How has 2023 been for you cycling wise?

[8mph]

For various reasons I ve spent very little time in the saddle this year but have been hiking more and getting to know Dartmoor better. I'm currently nursing a sprained knee, I'm hoping to get some winter mountain biking in during the crispy, cold end of winter if I can recover in time.

2024 - I'd like to keep up with the mountain biking and get to some new destinations on Dartmoor.

 

[Alex321]

He’s only describing 22 days and 12 of those will just be a morning, two overnight. I’m sure you could manage that out of 365 days.

Being in full time employment, it isn't 365 days though, it is effectively just weekends (holidays are generally taken up with other activities), so you are only talking about roughly 100 days maximum when I can theoretically do rides of much more than an hour.

The "just a morning" (or more commonly an afternoon), yes I can do those (and do - a 35 mile ride normally takes me around 2.5 hours, and I've done 13 rides of 35 mile+ this year). But he was talking about having done 12 metric centuries - that will be 4-5 hours for me (I've done one, in company, and that took 4:15 for 68 miles). To me that is a bit more than "just a morning"

But overnight isn't going to happen at all. And to take 10 full weekend/holiday days on top of those 13 longish rides, again not going to happen if I want to stay married.

Part of which is because I have two other hobbies that take up a lot of summer weekend days, with Morris dancing and Sealed Knot. My wife is involved in the Sealed Knot, but not the Morris dancing, and there is no way she is ever going to be able to come cycling with me, even if she wanted to.

I certainly hope to manage a few more metric centuries next year, but it isn't going to get anywhere near 12 of them, nor 4 imperial centuries - though I would really like to do at least one.

In 2-3 years time I will probably be looking to start winding down towards retirement by going part time, and if I drop to 3 days a week, that will far more than double the number of available days I have to take longer rides, and then I may well be able to get up to those sorts of numbers.

There have been 193 days this year when I have been active on the bike. But only 13 of those over 35 miles.

 

[Dogtrousers]

Being in full time employment, it isn't 365 days though, it is effectively just weekends (holidays are generally taken up with other activities), so you are only talking about roughly 100 days maximum when I can theoretically do rides of much more than an hour.

The "just a morning" (or more commonly an afternoon), yes I can do those (and do - a 35 mile ride normally takes me around 2.5 hours, and I've done 13 rides of 35 mile+ this year). But he was talking about having done 12 metric centuries - that will be 4-5 hours for me (I've done one, in company, and that took 4:15 for 68 miles). To me that is a bit more than "just a morning"

But overnight isn't going to happen at all. And to take 10 full weekend/holiday days on top of those 13 longish rides, again not going to happen if I want to stay married.

Part of which is because I have two other hobbies that take up a lot of summer weekend days, with Morris dancing and Sealed Knot. My wife is involved in the Sealed Knot, but not the Morris dancing, and there is no way she is ever going to be able to come cycling with me, even if she wanted to.

I certainly hope to manage a few more metric centuries next year, but it isn't going to get anywhere near 12 of them, nor 4 imperial centuries - though I would really like to do at least one.

In 2-3 years time I will probably be looking to start winding down towards retirement by going part time, and if I drop to 3 days a week, that will far more than double the number of available days I have to take longer rides, and then I may well be able to get up to those sorts of numbers.

There have been 193 days this year when I have been active on the bike. But only 13 of those over 35 miles.

You don't need to justify it. There's no obligation to cycle any particular amount. Just do as much as you enjoy.

I manage a couple of Saturdays a month on the bike (plus some turbo sessions and the odd shorter ride). Other people do tons more, other people do less. Diffrnt strokes.

 

[Alex321]

You don't need to justify it. There's no obligation to cycle any particular amount. Just do as much as you enjoy.

You are right of course. But I was responding to the implied criticism from Ming.

I manage a couple of Saturdays a month on the bike (plus some turbo sessions and the odd shorter ride). Other people do tons more, other people do less. Diffrnt strokes.

I actually ride quite a lot of days, but only average 21 miles per active day, with a total of 4107 miles, in 193 active days.

 

[Dogtrousers]

You are right of course. But I was responding to the implied criticism from Ming.



I actually ride quite a lot of days, but only average 21 miles per active day, with a total of 4107 miles, in 193 active days.

Significantly more miles than me. In fact more miles than I do kilometres. Not that it's a competition.

 

[mustang1]

Although I am grateful that I went out a lot this year, it's definitely been one of lowest years for both distance and elevation gain with a particular drop off in the last quarter of the year when I started using my e-bike a lot more (I can't really call my e-bike as a "ride for fitness" thing as it's more a "at least I'm getting out" thing). I've had a darn bug too.

 

[robjh]

2023 was a pretty good cycling year for me. I finished on 9082 miles, which makes it probably my 2nd highest year ever - only 'probably' as my record keeping a few years ago was not as comprehensive as now, and I may just have reached this figure in 2015 too, but will never be sure.
I've managed another year of the imperial century a month challenge on this site, and have done a few audaxes, most notably my first ever 400k ones. I feel I need to up my speed a bit on these as I have only just crept in within the time, and I would like to be up to challenge of London: Edinburgh-London in 2025.
I also did a couple of cycle -camping trips, to Yorkshire and Edinburgh, which were amongst the true highlights of the year.
Other than that, I've done regular club rides, other day rides and a lot of utility cycling. All in all it has felt like a pretty good one.

 

[palinurus]

Riding to work and riding to the shops only, 3900 miles (underestimate because I don't consistently record shopping / errands)

But that's OK. Riding to work is good riding.

• One leisure ride! rode over Harpenden way on my old 'cross bike.
• Probably the biggest challenge was riding to St Albans Oxfam bookshop on the Elephant bike with a heavy load of books for donation.

 

[antnee]

Well it starts ok at years beginning but as other half and family commitments became more haven't cycled since last October so not good and when I did cycle Found it hard to do more than 25 miles, old leg injury becoming more preverlent still waiting for things to become better.