Tom’s top 5 cycling books
Sharing the best of the 45 cycling books I have read over the past 4 years
Four years ago, I resolved to revive my long-lost love of reading. I became an avid reader with history, self help, and cycling books prominent on my bookshelf.
Bicycle touring books are my favorites. Goodreads tells me that I have read forty-five books authored by bicycle tourists. I am drawn to these books that highlight constant learning, personal change, inspiring moments, overcoming challenges, and revealing one’s inner self.
Tom’s top five cycling reads
Miles from Nowhere
Around the World Bicycle Adventure
Barbara Savage chronicles her husband and her 1978-80 around-the-world bicycle tour. Bicycle tourists often cite it as their favorite read. I agree. It tells an amazing story of touring exotic places before the advent of smartphones, Garmins, Google Maps, and modern technology.
The story is one of discovering a new world every day filled with excitement, and out-of-the-ordinary challenges, which ends with the joy of achievement. Savage draws you in with her words on her journey that relied on printed maps, word of mouth, intuition, and her drive to explore.
Quondam
Travels in a Once World
John Devoy authored this book over 30 years after he set out on a 33,000-kilometer two-year journey by bike from the top of Norway to Cape Town, South Africa. Quondam chronicles this tour’s adventures from Cairo to Nairobi where, like Barbara Savage, he was driven to persevere to reach his destination in the pre-internet age.
This book shines with Devoy’s storytelling. His detailed tour journals and memories vividly depict his days on the bike. He contrasts this with his present-day visits to Africa where cycling through tire-sucking sand, riding on top of a cargo-laden truck beds and crossing rivers on questionable boats have been replaced with modern highways and bridges.
Just Ride
A Radically Practical Guide to Riding Your Bike
Grant Peterson challenges cyclists on their views of cycling, bikes, and fellow cyclists. He had an impressive history in the bicycle industry before setting out to manufacture high-quality bikes. This is his honest frank view of the many facets of the cycling world.
He embraces cycling as being for everyone, not just Lycra-clad Tour de cyclists. His worldview Is that the cycling world places too much emphasis on these cyclists tainting the public and would-be cyclists’ view of cyclists and cycling. He challenges the reader to adopt a more comprehensive view of why cycling is for everyone.
Thunder and Sunshine
Around the World by Bike, Part Two
I am a fan of Alastair Humphrey, his writings, and his philosophy that exploring the world around us is for everyone. This is the second of the two-book chronicle of his 4+ year around-the-world bicycle tour. He gives detailed insight into the challenges that a cyclist faces and overcomes in a solo long-distance bicycle tour.
Challenges overcome are often my favorite part of a bicycle touring book. Humphrey’s cycling through Siberian winter with -40-degree days remains fresh in my memories. His insights on how our mind both limits and motivates us to reach seemingly unobtainable goals and overcome perceived and real obstacles are priceless.
Old Man on a Bicycle
A Ride Across America and How to Realize a More Enjoyable Old Age
The subtitle enticed me to read this book. I am constantly evolving on what makes old age more enjoyable. A bicycle ride across America with that subtitle made it must-read. Don Petterson was a novice cyclist who set out to cycle across America with zero experience in bicycle touring.
This book is mostly Peterson’s daily journal. The daily entries tell the story of change and transformation. His mileage increased, his cycling style and ability increased, and he transformed as a person finding the bike as the vehicle to an enjoyable older life as he headed west.
Honorable mentions
It was difficult to find the stars among my forty-five reads. Here are some Miss Congenialities that deserve a spot on your to-read bookshelf.
Unchained: One Woman, One Bike, One Dream... One World by Rubina Soorty is an inspiring read of a solo female cyclist around the world journey that has many unexpected moments and an ending you will remember.
Half the World Away: A 27,000 km bicycle journey from Alaska to Argentina by Ian Lacey is the best book I have read on cycling from the northernmost point to the Southernmost point of the Americas.
Ten Lessons from the Road by Alastair Humphreys is a quick read where Humphrey highlights ten lessons a bicycle tourist learns when discovering the world by bike no matter how long or short the ride.
Bonus: Tom’s best lesson learned from a book
Every F*cking Inch (EFI) Club
Well into his epic tour, Ian Lacey in Half the World Away encountered a seasoned bicycle tourist with many years of epic bicycle tours under his tires. Lacey shared his view of the importance of cycling every mile on his journey. The seasoned bicycle tourist’s response follows. It’s a lesson in not allowing preconceived limitations and unrealistic expectations to prevent you from celebrating an achievement.
It’s just that sometimes I meet these people – and believe me, after 20 years of touring, I’ve met a lot of ‘em – who are determined to ride every fucking inch. I call them the ‘EFI club’. I’ve seen a lot who get angry with themselves if they don’t do it, as if they won’t win their badge of honor on completion.
Quoted from Half the World Away by Ian Lacey
Continue your reading
Old Man on a Bicycle: A Ride Across America and How to Realize a More Enjoyable Old Age
Half the World Away: A 27,000 km bicycle journey from Alaska to Argentina
Happy reading on the trails!
Tom on the Trails
I just finished "Full Tilt" by Dervla Murphy. It's right at the top of my list (as are most of them at the point I finish one!)
Not only were her circumstances extraordinary, she offers a view of the Middle East and Asia (mostly, Afghanistan and Pakistan) that is 180 deg opposite our popular stereotypes.. She leaves us with the idea that values are not universal, but cultural, raising the question, "Who are we to assert that our Western values are in any way superior to those in the middle East?" What we in the West consider "right" is not necessarily right everywhere.
Have you read Get Up and Ride? It's an easy and enjoyable read.