Cycling and mental health are often intertwined within the same conversation. For good reason. This sport has been shown to have a profound effect on people’s mental health (perhaps even your own). But that’s a big term – mental health – what does it mean?

From the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC):

“Mental health includes our emotional, psychological, and social well-being. It affects how we think, feel, and act. It also helps determine how we handle stress, relate to others, and make healthy choices.”

Our mood regulation, how we interact with people, what we remember, our ability to process information, the way we see ourselves…anything and everything in life can be linked back to and influenced by our mental states. So it goes without saying that taking care of it is important…but how do we do so?

Well, it looks like our sport is one we can rely on when it comes to mental health. IF we use it properly, that is.

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Movement & the Accessibility of Cycling

We are not made to sit still. What many people don’t realize is that your brain is actually built on movement. From the time you were a toddler and throughout the duration of your life, movement has been the bridge between your mind and the outside world. It only makes sense that we need copious amounts of it to keep us healthy.

Modern lifestyles have done their best to divorce people from movement. Our jobs are sedentary, we drive, we “relax”, we watch TV, we go on our phones…it goes against the grain of millions of years of evolution. If you look at a baby they are constantly fidgeting, moving, reaching, exploring – it’s an inherent impulse deep, deep inside our nervous system. One that can always be reignited, even if it’s been ignored or suppressed for years on end. 

Cycling is something almost everybody can do. Most of us learn to ride bikes when we’re kids, and it’s something we never really forget. This partly explains the explosion of popularity the sport has experienced over the past decades. You don’t have to join a team or get a membership, you just need a bike, and the rest of the world is yours to explore. 

Cycling & Mental Health

There are several reasons why cycling is one of the best exercises for your mental health. Exercise in general has been shown time and time again to be a crucial component in the mitigation of mental health problems, especially commonly experienced conditions such as anxiety and depression.

Cardiovascular exercise in particular has a profound effect on cognitive function and the stability of someone’s mental state. The constant pumping of blood and repetitive movements in sports such as cycling help to circulate nutrients, oxygen and neurochemicals like dopamine and serotonin to keep your organs and tissues healthy, while at the same time making you feel good, satisfied and rewarded for your efforts. 

The after effects of a ride or other physical activity are long lasting, and also contribute to you sleeping more deeply at night, lowering your stress levels, increasing your sex drive and maintaining a healthy body composition. If you view your cycling regimen from a zoomed out perspective and stretched over time, you’re going to look better, feel better and have an improved self-image. All significant factors in keeping your mind healthy. 

Being Outside & Social Connection

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Two other important aspects of our sport when it comes to mental health are the outdoor element and the exciting social opportunities. 

Being outside in new environments and natural surroundings are both stimulating and salutary parts of the human experience. We are products of the environment, and it’s an ancient yearning within us all to be a part of it in some way. Think about the proclivity towards an activity like camping, even among homebodies. Cycling takes us there, and anywhere we can really imagine.

When you start riding you also instantly become a part of a new community. Humans are social beings, and we need to find relatability and commonality within other members of our tribe. Riding is a surefire way to do just that, and you’re guaranteed to find a cycling group or club that goes out for rides in or around your town. Even our equipment and apparel, which outsiders love to taunt, is something that unites us and automatically signals another tribe member from afar.

As alluded to at the beginning of this article, mental health is a massive term, and it has many components that contribute to its fitness and longevity. Being in tune with the harmony of human nature, by being outside and connecting with others, heightens our chances for a sound relationship within the mind, and are things that the essence of cycling naturally adopts.

Avoiding the Masochistic Trap

We must be careful of just one thing, and that is the often romanticized idea of working yourself to death on the bike. Cycling’s low intensity/high volume repetition allows people to train and race for hours on end, covering tens to hundreds of miles. It is one of the joys within our sport that we have the freedom to cover such distances and put in so many hours. But it is also a risk.

A healthy reminder that learning to push yourself is good, and learning how to use your bike regeneratively and therapeutically is just as valuable. Like anything, exercise/cycling can be addictive, and it’s possible to have too much of something good. The bike will always be there to pedal, it never gets tired, but you do, and you should never let it take you farther than you can go.

Cycling for Health, Longevity & Performance 

If you’re looking to build a strong and balanced body that allows you to be the best cyclist you can be, consider joining our community over at Dynamic Cyclist. We’ve developed a 100% online, fully interactive, follow along training platform for cyclists that helps you ride pain free to the best of your abilities. Sign up for a 7-day free trial by clicking here!