Coronavirus compels bike riders to keep their distance

Due to the COVID-19 virus, far fewer cars are on Highway 1 heading north from Cambria these days. So it would appear to be an ideal time for bike-riding enthusiasts to hit the road.

But there is danger out there, said Tom Parsons, a longtime long-distance rider who serves as president of the Slabtown Rollers, Cambria’s very active bike group.

“It is very important to keep a safe distance … keeping 10 to 15 feet from each other,” Parsons wrote in an email.

His concerns result from the concept of “respiratory signature,” which is the footprint left in the atmosphere each time riders expel air from their lungs through the mouth and nose. Air is expelled simply because the rider was talking, laughing, merely exhaling — or, in the worst-case scenario, coughing or sneezing.

Hence, for a bike rider directly behind another rider, particles from the first rider exhaling can hang in the air for enough time to become a “comet-shaped trail” that the second rider could inhale, according to Dr. Anne C.M. Hyman, president of the Potomac Peddlers. Parsons quoted Hyman in an email to his fellow Slabtown Rollers.

And if that first rider happens to be an asymptomatic carrier of the new coronavirus, meaning that they’re likely not aware they’re carrying the virus that causes COVID-19, riders trailing behind are potentially in harm’s way.

Parsons is a retired middle school teacher who stands 6 feet, 4 inches tall. He recently established a local record by launching a 100-mile trek from Cambria each month for 115 straight months and is now doing four 50-mile rides a month north and south on Highway 1.

He rides four or five days a week.

Given the danger of riders potentially inhaling unsafe particles, “Most Rollers are riding solo,” Parsons explained. “Some do ride with others but they keep 10 to 15 feet from each other.”

Slabtown Roller Jim Rogers said he is “doing more hiking than biking” since the advent of the pandemic. “If I do ride, I go solo,” he added.

“Picture yourself creating these comets, or riding through a comet tail,” Hyman writes, explaining why the Potomac Peddlers have canceled group rides during the pandemic. “The majority of your signature is still around you in your sphere, but you’re moving fast enough that your sphere starts trailing behind you, where you used to be.”