Cycling used to be simple. Joyful. Childlike.
Then somewhere along the way, it became too serious - all carbon, Lycra and KOMs. Joyrider is the antidote: a celebration of riding for the purest reason of all… because it turns ordinary days into good days.
The most inspiring book ever written about cycling for the sheer joy of it. Read it, and you’ll want to grab a bike and steal some days for fun.
Chris Ward needed more fun in his days, and so he returned to the one thing that gave him the most joy as a teenager: riding a bike and coming up with crazy ideas to go for a joyride on it. What started as an escape from the mundane became a life of joyful adventures.
Now, after pedalling through more than 80 countries - from India to North Korea, from Saudi Arabia to the Greek mountains he now calls home - Chris shares his inspiring, funny and unexpectedly moving stories from living life by bike.
From cycling across Britain without a mobile phone, to climbing to Mount Everest base camp by bike, to riding twenty miles with his daughter to visit Harry Styles’ favourite chip shop, Joyrider shows how any ride can reconnect you to joy, presence and purpose.
This book is for anyone who wants to feel more alive. It’s a reminder that adventure isn’t something other people do. It’s something we can all do.
Because life isn’t about the destination.
And neither is cycling.
It’s about stealing days to ride
and enjoying the simple moments that make you feel human again.
It’s about becoming a Joyrider - and having more fun, any day you need it.
INTRODUCTION
As a kid, I wasn’t great at sports or schoolwork, so my bike became my escape route. It gave me friends, freedom, and a way of exploring a world much bigger than the one I felt trapped in. I wasn’t particularly great at cycling either - most of my memories involve doing something stupid: getting caught by my mum, riding further from home than I was allowed, pedalling into the back of a parked car while talking to my friend, and once badly falling off while I was trying to carry my Action Man around to my friend’s house - I survived - with a scar – to match the one on Acton Mans face – luckily, it’s still the worst accident I’ve ever had.
What I was good at, though, was coming up with reasons to ride somewhere.
To the beach - even though it was ten times further than I’d ever ridden.
To watch my local football team play an away game.
To race my mates round the lake.
To cycle to my first girlfriend’s house.
To go camping with no plan other than “let’s see what happens.”
In fact, most of my rides still have no plan other than to see what happens.
These were the innocent days before responsibility, before mortgages and meetings and the pressure to be a sensible adult. Riding my bike wasn’t just exercise. It wasn’t just transport. It gave me joy.
Years later, when adult life became heavier - work stress, family pressures, the sense that I was losing the real me - I remembered how those childhood joyrides had made me feel. And I realised my way back wasn’t complicated. I just needed to start coming up with reasons to ride again.
These rides, big and small, have given me everything I was missing: happiness, freedom, good health, a clearer head, time outside, adventure, friendship, perspective and always a new learning about myself or the world.
Many of those can be found in just a few hours, cycling from home. But as I got braver, the rides grew - from Brownies to the Andes, from local group rides to 100 miles in whichever direction the wind is blowing, from taking my bike on family holidays to riding it to Star Wars locations in Tunisia.
I’m certainly not a great cyclist, but I have an unshakable belief in the goodness of people - and that belief is what turned my joyrides into a new way of seeing the world… and myself.
I hope the pages that follow inspire you to discover your own joyrides. I’ve included my favourite rides, everything I’ve learnt and needed that is useful and answered the questions I am most commonly asked.
Joyriders don’t have to be fast, fit or fearless to feel alive. We just need a bike, a reason, and a day or two to steal.
Welcome to Joyrider.
INDEX
PROLOGUE - FROM COUCH TO JOYRIDING
Everything you need to get started.
Like life, there are seven stages to joyriding…
STAGE 1 - SMALL RIDES OF JOY
To Save on Buying a Car
To Visit the Best Coffee Shops
To Visit the Monopoly Board in Real Life
To cycle ahead of my wife when driving anywhere
To Ride 100 Miles in Whatever Direction the Wind Is Blowing
To Get My Baby on a Bike ASAP
To Take the Neighbours’ Kids to a Five-Star Hotel
To Go to the Pub with My Brownie Daughter
To Take a Child Riding in Lycra for the First Time
To Ride with My Daughter Around an Olympic Velodrome
To take my bike on family holidays
To commute on an inappropriate bike
To Ride Around the M25 (London ring road)
To Visit Every Football Ground in the city
STAGE 2 – MULTI-DAY JOYRIDES
To Ride Land’s End to John O’Groats
To Visit 33 Brewery Taprooms in 33 Days
To Ride 500km Without My Mobile Phone
To Ride the Tour de France Route
To ride around the Monaco F1 Track
To try mountain biking
STAGE 3 - JOYRIDES WITH BENEFITS
To Find Friendship
To Find My Tribe
To Be in Nature
To Clear My Head
To Be Fitter
To Work Anywhere in the World
To Ride with Old People
To Be Able to Eat Whatever I Want
STAGE 4 - INTERNATIONAL JOYRIDES
To Ride Across America to see if it really is fucking mad
To ride to Obi-Wan Kenobi’s home in Star Wars
To ride back in time
To ride to where the Beatles hung out in India
To ride across the Andes
To ride to the world’s Most Iconic Recording Studios
To ride to Mount Everest
To ride to the Oldest City on Earth
STAGE 5 – JOYRIDES OF THE HEART
To Have a Cycling Holiday with My Wife
To Cycle to Where All My Children Go to University
To Have My Last Ride with My Father
To Save My Marriage
To Visit the Chip Shop Harry Styles Had Been To
STAGE 6 – CHALLENGING JOYRIDES
To enter a race
To Ride the Hardest One-Day Race in the World
To become the Oldest Brit to ride Something Ridiculously Tough
To Ride My Last Race
To Ride the Longest Distance on the Shortest Day
STAGE 7 - JOYRIDES THAT HAD A DIFFERENT ENDING THAN I PLANNED
To Ride in a Different Culture
- But Discover the Friendliest Country in the World
To Ride through Ancient Greece
- But Discover Paradise
To Ride Across Northern India
- But End Up in a Crying Mess
To Ride Abroad with Friends
- But Discover I Prefer Doing It on My Own
To start a cycling holiday business
- but end up on telly.
STAGE WINNERS - HOW TO DO IT YOURSELF
What I’ve learnt
What you need
FAQ’s
SAMPLE CHAPTERS
TO VISIT A CHIP SHOP, HARRY STYLES HAD BEEN TO
London – St Albans - London
