Katovsky Bill - Bike for life: how to ride to 100-- and beyond

PRAISE FOR BIKE FOR LIFE

I love riding my bike. But I really love riding my bike with Roy Wallack, a pleasure Ive enjoyed a few times over the years. Sure, we fall into rhythms and enjoy the scenery. But riding with Roy is really about listening to stories, and he has a million of them. Thats what sets Bike for Life apart from any other bicycle book. Roy Wallack is the most entertaining writer on two wheels youll ever have the pleasure of reading. Enjoy the training tips and the sage advice and the inspiration. But also settle back and enjoy the ride. Read about Roys honeymoon on a tandem, his ride with a kick-butt, one-armed mountain biker, his ride up the worlds steepest sea-to-summit mountain, his encounters with legendary cyclistsand cyclists who deserve to be legends. Roy fits that latter category. Hes a legend in my mindthe rare writer who can convey tons of practical information along with a deep appreciation for what makes cycling the ultimate pathway to fitness. Its the same thing that makes Bike for Life a great read: Its just plain fun.ROBERT EARLE HOWELLS, former Editor-at-Large of National Geographic Adventure and 2009 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year Silver Award

True, the bike industry is made up of many strange creatures, but of us all, few are as strange as Roy Wallack. At the start of many a group ride, as the rest of us primp and use carpenter levels to ensure a solidly level saddle, Roy will be over in the corner stretching and breathing loudly through his nose. That dude is bizarre, we reassure ourselves as we do our best to catch a reflection of our bikes in the mirror-like surfaces of our shaved legs.

But now heres a book with verifiable stories of old dudes riding their bikes well into their late 90s. It talks about how diet, stretching, and cross-training regimens will help. Apparently, our steady regimen of leg shaving brings nothing more valuable than group consciousness to our pedaling efforts. Imagine, riding into your 90sha, we should all be so lucky....

Maybe Roy is onto something with all that heavy breathing.ZAPATA ESPINOZA, Editor, Road Bike Action Magazine, and Mountain Bike Hall of Famer

Roy celebrated his 50th birthday on a team with me at the 2006 Primal Quest, a weeklong, round-the-clock 300-mile adventure race of mountain biking, white-water kayaking, backpacking, rappelling, rope climbing. He was 10 to 20 years older than the rest of us. We all broke down at one time or anotherexcept him. Now, a decade later, still hammering hard, he lays out his plan here in Bike for Life to keep living life all-out for another 50 years. It involves a lot of hard work and enthusiasm but really comes down to what I call the Wallack Way: Dont slow down! Keep pedaling! Keep seeing the world! Keep pushing your limits! This engaging how-to book, suffused with inspirational adventures and profiles of older riders doing amazing things, can change your life, on the bike and off of it.STEPHEN REGENOLD, Syndicated Columnist and Editor/Founder of GearJunkie.com

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Roy M. Wallack says he owes it all to cycling. A 5,500-mile Seattle-to-Maine-to-Florida bike trip in 1982 led to his first published article and a career change to journalism. Dozens of bike trips around the world in the 1980s, including Alaska to Seattle, the length of the Mississippi River, and London to Moscow on the first-ever bike tour into the USSR (in 1988), led to his first book, The Traveling Cyclist (1991). His 1994 honeymoon tandem ride from Nice, France, to Rome led to the birth of his sonexactly nine months later. His career as a magazine editor (California Bicyclist, Bicycle Guide, and Triathlete), as a freelancer for national magazines (such as Outside, Mens Journal, and Competitor), and as a longtime fitness-gear columnist and feature writer for the Los Angeles Times has revolved around fitness and cycling.

A former collegiate wrestler, Roy began focusing his attention on athletic aging after he hit age 40, profiling successful older athletes and seeking out training strategies and studies that can impact healthy longevity. He broke the news on the dangerous link between cycling and osteoporosis; a deleterious training phenomenon called the Black Hole; the connection between human growth hormone (HGH) and strength/interval training; the injury-reduction potential of barefoot-style running, and the benefits of butt-centric riding form and strength training for cyclists. That research led to the first edition of Bike for Life: How to Ride to 100, published in 2005. A half-dozen books on fitness and running, all keying on fit aging, followed in the next decade.

As he pushed 50 and beyond, Roy pushed it harder than ever on the bike, racking up more epic bike tripsincluding New Zealand by tandem with his wife, circumnavigating Icelands Ring Road, and (almost) tandeming from Portland to Yellowstone National Park with his teenage son. He also competed in some of the worlds toughest endurance cycling, running, and adventure events: the 1,200-kilometer Paris-Brest-Paris randonne, the 24 Hours of Adrenalin Solo World Championship, the weeklong Eco-Challenge and Primal Quest expedition races, the Badwater Ultramarathon and Himalayan 100 running races, and numerous mountain bike stage races, including the three-day La Ruta de los Conquistadores ride across Costa Rica (seven times) and the weeklong TransAlp Challenge, TransRockies Challenge, BC Bike Race, and Breck Epic races. In 2004, at the age of 48, he finished second in the obscure World Fitness Championship (only three people competed, and one guy couldnt swim). He was inducted into the 24 Hours of Adrenalin Hall of Fame in 2008.

Roys goals, he says, are simple: Keep writing about how we can all stay fit and healthy, and keep seeing the world in the best way he knows how, by bike. He lives next to a bike path and a vast trail network in Irvine, California.

ALSO BY ROY M. WALLACK

The Traveling Cyclist: 20 Five-Star Cycling Vacations

Run for Life: The Injury-Free, Anti-Aging, Super-Fitness Plan to Keep You Running to 100

COAUTHORED BOOKS

Healthy Running Step by Step: Modern Methods for Injury-Free Running, Injury Prevention, and Rehab with Robert Forster, PT

Fire Your Gym! Simplified High-Intensity Workouts You Can Do at Home