Field notes 4 MIN READ
Gifts for a cyclist who owns everything
They have the bottles, the socks and three sets of tyre levers. What is left is the one category that cannot be bought in advance.
The problem with cyclists is that everything they need is a known quantity they have already optimised. Bottles, socks, bar tape, tools — all replaceable, all already chosen more carefully than you would choose them.
What is left is the category that cannot exist until they have done something.
The one question to ask
*What was the best ride you did this year?*
Every cyclist has an answer to this and it comes out immediately. It is almost never the longest, the fastest or the one with the most climbing. It is the one where the weather turned, or the one where they went further than planned because it was too good to stop, or the one with the three punctures.
That is the ride. Not the palmarès one.
Getting the file
Once you know which ride, the file is two clicks from the activity. If you would rather not ask, most people will send a GPX without thinking much about why.
If you want them to choose, a gift card is the more honest instrument: they connect the account, pick the route themselves, and the surprise is the object rather than the route.
What to put on it
The ride's real name. Whatever they called it on the day. "Sjælland Rundt" is fine; "1 færge, 2 friske fyre, 3 punkteringer" is better, and it is the sort of thing they actually typed into the activity title.
The date. The most under-chosen and most durable element.
Elevation, if there was any. For a cyclist this is the number that means the most, and it is the one that separates a long ride from a hard one.
Skip average speed. It is the number that ages worst and the one they have the most opinions about.
Format
50×70 for a ride with real shape. 30×40 for a workshop or a desk, where it will be seen from a metre.
Frame it. An unframed print in a tube gets to a cyclist's to-do list and stays there for about eleven months.
Questions people actually ask
- How do I know which ride to pick?
- Ask what the best ride of the year was. Cyclists answer this instantly and at length, and the answer is rarely the longest one.
- What if I get the wrong one?
- A gift card lets them pick the ride themselves, which is often the better move for a route you were not on.
- Can I give it without asking them first?
- Yes, if you have the file. If you do not, asking is not much of a spoiler — 'send me the GPX of that ride' gives very little away.
- Do they need Strava?
- No. A file from any watch or head unit works, and a route they planned but rode is fine too.
YOURS, FROM A FILE, IN 90 SECONDS
One effort. One sheet of paper.
Bring the file and every choice is yours: treatment, colour, which numbers come along. Museum-grade 250 gsm matte, printed in Denmark, shipped in a tube with a nail taped inside.
Print it. FROM 349 kr