“YOU love that bike more than you love me,” said my wife, pointing at my trusty steed in the garage.

“Don’t be silly,” I replied. “You’re thinking of that more expensive one we saw in the shop. That’s the one I love more than you.”

With hindsight, I could have picked a better day to make the joke than our 27th wedding anniversary, but she knows I didn’t mean it – and, actually, it’s a serious subject.

Starting about a year ago, and especially over the last three or four months, I’ve taken up cycling in earnest for three reasons, the first two obvious. I wanted to lose weight, which was important, and also get fit, which is even more important.

Along with a drastic reduction in food consumption, it certainly succeeded in the weight loss department: over two stones lost, and counting. And the fitness? Even better.

Back in 2001, we went on a family holiday to Australia, just before my 40th birthday, and I made a huge attempt to be fit enough to enjoy a jog across Sydney Harbour Bridge.

Now I am at least as fit as I was then, and possibly more so.

And there is a third reason for this healthy obsession with cycling.

When you get to your 50s, you have more personal experience of friends and relatives suffering illness, some of them the same age or slightly older, and this has had a profound effect on me this year.

When you reach a certain age, you can’t help looking around for things to help you avoid suffering the same.

Conversely, I’ve also known a few people who have prolonged their lives and sometimes overcame serious illness because of an underlying fitness, and I always think back to the doctor who once told me a fitness regime, at any age, is “money in the bank”.

Cycling or any other way of getting fit is obviously no guarantee that you’ll avoid those problems, but it helps to tilt the odds in your favour.

So although my dear wife feels as if she is playing second fiddle to a pushbike, she not only has a new man, but hopefully one with a longer shelf life.

Now you might think this is heading for an evangelistic ‘Get on your bike and be healthier’ message, and you’d be right, but I also feel I should point out the other benefits I’ve discovered about cycling.

Healthy Living magazine, who assure us that “middle-aged cyclists are going farther and faster than ever before”, also say it “imparts a feeling of well-being that can be hard to find at times when you’re over 50. If you’re depressed, a bike ride will make you feel more like yourself again.”

And they’re not wrong, but they neglected to mention my great discovery of the year, which is: cycling is fun. It’s even more fun in Swindon than most other places because of the wealth of cycle paths and quiet roads you can use.

You also get a whole new perspective on your surroundings, and see more wildlife.

Only recently I have seen two extraordinary sights – coincidentally, both on a favourite cycle path that links Rivermead with Moredon.

Cycling along there in daylight one evening, I disturbed a young deer that ran along in front of me for about a hundred metres.

And the next day, which was hot and sunny, I saw an even rarer creature.

It was a jogger, dressed in a T-shirt, as you might expect, plus proper running shoes and… wait for it… jeans. We certainly see life, us cyclists.