Men who had not addressed a word to me all evening stared in awe. Women turned to me with coy, astonished looks.

But what on earth had I let myself in for? Soft of gut, puny of arm and short-sighted to boot, I'm hardly Sir Galahad. "Don't worry. We had a bloke who weighed 22 stone the other day. Had never ridden a horse before. He had a great time jousting," scoffed Karl Ude-Martinez, director of the course (dressed in full chain-mail and flowing cape), when I admitted on arrival at the Warwick International School of Riding that I wasn't sure I was really prime material for mediaeval combat training. I was reassured by Karl's words until he let slip that the XXL pupil was an Army bomb disposal expert - a stranger to fear, therefore.

Karl setup the jousting school at his sprawling, family-owned riding school a few years ago. He constructed a banked arena with a dirt-floored jousting runway or "tilt" in the middle and various sinister, man-sized contraptions called quintains around the sides. These are designed to spin if you hit them correctly with a lance, and bop you on the head with a plastic ball on a chain if you smack them at the wrong angle.

He knew what he was about. Karl was already a veteran of full-dress jousting displays -or sword- and stave-fighting-along with his team of six "knights" at county shows and castle open days in the Midlands. And the remarkable thing about him is that he doesn't have to dress up to look the part of an Arthurian hero. With his granite jaw, cheekbones like flying buttresses and swishing, shoulder-length locks he is Disney's Prince Charming come to life.

On the day I was there, two other would-be jousters pitched up, neither of them promising. The fellow down from London had never so much as sat on a seaside donkey in a kissme-quick hat, while the pretty young female visitor could ride like a pro but was so slightly built you would have thought you could swipe her from her saddle with apiece of soft boiled spaghetti.
Undaunted, Karl, with a fellow instructor in the full armour and robes of the Black Knight, handed out suitable horses (a walking sofa for the novice), explaining that we would work our way slowly up to an actual joust in the tournament arena by practising a series of exercises. First, we would ride with light dummy lances and flags on poles to give us the feel of steering our mounts with reins in one hand and an ungainly weight in the other. Our next (and extraordinarily tricky) task was to lift doughnut-sized rings with the tip of a heavier, wooden lance at a walk, then a trot and finally a quick canter. Then for the quintain... "Keep the tip of your lance in the air until the last moment, because the danger when riding fast at these targets is pole-vaulting from the saddle," warned Karl before goading us to smack the quintain as hard as possible.

At my first go, I was so determined to slam the life out of the machine that my knuckles answered the impact with a crunch and my lance punched back into my shoulder with a thump worthy of Muhammad Ali. "Great hit!" whooped Karl, unaware it was the quintain that emerged the clear winner from that bout.
The next exercise was trickier still, involving hitting two quintains in turn. And this time we were kitted out in suits of mail (silvered
knitted cotton), body armour (fibreglass), articulated gauntlets, full helmets and matching velvet capes of embroidered red or blue for ourselves and our horses.

I spurred on my horse, hit the first quintain gingerly and, still at an uncertain canter in all that sweltering kit, began to line up for the next target when -gadzooks! -the visor of my helmet flipped shut. Where had all the daylight gone? With the reins in my left palm, the lance in my right, how could I prise open the lid?
Riding blind, kitted out in armour and blundering full-steam ahead with a lance in hand, is a sensation that knights of yore must have dreaded as they rode into battle, knowing they would have but a few awful seconds before the facing enemy skewered them. I was worried too. The riding school rails were fast approaching but a panicked waggle of my head revealed a slit in the visor and the quintain dead ahead. Blam, it went spinning again.

At last we were ready for the ultimate test, jousting for real. The Black Knight, that vain and foolish churl, immediately volunteered to take me on, cantering off to the far end of the tilt, where he spun his steed to face me. The roar of planes landing at Coventry International airport seemed to hush momentarily in anticipation of our combat.

With a wave of my glittering lance, I saluted the Black Knight. He lifted his metal shield high to acknowledge my challenge then, as one, we spurred hard and cantered straight for each other with dust and the noise of thunder flying out behind our hooves. The tilt rail began to whirr past on my left side as I fought to steady the lance above my horse's ears, taking aim for the Black Knight's steel-plated chest as it doubled in size by the second.

I wanted a clean, honourable fight. Hit him too low and my lance could pitch into his stomach; too far towards his far shoulder and the wooden tip could smash into his helmet. Was my mortal enemy thinking the same thoughts in that instant before our mighty collision?

No, I imagine not. I must confess the truth, dear reader. The Black Knight did not actually hold a lance in his hand. I had the lance and he had only a shield.

The bravery belonged to the man in black. Beginners like me have to attend a second, more advanced jousting course before we are allowed to face a rider coming at us fully armed.
Did that stop me? Heck no. My lance whacked into the Black Knight's shield and he lurched in the saddle. Oh, this was fun, and even better the second go. In fact, I can't think of any I sport I have tried that boils up risk, aggression and child-like play-acting into such a heady and addictive brew.

But now that I'm a qualified knight, or at least carry a jousting certificate (Practical Skills, part one) tucked in my wallet beside my driving licence, I am wondering about the noble quest on which I must set forth. So if any Field reader knows of a fire-breathing dragon afoot in the English countryside, with a fair damsel in thrall, I hope most sincerely that he will whistle for bold Sir Sandy.