The 80 Best Cycling and Bike Quotes | Bicycle Motivation (2024)

• By: James Grear
• Last updated: 11/12/2023

If you’re finding it hard to get off the sofa or hype yourself up for your long bike ride to work, you’ve come to the right place.

Below is a list of over 80 of the best cycling quotes and sayings.

There are bike ride quotes from celebrities and elite athletes, famous cycling quotes, funny cycling quotes, and much more!

I put this list together to help you stay motivated and keep you pushing when you hit a mental block on your rides.

Alternatively, if you’re active on social media and need a bicycle picture caption idea, you’ll find what you’re looking for towards the bottom of the page.

Without further ado, here are the best bicycle quotes:

"Ride as much or as little or as long or as short as you feel. But ride."

Eddy Merckx - Greatest Pro Cyclist of All Time

"It never gets easier. You just get faster."

Greg LeMond - American Former Pro Road Cyclist

"To know if the weather is too bad for training, put on your gear, go training, then you know when you get back."

Sean Kelly - Irish Former Pro Road Bike Rider

"Bicycling is a big part of the future. It has to be. There's something wrong with a society that drives a car to workout in a gym."

Bill Nye - American Scientist

"Beyond pain, there is a whole universe of more pain."

Jens Voigt - German Former Pro Cyclist

"There will be a lot of complaining that today was too hard, but the winners never complain."

Phill Liggett - Cycling Journalist

"It's not the falling off that hurts, it's the landing."

James Carson

I thought of that while riding my bicycle.

Albert Einstein - German Theoretical Physicist

Nothing compares to the pleasure of a bike ride.

John F. Kennedy - Former American President

Don't buy upgrades, rip up grades.

Eddy Merckx - Greatest Pro Cyclist of All Time

"Give a man a fish and feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and feed him for a lifetime. Teach a man to cycle and he will realise fishing is stupid and boring."

Desmond Tutu - Former Arch Bishop of Cape Town

"The bicycle is just as good company as most husbands, and when it gets old and shabby, a woman can dispose of it and get a new one without shocking the entire community."

Ann Strong - American Spy from the American Revolution

"Running would be much better if they invented a little seat to sit on and maybe some kind of platform for your feet to push and... Oh, wait!"

Liz Hatch - American Former Professional Road Cyclist

"My biggest fear is that when I die my wife will sell my bicycles for what I told her they cost."

Unknown

"The riskiest thing you can do is get greedy."

Lance Armstrong - American Former Professional Road Cyclist

"People love cycling, but hate cyclists."

Peter Zanzottera - Sustainable Transport Consultant

"If the hills get too hard, just get off and walk - I'm sure the boys will wait for you!"

Beryl Burton OBE - British Former Racing Cyclist

"For cardio, I dance, I ride my bike, I run, and I have kids. There is a lot of cardio just from being a parent."

Hugh Jackman - Australian Actor (Wolverine)

"If I can bicycle, I bicycle."

Sir David Attenborough - British Broadcaster & Biologist

"I want to be motivational and inspirational for everybody: my big aim is more women on bicycles."

Marianne Vos - Multi-Discipline Dutch Pro Cyclist

"Get a bicycle. You will not regret it if you live."

See Also

The 35 Best Cycling Quotes: Inspiring Bike Quotes92 Famous Bicycle Quotes: The Best Bike Ride Captions Ever44 inspirational Cycling Quotes for 2022 | Cyklopedia61 Inspirational Cycling Quotes For Every Rider

Mark Twain - American Writer & Entrepeneur

"I know that a good many champions have entertained the thought that the more they discourage youngsters, the longer they would reign.
However, this theory never impressed me, and I always made it a point to give youths the benefit of my experience in bicycle racing."

Major Taylor - American Former Pro Cyclist

"Let me tell you what I think of bicycling. I think it has done more to emancipate women than anything else in the world.
It gives women a feeling of freedom and self-reliance. I stand and rejoice every time I see a woman ride by on a wheel…the picture of free, untrammelled womanhood."

Susan B Anthony - American Women's Rights Activist

"I never think "If I crash, I'm going to hurt myself." I think, "If I crash, I'm not going to win." Everything's about that finish line."

Mark Cavendish - Professional Road Cyclist

"I'm from Holland, and I'm used to rain."

Marianne Vos - Multi-Discipline Dutch Pro Cyclist

"You can't get good by staying at home. If you want to get fast, you have to go where the fast guys are."

Steve Larsen - Former Road & MTB Pro

"Cyclists live with pain. If you can't handle it, you will win nothing."

Eddy Merckx - Greatest Pro Cyclist of All Time

"Work to eat. Eat to live. Live to bike. Bike to work."

Unknown

"People will put restrictions on your ability, on your aptitude, on your talent, on your character, and to be honest, it's just an opinion.
Don't let anyone put you in a box or draw your path for you."

Victoria Pendleton CBE - Former Pro British Track Cyclist

"Every rider trains their muscles, but few train their brain."

Mark Cavendish MBE - Professional Road Cyclist

"When your legs scream stop, and your lungs are bursting, that’s when it starts. That’s the hurt locker. Winners love it there."

Chris Mccormack - Australian Triathlete

"If you brake, you don't win."

Mario Cipollini - Itallian Former Pro Road Cyclist

"I've never met anybody who regretted taking a long ride. But I've met many who regretted not doing one."

Moods of Future Joys - Alistair Humphreys

"When it's hurting, that's when you can make a difference."

Eddy Merckx - Greatest Pro Cyclist of All Time

"Life is a long, winding hill climb. It's knackering and painful at times, but as long as you don't give in, you'll be able to look back and enjoy the view."

Unknown

"When my legs hurt, I say, "Shut up legs! Do what I tell you to do!""

Jens Voigt - German Former Pro Cyclist

Pain is temporary. It may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year, but eventually, it will subside, and something else will take its place. If I quit, however, it lasts forever.

Lance Armstrong - American Former Pro Road Cyclist

Whenever I see an adult on a bicycle, I have hope for the human race.

H.G. Wells - English Writer

Anyone who rides a bicycle is a friend of mine.

Gary Fisher - Early MTB Inventor

I'm quite mad by nature, and it's my craziness that has saved me from extinction.

Marco Pantani - Italian Pro Road Cyclist

"Pain is still the friend that always tells me the truth."

Chris Froome OBE - Tour De France Four Time Winner

"When the spirits are low, when the day appears dark, when work becomes monotonous, when hope hardly seems worth having, just mount a bicycle and go out for a spin down the road, without thought on anything but the ride you are taking."

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle - British Writer & Physician

"Focusing on a long-term goal can be disheartening when you're so far away from it, so it's vital to have ongoing targets on a daily, weekly and monthly basis."

Chris Hoy MBE - Gold Winning British Olympian

"Cycling is a good school for life. It makes you hard and gives you ambition, but you can never say you've arrived."

Eddy Merckx - Greatest Pro Cyclist of All Time

"One of the most important days of my life was when I learned to ride a bicycle."

Sir Michael Palin - English Actor

"Family does not come first. The bike does."

Sean Kelly - Irish Former Pro Road Bike Rider

"My two favourite things in life are libraries and bicycles. They both move people forward without wasting anything."

Peter Golkin - English Teacher & Avid Cyclist

"Bicycles may change, but cycling is timeless."

Zapata Espinoza - Editor of Road Bike Action

"I was six when I saw E.T. It changed my life. I wasn't interested in cycling at all before."

Chris Hoy MBE - Gold Winning British Olympian

"I relax by taking my bicycle apart and putting it back together again."

Michelle Pfeiffer - American Actor

"Lock it or lose it."

James Grear - BikeLockWiki

"Riding bicycles will not only benefit the individual doing but, but the world at large."

Udo E. Simonis - German Professor of Environmental Policy

"Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving."

Albert Einstein - German Theoretical Physicist

"Being in a team with a good atmosphere and where the people hang out, you can always outdo yourself there."

Eddy Merckx - Greatest Pro Cyclist of All Time

"No bike ride is too far when you have good company."

Unknown

"Riding a bike is everything to a cyclist. The friendship and camaraderie you have with other cyclists …to a cyclist, it was the be-all and end-all of your life."

Tommy Godwin - British Cyclist

"In sports, you always think the strongest guy should be going for it and getting the best results.
The thing is, cycling also has a very important team aspect, which I don't think a look of people fully grasp."

Chris Froome OBE - Tour De France Four Time Winner

Life's too short not to go big.

Josh Bender - Mountain Bike Hall of Fame Inductee

When you ride hard on a mountain bike, sometimes you fall, otherwise, you're not riding hard.

George W. Bush - Former American President

A bad day on the mountain bike always beats a good day in the office.

Unknown MTB Rider

"I go round and round in circles, really, really fast, on a big wooden bowl."

Victoria Pendleton CBE - British Former Pro Track Cyclist

"I was a bicycle messenger when Alkaline Trio was formed as a way to make ends meet before the band became a career, and I’ve just always been a cyclist.
I BMX’d, and then through messengering, I got really into road bikes and fixed gears, which I still have."

Matt Skiba - American Musician

"If it's not fixed, it's broken."

Unknown

"You can always add something to a bike, but you come to a point where you can take anything away, and that's a fixed-gear bike."

Graeme Obree - Scottish Former Pro Cyclist

"The most important thing is motivation - this is what you need to achieve this double.
If I win just another grand tour, it's not going to change my career, but if I achieve the double, this is something people are going to remember. I take a lot of motivation from this."

Alberto Contador - Spanish Former Pro Road Cyclist

"The bike will transform anyone who is willing to let it happen."

Ina-Yoko Teutenberg - German Former Road Bike Pro

"As long as I breathe, I attack."

Bernard Hinault - French Former Pro Road Cyclist

"Your bike is just a noun. It's just an object. It will do what you want it to do. There is no reason why it won't."

Harry Main - British Pro BMX Rider

"I believe BMX has shaped me into who I am today, so if this journey never would have begun, then who knows the person I would be or what I would be doing with my life."

Donny Robinson - American Pro BMX Rider

"I don't ride to add days to my life, I ride to add life to my days."

Unknown - Rad BMXer

"Of all paths you take in life, make sure a few of them are dirt."

John Muir - Scottish-American Naturalist

"A bicycle ride around the world begins with a single pedal stroke."

Scott Stoll - Round the World Cycling Addict

"It is by riding a bicycle that you learn the contours of a country best since you have to sweat up the hills and coast down them."

Ernest Hemmingway - American Novelist

"A raggedy ride beats a dressed-up walk."

Simon Peat

"You can't buy happiness, but you can buy a bike, and that's pretty close."

Unknown

"Your legs are not giving out. Your mind is giving up."

Unknown

"The only bad ride is the one that didn't happen."

Unknown

"No time is ever wasted when it's spent on two wheels"

Unknown

"Sometimes I wonder if my bike is thinking about me too."

Unknown

"Feeling like a little kid again."

Unknown

"Just a couple of pedal pushers."

Unknown

"Rolling into the best days of summer."

Unknown

"Better than a Peleton class."

Unknown

And there you have it, one of the longest and best lists of bicycle quotes and bike sayings you’ll find.

I hope you enjoyed reading through the list because I enjoyed compiling this cycling quote collection.

My favourite bicycle quote from this list is: “Beyond pain, there is a whole universe of more pain.” – Jens Voigt (German former pro cyclist).

Let others know your favourite cycling quote in the comments section below!

If I’ve missed a bike quote that needs to be added, let me know, and I’ll add it so the next reader can enjoy it!

If you’ve read through the complete list, you love cycling, so whilst I have your attention, ensure you take care of your bike and always secure it with a good quality lock.

• 11th Dec 2023: We reviewed this article to improve user experience on mobile and made minor changes to some quotes for readability purposes.