Christmas gifts for cyclists: the ride, not more kit

A personalised route print of a ride from Brighton pier up Ditchling Beacon, drawn in gold on a navy sheet with the speed in miles an hour and the climb in feet

Buying kit for a cyclist is risky. They have opinions about saddles, tyre widths and which lights are worth having, and they probably bought the good version already. A ride they are proud of is safer ground: a first hundred miles, the sportive they trained all summer for, the climb they finally got up without stopping. The route print draws that ride from the file their computer or watch recorded.

Which ride to choose

  • A climb with a name. Our example is a ride from Brighton pier up Ditchling Beacon, with the speed in miles an hour and the climb in feet; Box Hill's Zig Zag Road or a col from a cycling holiday works the same way.
  • A sportive or a charity ride. Many organisers publish the course as a GPX file before the day, which helps if their own device died halfway round.
  • The club's Sunday loop, or the commute they have ridden a thousand times. A short loop prints well because the map is framed to fit it.

Getting the ride file quietly

The print reads GPX and TCX files. On Strava, open the ride on the website (the phone app doesn't export), click the ⋯ menu under the title and choose Export GPX. Garmin Connect, Wahoo, Komoot, Coros and Polar all export GPX too. FIT files aren't read yet, and Strava's bulk export is a zip of FIT files, so export the single ride instead. If you can't get at their account, a riding friend who was there may have recorded the same route.

The file is read on your own device and never uploaded; only the line is kept. The map behind it is our own, framed to the route, with no labels or pins, so a ride that starts from the front door doesn't print a street name.

What the print shows

The line itself, alone on cream, blush, meadow, ink or midnight paper, or over our own map with no labels. Under the title sits the climb as a filled profile, then distance, time, speed and total climb in a row, in kilometres or miles. Only the numbers the file holds are printed: a ride recorded without heights prints no profile, and an organiser's course file has the line but not their time. An indoor turbo session has no route at all, so choose an outdoor ride.

Add a title, where and when, and a line of your own: the café stop, the puncture count, or what they said at the top. If they ride it faster next year, open the saved design, swap the file and order another.

Runners and walkers in the family

The same print takes runs and walks. Our marathon runner gift page covers race files and the built-in London Marathon course, and gifts for walkers covers long-distance paths. For a T-shirt or mug rather than a print, our Bicycle Rest Day design is a lighter option, and there are Love From designs for Box Hill and Ditchling, the village below the Beacon.

Route prints are made to order in the UK once you approve the artwork; check the delivery estimate on the product page before counting on it for Christmas.