Sunday 6-Footer

On Sunday, I went for an official 6-foot ride with Strava Jeff on the mostly clear pavement out by Woodbend. We drove out there in separate cars and made a careful point of keeping our distance the whole time. To be honest, other than the separate cars, it wasn’t that different from any other ride.   

On country roads where we were, it’s not hard to maintain a 6-foot separation. Unless you’re a super-pro used to big group rides with people who really know what they’re doing, 6 feet is just a bit more than the usual healthy distance to keep between semi-serious cyclists. We did have to talk a bit louder, and we did less side-by-side riding than we normally would, as it’s not always possible to maintain distance while riding two-abreast and still trying to stay on one side of the road. 

But the main difference I noticed was how much more self-conscious I was about snot and spit, those two constant companions of early season rides, especially rigorous rides. Good breeding and cycling etiquette generally dictate that riders separate themselves off the back when they’ve got to expectorate. But on this ride, I found myself dropping way back and double and triple checking before I fired any bodily fluids into the ditch.

Otherwise, it was a regular ride, and that was the best part. The world of humans has gone bananas in the past few weeks, but nature and bicycles are the same as ever, and we mostly forgot about the virus and the chaos and just pedaled.