Cycling Level is a data-driven cycling standards platform created by Michael Clark in 2021. Our 2026 standards analyse 360,231 rides submitted by 124,328 users from 2021 to 2026 to compare your cycling performance with other cyclists, accounting for gender, distance and age.
Cycling Level covers 23 standard distances across sprints, shorter rides and endurance cycling, including 100m, 1k, 5k, 10k, 40k, 100k and 100 miles. These standards help you understand how fast you are and set realistic goals for speed, endurance and ride times.
We build our current standards from carefully filtered calculator results submitted by cyclists. We check for implausible times, duplicates, automated entries and unusual submission patterns before fitting the models. This allows us to publish community-based standards from short sprints to long endurance events. Where a distance does not have its own model, we estimate its standards from related events.
The Cycling Level Calculator takes in your distance and time and compares your performance with cyclists of the same gender and age. It can then tell you your percentile and level from Beginner to Elite plus extra stats like equivalent times for other distances, speed, estimated power, watts per kilogram, functional threshold power (FTP) and effective VO2 max estimates. Then our Cycling Times allow you to browse and analyse male and female standards across ages and distances.
Cycling Level has used age adjusted percentile ratings since its launch in 2021. The framework comes from Strength Level, which introduced data-backed percentile standards in 2015 using levels from Beginner to Elite. Using a percentile scale makes performance comparable across distances while accounting for gender and age. Beginner means faster than 5% of cyclists, Novice 20%, Intermediate 50%, Advanced 80%, and Elite 95%.
Learn more about using Cycling Level in our FAQ, or read more about Strength Level.
This timeline follows the development and launch of Cycling Level, using our research records and public web archives.
Strength Level defined Beginner, Novice, Intermediate, Advanced and Elite at the 5th, 20th, 50th, 80th and 95th percentiles. Cycling Level later applied that exact scale to cycling so a ride could be interpreted in the same language as a lift, run or row. See the Strength Level standards timeline.
The first Cycling Level distance standards were implemented on . Before launch, the calculator was rebuilt around published cycling formulae that estimate the power needed for a speed, with bodyweight carried through the standards for male and female cyclists.
Power, watts per kilogram, FTP and effective VO2 max joined the time and speed result in early December. Strength Level introduced Cycling Level across the public fitness network on . Compare the current calculator with the earliest useful public archive.
A shared site switcher connected Cycling Level with Strength Level, Running Level, Rowing Level and Swimming Level. This completed a consistent path between five sports that all explain performance using the same explicit percentile thresholds and five ability names.
In September, we developed our first cycling standards based on performances submitted by Cycling Level users. We built the new approach around the speed cyclists sustained over a distance, making their own ride times the foundation of the comparison. This gave cyclists community benchmarks for assessing a performance and setting their next goal.
We modelled individual distances and explored how best to connect them. The selected approach captured the range of cycling speeds and used results from 5k to 40k to model how performance changes over longer rides. We also included a separate male 100k model, bringing more evidence from endurance cycling into the standards.
The new model added 100m, 200m and 500m standards. We used the patterns in 1k results to develop these shorter comparisons and refined the fast top end using track-record benchmarks. Together, the sprint and endurance models created one set of standards for exploring performances from a short cycling sprint to a 200k ride.
Bodyweight is used for the power, calorie and VO2 max estimates. Earlier versions used different assumptions. See how bodyweight is used in the selected version.
Michael Clark is Cycling Level's founder and lead developer. He holds a master's degree in Computer Science from the University of Cambridge and previously worked as a Technical Lead at Redgate Software. Since launching Cycling Level in 2021, he has led its product, data, web, mobile, infrastructure and operations. Read more about Michael Clark's work, or get in touch to report a problem or suggest an improvement through our feedback form, email support@strengthlevel.com, or Facebook page.
Strength Level Limited (company number 14076102) was incorporated in England and Wales on 28 April 2022. It operates Cycling Level, which Michael originally launched in 2021, and the wider Strength Level family of fitness standards websites.
Cycling Level continues to improve through feedback from cyclists, coaches and researchers. We are grateful to everyone who has helped us identify errors, improve the standards and make the site more useful.