Why Do You Cycle ?

shm_uk

With all the initiaitives designed to get more people to become more active, everyone's always clattering on with phrases like 'riding a bike is an excellent way to improve your fitness' ...

I was wondering how many people start riding a bike purely because they feel the need to do the exercise ?

Or do you ride a bike because you enjoy it, and the fitness benefits are a convenient side-effect ?

(I guess the third option is that you ride a bike through absolute necessity and would stop at the drop of a hat given the chance).

Pep

Walking takes too long.

Agent57

I started riding a bike when I was about 4 years old, then as I got to 7 or 8 it became the best way of getting around independently and seeing my friends. Used it for fun, doing my paper round, going to the shops, visiting my nan, getting to school. Now I use it for recreation, nipping to the shops, getting to work... Just never stopped using a bike.

Hot Orange

I started because we needed to economise and the £4.20 a day to park at the station (plus petrol, wear and tear etc) was an obvious thing to cut out.

I wouldn't stop now, though. Now I know it is commutable, I feel like I'm letting myself down whenever i don't do it.

Sailorchick

Many reasons really, in no particular order.
* Cheaper than car (which I sold when I got my bike)
* Fitness - its perfect training for my main sport of sailing
* Quickest way to get to work - 10-15min ride depending on how fast I can be asked to go. Car takes at least 20min, worst days about an hour due to traffic, buses take at least 45min as no direct route.
* Wakes me up for the day and then refreshes me on the way home after a day of staring at a screen.

iPete

Walking is long & can't carry as much, don't need a car, rail card is over 2.2k per year, fitness, prefer it to running, takes the same time as the train etc etc.

Essentially I started for fitness, got bored of running and fell into commuting with a new job...

ndru

Because I am cheap, and I fail to see the point of paint £30 pounds a week to sit in a stinky, overcrowded train twice a day and then have to walk a good mile, because that's where the closest station is from my work.
Plus I don't have the time now to go to the gym, so I get my workout while I am getting home.
Plus it's fun.

asprilla

As an adult I took up cycling again as part of the overall fitness drive that having kids sometimes brings; I figured that if I wanted to play with my kids in the back garden and set a good example ablout fitness then I should pull my finger out. I started running half marathons for a while, but there are only so miles you can run without injury and a knee ligament injury stopped me running for 7 months. I couldn't run but the injury meant I could still cycle, so I bought a bike.

I still run as I now do triathlons but I enjoy cycling much more.

Pufftmw

I do karate but I'm old(er),less flexible and struggle on hand/foot co-ordination, so I aim to be fitter than all the youngsters or anyone else for that matter. So as part of my training, I cycle to work and MTB whenever I can, which isn't as often as I would like Cycling is better for my knees long-term over running, which I find boring as anything.
I don't have to worry about traffic jams or parking, its cheaper than driving, its quicker to work and in fact I can't think of any reason not to.

Flyingbogey

Did it once 3 years ago because of a strike on PT and still going strong. I get free travel but still go for the bike option unless its icy. Its like the snoutcasts you see o/s offices, were all in this together and you meet some good people, and some tw@'s

Headhuunter

Fitness
Enjoyment
Financial economy (way cheaper than London public transport to work)
Convenience (easy to get to and from destination, no problems with parking and pretty much always faster than motorised transport of any kind in London, except perhaps helicopter)

cyclopsbiker

fitness - means I don't have to do a great deal of any other exercise or suffer the dullness of a gym
its cheaper than PT
I don't have to share a seat with anyone
totally in control of departure and arrival times
quicker than PT by a good 20 minutes
sense of achievement cycling everyday, come rain or shine or snow

Headhuunter

cyclopsbiker wrote:

fitness - means I don't have to do a great deal of any other exercise or suffer the dullness of a gym
its cheaper than PT
I don't have to share a seat with anyone
totally in control of departure and arrival times
quicker than PT by a good 20 minutes
sense of achievement cycling everyday, come rain or shine or snow

Oh yes, forgot the control thing. PT can be very unpredictable as can driving when you hit traffic...

jonginge

I just like it. The effects of endorphins and adrenaline are nice, too.

I've cycled for as long as I can remember. Similarly, the first injury I can remember (around the age of 3) was headbutting the handlebars of my bike during a crash. If only I'd been wearing a helmet. Why didn't someone think of the children!

re-cycles

I started riding to reduce my impact on my local environment. I like the idea of taking up less room and causing less noise than I used to. Since then I've trained as a bikeability instructor and the thought of driving to a cycling session just feels so wrong!

snooks

It kills two birds with one stone.

Gets me to work AND I don't have to spend time going to the gym.

I would say time or money going to the gym. However cycling reduced the gym fund to £0 but increased the bike fund to the roof!

I'd cycled loads before moving to London, but when I moved up here I bought my bike full of hope to keep riding it, never really happened. I had a bike in London for years but never really used it. Split up, moved somewhere with a shed that I could access easily, and I started off cycling in the morning before work to get fit

The cycle time before work got longer until I was up to the time it would take me to commute (45 mins @ the time) then started commuting by bike.

squired

As a kid the bike was a key form of transport for getting round to the houses of friends. Then one day, when my brother and I were about 12 years old our uncle came to visit us during the school holidays. He was regularly taking part in triathlons at the time and was cycling over to a triathlon shop in Herne Hill. We went with him on what seemed like a majorly long ride at the time. From that moment we simply fell in love with cycling.

As a 15 year old I can remember riding up a particular climb that is appx. 800 metres long about 10-20 times a night.

I cycled to college, then uni and now work. If my knee wasn't bothering me constantly I'd probably do more, but simply put, I love riding my bike.

nich

Right now I'm gonna cycle to keep warm.

It's fricken cold in our office and I need to get out on the bike 'n get the muscles working 'n blood pumpin!!! BRRRR

MonkeyMonster

Its fun

hatbeard

cyclopsbiker and cafewanda are forcing me too

just kidding, it's to lose weight and get fit

fnegroni

There are three different motivations for me.

When cycling to work, it saves money and time. Cycling is the most reliable method of transport, the cheapest, the safest, the most convenient, the most pleasant.

When cycling at the weekend with the club, it is the fitness it provides.

When cycling to the school, the shops or to town or to a friends house etc. it is the environmental side (air and noise pollution) that is the most important for me. It also encourages my son not to depend on the car and in fact, he braves the weather and has generally been healthier since being outdoors more.
Two or three days worth of shopping fits neatly into my pannier bags (family of three).
Anything bigger, I just get home delivery.

shouldbeinbed

Agent57 wrote:

I started riding a bike when I was about 4 years old, then as I got to 7 or 8 it became the best way of getting around independently and seeing my friends. Used it for fun, doing my paper round, going to the shops, visiting my nan, getting to school. Now I use it for recreation, nipping to the shops, getting to work... Just never stopped using a bike.

this


& Guinness

UndercoverElephant

I did it once to shut the bike bores up around the office, since it was further than they commute and I was on a rubbish bike...

That was 6,000 miles ago, and I think I'm one of the chief bike bores now.

simonaspinall

When I first moved to Leeds I couldn't afford a car and rent so I got on a BSO stuck in top gear. After joining the cycle to work scheme and getting my first road bike I didn't look back and now do it for fitness and amazing feeling of fast(er than I was).

Couldn't comprehend getting a car again - Would be soul destroying getting back in a hideous metal box and sitting in traffic.

Also do it because I really believe in the bike as the current and future method of transport...

I think it's made me venomously hate car drivers quite irrationally/rationally depending on whether you'd use a rubber or metal hammer.

Alphabet

purely because i like riding a bike. fitness and ££ saving are incidental. it's all about actively enjoying my journey to and from work.

SamWise72

When I was a kid, I loved cycling. Sure, it got me places when I was too young to drive and had no money for a bus, but more than that, it was brilliant fun! I'd hurtle around, seeing how fast I could go, slaloming in and out of invisible obstacles and pretending to be James Bond or Eddie Mercx. Turns out I haven't changed much!

I cycle cos it's fun. It's nice that it gets me in shape, but I'd still ride if it didn't. It doesn't save me money; quite the opposite, I get a generous mileage allowance from work and by driving cheap bangers I can generally turn a profit on car ownership that way, plus then I wouldn't be buying Bromptons or shiny bits of kit. Sure, it saves money on days I'm in London (parking at the station), but I could do that on a bike I got for a fiver from the tip and charge my underground costs on expenses. I'm glad to be reducing my carbon footprint, but the truth is, I mostly cycle cos I think it's brilliant fun.

SimonAH

Initally it was 'cos DVLA pulled my licence for a bit (ouch, honesty, I was a bad boy) on a BSO.
The the engineer in me got hooked with improving the machine.
Then I quit smoking.
Then I found I'd dropped 2'' from my waistline.
Then I got faster.
Then the engineer bit again.
Then I got my wife and daughter nice bikes.
Now I've specced my new company car to take three bikes.
Now I'll never stop!
Love it!

cyclopsbiker

hatbeard wrote:

cyclopsbiker and cafewanda are forcing me too

just kidding, it's to lose weight and get fit

yeah yeah!

arthur_scrimshaw

Because I'm obsessed and get withdrawal symptoms if I don't ride in.

mtb-idle

because i enjoy it

itboffin

The voices make me do it ...