How hard is it to stick to the rules?

If someone had told you in 2019 that the Government of tomorrow would be dictating when you're allowed to go outside, you'd have assumed that either war had broken out or you'd inadvertently mistaken the plot of a Tom Cruise blockbuster for real life.

But this is real life, in its most terrifying form. We are living through the third wave of a pandemic that has fundamentally changed the way we live and which, on its current trajectory, is set to get worse before it gets better. 

So I am struggling to understand why, when the news is so bleak, so many of us still think that we can interpret the rules as we wish, to suit whatever circumstances we choose.

While on my long run this Sunday - alone - I found myself diving into bushes, scrambling across the uneven edges of trails and taking to the puddles in order to avoid large groups of people and children walking together. Of course, I could be wrong. They could all have been innocently walking together in their nominated bubbles, but I must have missed the societal shift that has made it common place for three sets of forty-something couples and their nine children to live together. 

Granted, some of the adults were making an effort to walk two-metres apart, but again I feel that they must have mistaken metre-rules for standard rulers in their interpretation of the social distancing guidance. Their awareness of other trail-users - namely myself - meanwhile, was non-existent.

For some reason, every group I encountered at the weekend was walking away from me as I approached. With the early encounters I would therefore either cough loudly (probably not the most appropriate tactic in hindsight) or scuff my shoes on the gravel to make the party aware of my presence. Without exception, this failed. By the end of the run, I was therefore simply shouting "behind you" in pantomime fashion to make them move. This would result in a scattering of the party across the whole trail, forcing me to stop and wait until they had the sense to move in a common direction and allow me enough space to pass.

Why is this happening? Why are people still not following the rules? 

As someone who embraces the outside and recognises its value in terms of our physical and mental wellbeing, I can’t help but feel that breaking the rules is at the least selfish, and at the most both illegal and morally indefensible. Even if the chance of you contracting coronavirus or inadvertently passing it on is as slim as Donald Trump's chance of having his Twitter ban overturned, there is still a chance. You may never see or hear of the damage that is caused as a result of your actions, but that extra trip out might just end up bringing tragedy to the door of an entirely innocent family. Gathering in groups just exacerbates this tenfold.

As the staggering number of hospital admissions and deaths continues to rise, and as Professor Chris Whitty takes to every known form of media to hammer home the stay-at-home message, the consequence of these people's actions could mean tighter restrictions for us all. 

Outdoor exercise once a week? Curfews every evening? No one wants to get to that stage. So come on people, play your part and stick to the rules. 

Stay home. Protect the NHS. Save Lives. Watch Netflix. Easy.

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A year ago, a cold was a cold. If I had one, I’d be miserable, I’d look like death and people would generally refrain from a cuddle, but we’d all otherwise go about our days. Today, however, venturing out in public with a cold feels like you’re threatening the security of the nation. People stare in horror, hurry their children away and tighten their face masks at the mere sight of your blood shot eyes or, heaven forbid, the sound of an involuntary sneeze, however muffled by your incendiary tissues.

 

My cold this week has put me firmly in the ‘he must have coronavirus, let’s avoid him’ camp, but I can’t blame people for scrambling to the nearest exit in their bid to escape the fallout zone of my nostrils. While I most definitely don’t have coronavirus  - no fever, no continuous cough and no loss of taste or smell – I’ve not exactly been an advert for positive wellbeing either, a point that was brought starkly home to me on my first post-cold run.

 

In hindsight, I should have left it one more day, but in my Lemsip-addled brain, I was determined to show this cold who was boss and get back to running. Over compensating for the slight dip in temperature, I spectacularly over dressed for the gentle 5KM I had planned, donning leggings and a buff around the ears. These served to almost instantaneously warm me up to a beyond comfortable temperature and set the trend for what was to be the most uncomfortable run of the year.

 

Without wanting to put you off your dinner, colds inevitably come with mucus and the kilometres that followed saw much of that mucus attempting to find its way out of my nose or down my throat. The result, I imagine, was the sight of a sweaty man whose bloodshot eyes were streaming and whose nose was running faster than he was. The strange gurgling/hacking noises, meanwhile, were not too dissimilar to those you’d expect from your average zombie. No wonder people were crossing the road 50-metres ahead of me, they were probably rushing to find the nearest cricket bat with which to bring my undead suffering to an end.

 

My energy levels were low, but at the back of my mind I had a nagging voice – most likely that of my old PE teacher – telling me; “This is good for you. It’ll sweat it out of you.” Of course, a large part of me wanted to believe it, but another part of me wondered whether “sweating it out of you” was supported by any kind of clinical evidence. Much in the same way as “run it off” was often used in my school days as a cure for sprained ankles and lower limb fractures, I doubted whether there had ever been a published study of either practice in the British Medical Journal. Nevertheless, I kept going.

 

Labouring around the familiar route, I was of course aware that I was still poorly, so I purposefully ensured that I maintained as much distance as I could between myself and anyone else on the pavements. The result was that I zig-zagged across streets and stumbled off kerbs, looking like I’d taken my last two paracetamol with a pint of Jack Daniels. However, I know that I did the right thing by my fellow pedestrians – as the majority of runners always do, despite the occasional glassy-eyed stares of those sceptical of anyone breaking a sweat.

 

By the time I reached home, I felt like I’d been in a fist fight. Everything ached and I had a ringing in my ears, but my breath eventually returned, my eyes stopped watering and, as I stepped into the shower, I realised that I actually did feel better for it. My body had needed a bit of a beasting to get it functioning properly and my mind had needed the wake up call to stop moaning and get on with getting better.

 

Granted, running with a cold is perhaps not a training session any of us would ever opt for, but when you’ve got no option – and providing you can accept the fact that you are going to look the worst you have ever looked – my 100% non-clinical advice is go for it. Just remember to take a tissue or two with you.

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This time last year I shook hands with whoever I wanted, high-fived strangers, hugged relatives, congregated in large groups, held on to hand rails and shared an office with real human beings. I didn't own any hand sanitiser, the only masks in my home were for Halloween and my children went to school for a full academic year.

Oh, how things have changed.

Let's face it, 2020 has been a car crash of a year. Today, like a dystopian sci-fi movie, we are living by the rule of six and slaves to the R number, dictated to by the undynamic trio of Johnson, Whitty and Vallance and walking around our highstreets like the air itself is poisonous. The world has turned upside down, but there has been one constant throughout the chaos; running.

Like the rising of the sun and Piers Morgan's smugness, there are some things in life you can depend upon. Thankfully, running is one and I have found untold comfort over the past few months in being able to lace up my trainers and head out of the door at a time when so much has been changing around me. My work and home life have become entwined in an ugly Zoom-call mess, my social life has been more or less cancelled in its entirety and my family's plans for the short, medium and long term future have all been put on hold.

Running, however, has been an ever present over the course of the pandemic. I have had to adapt and evolve the way I have run to abide by the rules, but that, I have found, has only opened my eyes to the sport even more. Who knew, for example, that, far from being a machine of evil, the treadmill can actually be a joyous experience for sceptical runners like me. Or, who'd have thought that it would take a pandemic to see my local pavements fill up (albeit socially distanced) with the welcome sight of new runners taking to the streets for the first time. 

This phenomenon has, of course, been replicated across the country, with a Public Health England 'Couch to 5K' app being downloaded 858,000 times between March and July, running footwear sales for manufacturers like Hoka soaring by 75% and even 39,000 people a week running in the (not)Parkrun events. During a time when so many other sports have been forced to closed their doors, it's been the solo, minimal contact sports like running and cycling that have flourished. How many of those new trainers see out there 800-mile lifetime, however, remains to be seen, especially once the inevitable rain, gales and snow turn the pleasant, sunny autumnal runs into finger-freezing, winter endurance challenges.

On a personal level, running has provided me with an escape from the pressure of the pandemic over recent months and allowed me to switch my brain off from the upward curves, second waves, rising infections, new restrictions and virus paranoia that has become part of our day-to-day. And this is important, we all need to be able to switch off from the news. The situation is frightening for many and it seems from reports that, whereas thousands have rushed to Decathlon for new trainers, vast swathes of people have eaten or drunk their way through the fog in a bid to switch off, rather than finding an alternative to the gyms and sporting opportunities that they may have otherwise used.

I find this rather depressing as running is such an accessible sporting activity for the majority of the population. The science has shown that it also supports positive mental health far more effectively than unhealthy alternatives such as alcohol and fast food, so it seems like such a simple solution to lift the nation out of its Covid-induced stupor. And if you've never run before, you don't need to head out for your first run at Eliud Kipchoge pace or attempt the steepest hill you can find. A fast, heartrate-lifting walk might simply suffice and provide the lift you've been looking for.

One of my abiding memories of lockdown was of a long, slow Sunday run in late April through the Hampshire countryside close to my home. The early morning sun was shining, there was no traffic hum, no planes in the sky and no people on the trails. I set off with no clear route, distance or time in mind and with every passing kilometre felt the built up tension from the preceding week dissipate, my mind empty and my body relax. I was running and working hard, but at the same time experiencing a kind of calmness that is difficult to emulate outside of a five-star spa. It honestly felt like I was the only person on the planet, wiped all thoughts of coronavirus from my mind and set me up for the week ahead, or at least for the challenge of homeschooling my children the following day!

So, while this pandemic is horrific and terrifying in equal measure, remember that there are silver linings to its dark cloud. And be thankful, if you're a runner, that you can enjoy the world, mask free, from its pavements and trails, without the need for a gym membership and regardless of what Messrs Johnson, Whitty and Valance say.