5 things we learned this week

1 Lewis Hamilton dislikes driving on normal, twisty roads. ‘I find it stressful,’ the Formula 1 ace, pictured, told a Vanity Fair journalist while motoring around the South of France. ‘This road is crazy. So much going on here. I’m going to turn around in a second.’

2 Climate change could lead to Britain beating Burgundy at producing worldclass red wines, according to research published in a viticulture science journal. A predicted 1.4C rise in summer temperatures over the next two decades means that pinot noir grapes could be able to achieve perfect ripeness in southern England, which has historically been too chilly for the task.

3 Boris Johnson starts each day with a run and by reciting to himself the first 100 lines of Virgil’s Aeneid, according to his sister, Rachel. The Aeneid is the story of a public figure who’s hopeless with women, and the story ends abruptly with no real conclusion.

4 Chinese meteorologists are firing missiles into the sky to try to make it rain. A severe drought and recordbreaking heatwave means the Yangtze River is the lowest it has ever been. This is not only depleting water supplies – it’s cutting output at the region’s hydro-power plants, leading to electricity blackouts and forcing factories to close. So nearby provinces have begun launching rockets full of chemicals into the clouds in an attempt to kickstart a downpour.

5 The cost of a boarding school education is set to top £500,000 for the first time, according to the private bank Weatherbys. Since 2010, fees have risen by three to five per cent annually, this year reaching £37,032 for the average boarder. If fees continue to go up by two per cent a year, parents would pay a total of £505,955 to complete the education of a seven-year-old who starts boarding school next month.