{"id":789416,"date":"2026-10-02T07:48:08","date_gmt":"2026-10-02T07:48:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/789416\/"},"modified":"2026-10-02T07:48:08","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T07:48:08","slug":"rowan-pelling-princess-anne-is-right-that-exercise-is-pure-misery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/789416\/","title":{"rendered":"Rowan Pelling: Princess Anne is right that exercise is pure misery"},"content":{"rendered":"

The biggest fib I tell on a regular basis is that I enjoy running<\/a>. What I actually mean is that when I reach the homeward straight and sense that my front door is seconds away, I start to feel a genuine sense of elation. What I actually, fully, bodily relish is the sense of having just completed a run \u2013 the endocannabinoid rush combined with a feeling of overwhelming virtue and the certainty that I now deserve that glass of wine.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But the dull, sad thud of my feet on tarmac as I long for easeful death, alien abduction, a hostage situation, or any everyday intervention that will stop this living hell, feels overwhelming until I turn into my street.<\/p>\n

So thank God for Princess Anne, who is the only member of the Royal family who can be relied upon to speak the pure, unvarnished truth \u2013 much like her famously forthright father<\/a>. This week\u2019s pithy observation was that a \u201cfun run is a contradiction in terms\u201d. With one well-aimed barb<\/a>, she exploded the myth of a cheering park run, full of laughing children, energised adults and bouncy dogs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Suddenly, we saw the pain and misery for what it was. The 76-year-old princess was visiting York to support Sir Kevin Sinfield, a rugby coach, as he attempts to run seven ultra-marathons in seven days<\/a> to raise money for motor neurone disease charities (in memory of Rob Burrow, his friend and former teammate). To make her feelings crystal clear, Anne added: \u201cI can run, but I don\u2019t do it for fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her no-nonsense clarity made me wonder why I ever attempt to persuade others that I lace up my Nike Zooms for pleasure. Part of it is the hope that some poor sap will fall for the propaganda and join me on my weary circuit, halving the monotony via grim-but-distracting conversation.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But much of the impulse comes from the tyrannical role \u201cwellness\u201d plays<\/a> in wider society. We are told it\u2019s all good, clean-living, healthy fun to the point that you feel forced to capitulate. Everywhere you turn, there are fresh-faced women in Lululemon joggers and vests<\/a>, looking like they\u2019ve just finished reformer Pilates and are going to grab a matcha before jogging home for kicks.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Men are no better. If another 50-something man I know shakes off his dad bod<\/a> and \u201cdebuts\u201d a six-pack (generally the result of divorce, or a cardiac scare), I\u2019ll scream. They all seem to think they\u2019re auditioning for Go Hard or Go Home.<\/p>\n

Just look at Wayne Rooney<\/a>, who\u2019s been \u201cworking really hard\u201d to lose weight. Until recent months, the footballer looked like a friendly Scouse bouncer who imbibed pies and bumped large birds up the queue. Now, he looks thin, trim, sober and slightly pinched \u2013 as you\u2019d be after doing press-ups all morning. Fat jabs (which Rooney denies using) have accelerated the trend. There\u2019s a new legion of men and women who look svelte and smug in Lycra, but whose secret source of joy<\/a> is not a treadmill, but Mounjaro.<\/p>\n

Fitness is like a religious movement \u2013 the gleam of the zealot<\/a> matters more than the hours they\u2019ve put into the transformation. I must say I preferred things in the days that exercise was all about sweat, blood, tears, pain, torn cartilage and ruptured tendons. Doesn\u2019t that continue to be the secret story?\u00a0<\/p>\n

I have quite a few friends who looked, briefly, like Greek deities before their knees or backs caved in<\/a>. I never run for longer than 20 minutes because it\u2019s boring and my body can wear out \u2013 from couch to ouch.<\/p>\n

Isn\u2019t it time to join forces with the Princess Royal and declare an amnesty? Can\u2019t we all agree that exercise is much like sex between a long-married couple? You\u2019re not at all sure you want to do it at first. It feels like a chore, and you\u2019d rather watch Slow Horses.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But once you\u2019ve got into your rhythm and are heading to that last peak, you remember the delights, the rewards and how amazing it eventually leaves you feeling. Just remember, there\u2019s no need to boast afterwards.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The biggest fib I tell on a regular basis is that I enjoy running. What I actually mean…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":789417,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[5337,106541,1167,6647,102,50,6884,159955,22318,210622,10695,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-789416","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fitness","tag-comment","tag-daily-features","tag-exercise","tag-fitness","tag-health","tag-news","tag-opinion","tag-other-features","tag-princess-anne","tag-rowan-pelling","tag-running","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/789416","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=789416"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/789416\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/789417"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=789416"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=789416"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=789416"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}