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Older brother is in the 300,000 mile club
I've got one bike that's done nearly 100,000 miles.
It's a first-gen Specialized Langster SS road bike so must be 25 years old now (although the only original parts are frame, forks and seatpost). Had it since new and it was my commuter bike for most of that time, often doing a 4-month stint each year as winter road bike as well. That'd usually add up to 4000+ miles a year although I hardly use it these days.
As I said somewhere up there ^^, little and often just quietly adds up!
I’m around 4.8k miles so far this year with about a 50:50 mix of road and off road. Not too bad. Last year it was less after breaking the collar bone on the first day of an Alpine MTB week! The year before it was 6.5k miles since I was training and did the Haute route.
it all pales into insignificance to when I was a roadie. Winter training. Stage races. 3-4 races a week in the summer. Probable 10-12k miles
9024 km so far this year. And that included three months off with injury in the Spring. Training is 400 km/week. I include indoor track in this, and my cumulative total on the Dolan Seta is 2144 km. I ride about 50-90 km/week on the track at the moment. Off road has been two rides, including Swinley on Sunday on the gravel bike!
What even is a mile and why do virtual miles on Zwift count the same as really miles because they are in no way similar and most importantly who gives a toss how far you ride anyway?
Well, when you Zwift on Elite Nero rollers with a speed sensor, you get real miles too on the Garmin - Zwift miles are a little more optimistic than real miles.
- Zwift miles are a little more optimistic than real miles.
I've seen estimates of up to 20% more "optimistic". Probably affected by power/weight.
who gives a toss how far you ride anyway?
The person who started this post and to whom we are responding. Why open a post specifically asking this question otherwise?
~400 hours in '22, in addition to walking on delivery as a postie until October.
On the one hand, my mileage will be low for hours ridden, because my rides are typically ~60 feet per mile up in the South Downs and solo.
But on the other hand, I'm a slave to Zwift, especially Nov-Mar each winter, along with wet days. Far less effort needed to get ~20mph+ ride average!
Why open a post specifically asking this question otherwise
Well, this is called a discussion forum, if you don't like discussion, maybe don't bother.
I treat it like a conversation, if someone asked me how many miles I have ridden this year, I would say I have no idea, don't know what a mile is anyway and it's fairly unimportant to me anyway. Then someone would pipe up with well I've done 6000 or something and I would point out that half of that is Zwift and there's no way that person can do 2 hours at 35+km an hour in really life so it doesn't really count...
Still if you don't want a conversation maybe don't open a thread!
and most importantly who gives a toss how far you ride anyway?
well all the blokes who have replied seem to.
obviously you dont, so why even waste your time and energy relying........ seems pretty odd.
Confused by a couple of things. Why you’re bothering to post on a topic about mileage when you don’t care about mileage, just seems a complete waste of energy just to say ‘who cares’, quite bizarre really.
and saying you don’t know what a mile is, what are you talking about?
Older brother is in the 300,000 mile club, so anything I do would pale into insignificance.
i reckon i could possibly getting near that.
40 years commuting to work at 100 miles per week.
plus 40ish years on mtb or touring on a weekend, with a few years audax riding.
would love to know what it all adds up to.
Not a clue. A lot fewer miles since Covid, I know that much. But why did I bother opening and replying to this thread anyway. Cos I is on STW and bored and thats what we do innit
I'll turn it round because this is something that's always interested me: how few miles (it's a number you can use as a measurement) does one have to do before you can no longer consider yourself an active cyclist - and why would you be hanging round on a cycling forum in that case?
I took a break from cycling 2-3 years about 14 years ago following an injury (it was the spur, not the cause). Did I continue posting on forums? Did I ****!
I took a break from cycling 2-3 years about 14 years ago following an injury (it was the spur, not the cause). Did I continue posting on forums? Did I ****!
Oh God, if you actually had to Do Cycling (or even more specifically, Do MTBing) in order to post on here, forum traffic would be a quarter of what it is! 🤣
A lot of people quite like stats and figures. I don't think anyone on here is trying to boast or claim that more miles somehow makes them superior to anyone else, it's just a point of interest.
The Strava end of year summary will be out soon. Also Festive 500 (which also seems to generate a mix of "WTF are you doing you weirdo?!" vs people who quite like it!)
Who cares is the wrong wording of saying that i do like to see how far i ride each year but i am not driven by it, like say finishing the.Rapha 500 or something.
The weekly target is nice to aim for, and actually what i look at mostly but if i fancy an mtb ride or gravel ride , thats my priority rather than than road miles to purely hit the weekly target with the time I have.
If i miss the yearly target....its probably because i did more off road than on road.
It is a funny topic because we all lead different lifestyles. The commute is the way mileage adds up and good use of time as well.
I'll turn it round because this is something that's always interested me: how few miles (it's a number you can use as a measurement) does one have to do before you can no longer consider yourself an active cyclist
A mate that I used to ride with hasn't done an MTB ride for over 12 months now but keeps telling me he hasn't given up.
I ride quite a bit more than a lot of folks but have never considered myself a cyclist.
All depends how you look at things and doesn't matter to anyone else.🤷♂️
As for a_a doesn't he just moan about everything on here?
I've just skimmed over his posts for years now.
. I don't think anyone on here is trying to boast or claim that more miles somehow makes them superior to anyone else,
as my speed is now 10mph max, my boast would be for the slowest mile counter........... lol
i reckon i could possibly getting near that.
@ton I'm not sure when he started recording mileage, but he was commuting 40 miles a day to uni in his early 20's, got into long distance time trials in his early 30's (240 miles in 12hrs/400+ miles in 24hrs sort of stuff), now aged 66 and retired his Strava is probably going to be 10k miles this year. Mind you his knee is ****ed so he can only walk about 1/2 mile & hates driving which could explain a lot of the miles, ie he cycles absolutely everywhere.
Confused by a couple of things. Why you’re bothering to post on a topic about mileage when you don’t care about mileage, just seems a complete waste of energy just to say ‘who cares’, quite bizarre really.
Because I cannot understand why people give two shits about a pointless metric, it's meaningless. Mind you I thought as I said earlier it was a discussion forum, why post if you don't like to discuss?
What even is a mile
Educational standards in the UK have slipped even further than I thought.
FYI, it's 1,609.344 metres.
I normally hit between 5-6000km a year.
This year, I'm already over 7000 as I did LEL (well, two thirds, storm Floris robbed me of 500km extra).
I've got a chunk of xmas week off, so I might do the festive 500 for kicks.
If you're into such things, I can add on another 1000km of virtual rides, but it doesn't really count.
Educational standards in the UK have slipped even further than I thought.
I would suggest they have just moved on from the 1970's 😀
FYI, it's 1,609.344 metres
Nice work on mixing metric and imperial...how many furlongs is that? (I do actually know that one!)
how many furlongs is that? (I do actually know that one!)
Bonus points if you know the origin of the word "furlong"!
Just shy of 4000 km ridden and really close to where i was last year. Mainly rest off road
55,000m of elevation gain all activities
400 hours all activities
i like the last one. Averaging over an hour a day doing stuff i love
Mind you I thought as I said earlier it was a discussion forum, why post if you don't like to discuss?
because what you have posted isn’t what we are discussing. It’s a thread with the title about how many miles you cycle.. if the topic was “is there any point in logging how many miles you cycle” then your input would be relevant, pertinent & interesting, but it isn’t so it isn’t.
then your input would be relevant, pertinent & interesting, but it isn’t so it isn’t.
and who made you the guardian of what others find relevant and pertinent? It's an open discussion forum, if you don't want discussion to develop it would be a very boring thread.
Bonus points if you know the origin of the word "furlong"!
I have always imagined it's something to do with ploughing but no idea why I think that.
i like the last one. Averaging over an hour a day doing stuff i love
A much better metric.
Ooo an old school STW squabble about not very much... 🙃
Ton posited the question as is a fairly regular occurance around this time of year. Some people responded, maybe some thought they had something to brag about who knows. In my view, unless you're doing mega mileages (like 20k miles), you're just regular and keen with mebbies a small dose of OCD/on the spectrum... (which definitely describes my approach).
I prefer miles as my unit of measure rather than those new fangled pesky KM's and I'm definitely not a machine so it'll not be in hours thankyouplease.👍
maybe some thought they had something to brag about who knows. In my view, unless you're doing mega mileages (like 20k miles), you're just regular and keen with mebbies a small dose of OCD/on the spectrum... (which definitely describes my approach).
Certainly my approach too!
The thing about defining the year by mileage is that anyone riding mostly off-road (unless they're doing some massive bikepacking expedition) will be doing far fewer miles than someone who rides mostly on road but as you say, that doesn't mean anything in the real world, it's just different ways of riding.
The thing about defining the year by mileage is that anyone riding mostly off-road (unless they're doing some massive bikepacking expedition) will be doing far fewer miles than someone who rides mostly on road but as you say, that doesn't mean anything in the real world, it's just different ways of riding.
Which is why hours in the saddle is a better metric. Mileage will vary based on how hilly and area is too
In my view, unless you're doing mega mileages (like 20k miles), you're just regular and keen with mebbies a small dose of OCD/on the spectrum... (which definitely describes my approach).
I don't think there's anything wrong with setting your own targets and that'll often mean trying to "beat" previous years. That VeloViewer image I posted earlier has a whole load of stats and can be customised according to the users whims. Ideally I'd improve on ALL the numbers I recorded last year but I'm likely to fail on at least one.
Ton my AVG bike is 11,0 for comparison a bus does 22, the 555 Lancaster to Keswick anyway, and my car 30. I m just happy to be out of single figures.
Well done some impressive mileages.
It's December 3rd and I've already exceeded my distance and elevation for December 2024, so monitoring stats has some value.... but the RidewithGPS app on my phone has been occasionally dropping out mid-ride since an Android update in the summer. I'm quite impressed by those Strava-derived visualisations posted above so I might hold my nose and start using that in 2026.
can't say I've really given milage much thought.
I look at elevation.
I'd call a good brisk evening 2 hr ride a success with 500m; a more social one 300m. A "proper" weekend ride I'm sad if I don't hit 1000m, though last weekend I was racing so lower total climbing which was all done full gas... so maybe this doesn't work...
On road, off road, or indoor - I find the climbing to be a statistic equaliser
climbing it great if your engine is working well. but if you are running with a miss firing valve, it aint much fun.
i do some but it floors me a bit.
Aye. I think people should measure their riding however they want. It's their metric for their consumption and there's no 'correct' answer/panacea. If you use hours so it reflects MTB activity better, what about road miles? 4 hours at 20mph on the road is definitely not like 4 hours at 10mph... And what about mixed rides? Some road, some gravel, some pukka MTB stuff all in one day?
If you're only worry is how your numbers compare to everyone else's, mebbies you're in it for the wrong reasons...
Check out Matt Fairbrother's profile. I follow him on Strava just to marvel at the places he gets to and the sheer volume of off road riding he does.
2025 so far:
11,963 miles
1,019,600 ft
He was the nutter who a few years ago rode, yes rode between the various EWS races before competing in them.
A friend of mine did one million feet of climbing a year for two consecutive years, all off-road, no e-bikes - all on Strava. But he did have a lot of spare time… If I tried that my wife would divorce me!
Used to be just under 7000 miles for a good few years but awaiting a knee replacement means I am down to about 5000 this year.I have also managed to stick out more than a week of Zwift so I am tempted to have an hour of that one or twice a day instead of riding but that doesn't count.
Check out Matt Fairbrother's profile. I follow him on Strava just to marvel at the places he gets to and the sheer volume of off road riding he does.
2025 so far:
11,963 miles
1,019,600 ft
He was the nutter who a few years ago rode, yes rode between the various EWS races before competing in them.
the short film about him completing the NZ MTB rally entirely under his own steam when other competitors were shuttled between stages by various methods including boat and helicopter is worth a watch. It’s called ‘All in or nothing’ and available on YouTube
Check out Matt Fairbrother's profile. I follow him on Strava just to marvel at the places he gets to and the sheer volume of off road riding he does.
He was the nutter who a few years ago rode, yes rode between the various EWS races before competing in them.
There was a guy (years ago) who used to ride to the 24hr races with his tent and kit on his bike, he'd pitch his tent, take the racks off the bike, compete (solo), do very very well indeed, refit the racks, pack the bike up then ride home again.
Can't remember his name but I saw him once at Sleepless in the Saddle - he was an absolute machine, just churning round relentlessly. Someone else said "oh yeah, that's [name], he comes to all these things, smashes it for 24hrs solid, has a kip, packs his kit up then rides home".
i was looking through some old audax journals recently.
top audax rider Pat Kenny was over 900 000 miles prior to being killed by a car driver.
some distance that.