This is a truly democratised activity perfect for our times
When I was planning to learn to skip, my main problem was a broken hand, and I had no idea what would become of exercise – the cornerstone of this huge fallacy of self-improvement in a crisis, plus one of only a handful of excuses to leave the house. Well, now my hand is healed(ish), and skipping is huge. I can see the appeal: on an atmospheric level, it is a truly democratised activity, as popular with boxers as it is with 10-year-old girls. On the practical one, it is, like all activities that use your entire body weight, a fail-safe calorie-burner. If you don’t already own a rope, they’re available on Amazon for a million pounds, if you’re prepared to wait until May (I’m being flip; you can get a perfectly good rope, fast, on eBay).
I already had a rope, and it was impossible, I thought because it was too long; turned out, it was because it was too light. You get much more feedback from a heavier rope, so your feet can feel it coming and react. Sounds improbable, but it’s true. Now choose a surface. I can tell you what doesn’t work: grass (too catchy); my kitchen (marble floor, bone-shaking; I felt as if I’d done parkour); my room with a carpet (fine, except that I made the house tremble). The dudes always demonstrate in a car park (search Jump Rope Dudes on YouTube), and tarmac is kinder than concrete. Ideally, you want one of those spongy playground surfaces, but sadly, since lockdown, they’re out of bounds.
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