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I came out for exercise, gentle exercise and to notice the scenery and to botanise. And no sooner do I get on that accursed machine than off I go hammer and tongs; I never look to right or left, never notice a flower, never see a view – get hot, juicy, red – like a grilled chop. Get me on that machine and I have to go. I go scorching along the road and cursing aloud at myself for doing it

Learn to ride a bicycle. You will not regret it if you live

It’s one of the worst things in the world to wake up and not see your bike where you left it

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

I was bought a nice racing bike for my eleventh birthday and I got the bug… I suddenly thought: I’m on my own! My parents aren’t here. It’s quite good!

I thought of that while riding my bicycle

Don’t buy upgrades, ride up grades

Let a man find himself, in distinction from others, on top of two wheels with a chain – at least in a poor country like Russia – and his vanity begins to swell out like his tyres

As a kid I had a dream – I wanted to own my own bicycle. When I got the bike I must have been the happiest boy in Liverpool, maybe the world. I lived for that bike. Most kids left their bike in the backyard at night. Not me. I insisted on taking mine indoors and the first night I even kept it in my bed

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. Thus you remember them as they actually are, while in a motor car only a high hill impresses you, and you have no such accurate remembrance of country you have driven through as you gain by riding a bicycle