Cycling doesn’t make it onto regular T.V. much in North America. At least not compared to Europe, where every prominent pro seems to end up on Dancing With the Stars so frequently we had to cut reality T.V. out of this review. In fact, cycling’s on T.V. in North America so little, we had to include the U.K. to get a proper list.

So, here’s our list of the best time bikes or their riders made cameos on T.V. programming. Aside, as mentioned from Peter Sagan (and Maja Wloszczowska) appearing on their national Dancing With the Stars – and Wout van Aert’s Masked Singer. Ok, cyclists spend a weird amount of time on reality T.V., mostly outside of North America. So let’s just put aside all reality T.V., that way we don’t have to talk about Lance on Stars on Mars. 

Girls 5Eva – Cycling arms 

Cycling might seem like a surprising reoccurring character in a show about ageing pop stars trying to reclaim their youthful success, but it actually fits quite well. What’s a better complement to the ageing pop start than a MAMIL chasing his dreams of athletic prowess on weekends? And Girls 5Eva is both accurate, funny and kind with its MAMIL character, the Dawn’s husband, Scott. From saying he doesn’t trust the Dali Lama because he lives in the Himalayas and doesn’t ride a mountain bike to cheering for “Pescal Pacos” at Tour de Fresno because “he was a forceps baby so he just slices through the wind.” The best moment, though, is the “cycling arms” bit.

That’s all in the first season. In the second season, the husband confesses. “I did something weird. I bought a gravel bike. It cost four grand and I can’t return it because it’s built to your heel-to-crotch ratio.”

The Seinfeld bikes

Ever present, never ridden, Seinfeld’s bikes were a character of their own. Reflective of the mountain bike boom in the 90’s, the bikes hung in the background collecting dust, season after season. The actual bike changed. There was a Cannondale, a Specialized and, most famously, the green Klein. At least Seinfeld had good taste in bikes, even if he never rode them.

Monty Python’s Bicycle Repair Man (S1 Ep.3 )

Turning the clock back, waaaay back to 1969 and the first season of Monty Python’s Flying Circus, (specifically, episode three: How to Recognise Different Types of Trees From Quite a Long Way Away) we get the Bicycle Repair Man. In a world of super heroes, it is the humble bicycle repair man who saves the day. We think bicycle mechanics are always super heroes in real life, saving our bikes from abuse and our own misguided attempts at home repair. We also wish there was a roaming bicycle repair van that showed up every time we had a flat.

Stranger Things 

Bikes are a constant theme in Stranger Things, until the grand finale. Right from the first episode where the kids use bikes to evade the authorities and hide Eleven. Bikes are at their best in the show: giving kids freedom to roam the adult world and, for us viewers, letting us go back to bikes as a way to escape the pressures of grown-up life, even if just temporarily.

Malcolm in the Middle – Speed walking as a proxy for Master’s racing

When Hal gets into speed walking its, well, clearly only sort of about speed walking. Bryan Cranston’s hyper competitive weekend warrior is a pitch-perfect send-up of cycling’s MAMIL culture. Excessive spandex, expensive gear, dubious aero gains are all dragged in service of turning a fun hobby into something twisted and a little too serious. The worst part is Malcolm in the Middle’s mocking of aero gear doesn’t look as silly as the latest pro helmets. Ok, that’s a stretch. It does. But it’s, sadly, kind of a fair fight these days.

Perhaps you doubt this is a very thinly veiled send-up of cycling? You might have a point, until Hal’s rival utters my least favourite saying in cycling: “On your left!”

The Simpsons – Bart’s bike

Homer buys Bart a bike, or a bicycle-shaped-object, struggles to put it together, then it collapses immediately. Then Bart gets a real bike and joins the local bike gang of youth. It’s simple, it’s short, it’s great.

The Simpsons – The biker bar

Two or three decades later, Simpsons viewers return to two wheels to make fun of amateur cycling. Principal Skinner and a Superintendent Chalmers accidentally walk into a biker bar while on a road trip. Only it’s the other kind of biker bar, serving hits of pure oxygen instead of bottles of beer. Hilarity ensues.

The Simpsons parodies the cycling scene: Official Thrillhouse verdict

The Bear

In the fourth episode of the second season of The Bear, the chef stops to help an injured cyclist. Sad, but this is a part of cycling in cities that is never far from mind.

Family Guy – “And it’s a great way to stay in shape”

The weather person interviews “rides a 10-speed everywhere guy” who can’t stop saying “and it’s a great way to stay in shape.” It’s Family Guy, so it obviously goes in a very weird direction from there. But it’s a good knock on how everyone else sees cyclists who still head out there in bad weather.

Benny Hill – Hospital escape on BMX

A classic!