Meet Office Tour de France Tim – The Cyclist Who’s Always “Out of Office” (Literally)
Office Tour de France Tim cycles more than he works. Always “out of office,” always doing a charity ride, and always drenched in Lycra. The coworker who turned his midlife crisis into a sport.
Have you ever worked with someone whose entire personality revolves around their bike?
Ladies and gentlemen, meet Office Tour de France Tim — the man who pedals harder than he works and has more Lycra than sense.
Tim loves his bike.
Correction: Tim is his bike.
Ever since he was a toddler, he’s been glued to one. Three-wheelers, choppers, BMXs, racers, mountain bikes — if it had wheels and could be pedalled, Tim mastered it before he could spell “stabilisers.” Most kids spent weekends playing football or gaming. Tim spent his cycling across counties like a tiny Tour de France hopeful with a lunchbox strapped to the handlebars.
James Mason
He’s done it all — tournaments, long-distance rides, London to Brighton, charity events, you name it. He genuinely believed he would one day wear the yellow jersey… until reality hit him harder than a crosswind on an Alpine descent. His girlfriend got pregnant, adulthood arrived early, and suddenly the only thing he was riding was a 9–5 job at the local bike shop to pay for baby number one.
Then baby number two.
Then three, four, five…
Six kids, even Tim lost count.
With each new child came more stress, more responsibility, and significantly more drinking “to cope.” His Tour de France dream faded faster than his hairline.
But Tim is a fighter.
He studied at night school, got himself an NVQ in Business, and upgraded his salary from “bike shop apprentice” to “just above minimum wage.” Over the years, he clawed his way up to director level at a corporation, which nobody understands, because he’s never actually been in the building.
James Mason
Because now he cycles to work.
And cycles during work.
And cycles instead of work.
Tim is forever doing charity bike rides, all over the country and sometimes across continents. His out-of-office email is practically a permanent fixture:
“I am currently participating in a 900-mile charity ride across North Africa.
If your request is urgent, please contact literally anyone else.”
On the rare occasion Tim joins a call, he’s usually halfway up a mountain, sweating, panting, and shouting into his headset over the wind:
“SORRY — BAD SIGNAL — I’M AT 4,000 FEET ELEVATION — CAN THIS WAIT!?”
Delegation has become his ultimate superpower.
Why do something yourself when you can palm it off to someone else while raising awareness for a charity you can’t pronounce?
But here’s what really makes Tim peak annoying:
- He arrives at work in full Lycra, dripping with sweat, as if the office corridor is the final kilometre of a mountain stage.
- He won’t stop talking about cadence, even though nobody cares and nobody asked.
- Every Monday morning starts with his Strava screenshot, unprovoked, in the team chat.
- He describes normal things with cycling metaphors:
- “We need to gear down on this task.”
- “Let’s pace ourselves.”
- “I’m drafting behind Finance this quarter.”
- He eats like he’s on a competitive tour — six bananas a day, protein bars everywhere, and energy gels that look suspiciously like toothpaste.
- He judges you if you take the lift, and you can feel it.
- His bike is worth more than your car.
- He parks it in the office like it's a registered emotional support animal.
James Mason
Tim is the man who never made the Tour de France, so he turned the office into his personal peloton — and now we're all trapped in his midlife crisis on wheels.
