at the home of a traffic accident victim.

* hitting the island at the junction of Bridge Street and Academy Way, bursting the sports editors front tyre.

* Losing the deputy editors keys. While the car was parked in Preston.

* Minutes after nervously joking with the deputy editor he had nothing to fear, reversing his car in The Academy Car Park into another staff members car park.

I was too ashamed to go back inside so I stood there ashen-faced for 10 minutes before phoning him and asking him to come out.

So, the end result was a ban.

I still have my own car but I'm trying to use that as little as possible for health/environmental reasons.

So when I cycle in, I can't use company cars and have to cycle to jobs instead.

It's quite good fun. A throwback to the old days when reporters biked around town.

People quite like the novelty (I think).

Councillors seem to know me know as the cycling reporter, and ask how I'm getting on - the other day one was saying he was thinking about getting a bike himself.

The only problem is I don't get any mileage money, though I've been told if I get a puncture I can claim the repair money back.

So even in the unlikely event the accountants go made and let me start to drive their cars again, I think I'll stick to two wheels.