Perhaps predictably, every tiny thing has become a potential controversy at the moment, and the one that’s irking me is how long counts as exercise. There is no time or distance specified in government guidance, which I think is as it should be, as what’s suitable will vary hugely. Let’s face it, for a lot of people, any sort of exercise is going to be a novel experience so both Jason Leitch and Michael Gove are probably in the right ball park to suggest 30 to 60 minutes a day. For those of us who count walking, running or cycling as a hobby it really is a different matter - and no, my teenage self wouldn’t have dreamt I’d include myself in that category! For me personally, more than 2 hours would feel like pushing it a bit, even though there’s absolutely no logical reason for me to feel that.
If the key to not spreading the virus is to avoid being within 2 metres of another person lest either of you cough or sneeze I can do that just as easily on a 3 hour ride as an hour ride by picking my route well. In fact I’d argue an hour walk from my front door is more likely to bring me into contact with people. I think maybe part of it is a weird guilt about being lucky enough to be able to spend 2 hours out on country roads if I want to. Social distancing is incredibly difficult for a lot of people so maybe I just feel bad that it’s really my default setting.
Yesterday I actually cycled through the city centre which I wouldn’t usually consider doing. It was a bit of a happy/sad experience as the lack of traffic was lovely but the lack of people not so much. It would be great to think that once this is all over councils might have the courage to take private cars away from town and city centres to leave them for people on foot and bikes. I suspect people are still too attached to their cars to ever go for that though.
