The fitness trainers of Canberra have taken a step towards normality.
"I'm raring to get back," Chris Murphy of Murphy Personal Training said.
The rules have just been eased to allow them to train pairs of people outdoors. It's still far short of what their businesses were like before the pandemic but they welcomed the progress.
"It's been positive," Beth Cornforth said. The small business she and her husband Tim run was hit for six when the rules prevented them from training customers in person.
But now she thinks the trade will start returning. "A lot of people have shown interest in getting back to training," she said.
And not just to tone the muscles up. "There's been a lot of people who train as part of their mental health plan," she said.
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Chris Murphy has been giving sessions on video from his gym, so he's had to hone the skill of presenting himself to the camera. He now knows he just has to keep talking and fill the silences.
It's much easier to correct someone's posture when they are standing in front of the trainer. On camera, Chris gets them to repeat movements at different angles to the camera in their home so he can analyse whether, for example, they are lifting a weight badly.
He has kept fit because he assumed his business would return. "I knew there was an end goal in sight," he said.
And he feels being physically fit helps him be mentally fit. "I made sure I was keeping sane myself, and fitness was a big part of that," he said.
Personal training is what it says - personal. It demands contact with people.
"A lot my profession is networking and getting your face out there, and I couldn't do that," Mr Murphy said.
"I guess it's that self-motivation. I used to like going to the gym and socialising (and socialising down a video link is not quite the same).
"I went from 50-plus hours a week to two hours a week, so that is a big change."
Not least to his finances. He said the support from the ACT government "was really good". It didn't make up the loss but it did mean he could pay his mortgage.
He remains baffled by why other groups seem to be allowed more freedom.
He can now run outdoor boot camps with no more than two people, he said, but picnics were allowed with five people.
This theme of which sports have been given easier restrictions earlier is common among personal trainers.
"I find it strange that you can go rowing or play golf or tennis but you can't meet your personal trainer," Beth Cornforth said when the lockdown started to ease.
She wondered if there were easier rules for tennis, rowing and golf because they were "prestige which suits one demographic".
