Last week I read an interesting article about how regular exercise can help prevent you getting a cold and reduce the amount you do get by about half. A lot of born-again runners (those like me who have come to the sport later in life after reforming their once sedentary lives) know this from first-hand experience. I’m ill far less than I was before I started running but now the British Journal of Sports Medicine backs this up.

So it may be more than coincidence then that I skipped my runs on Thursday and Saturday last week only to end up spending all of today on the sofa with a cold. It’s no fun being ill and now that I run that’s one more thing that having a cold has stopped me doing – along with eating anything that doesn’t come out of a can, watching anything that doesn’t involve Jessica Fletcher and having a shower.

It’s been nearly a year since I was last sick and I think that running has a lot to do with that. But, even a boosted-immune system from regular exercise is no match for the constant coughing and sneezingf my fellow South West Trains passengers.