As I read through various threads on a few different forums, it is always interesting to note the different lifestyles, cycling methodologies, and abilities. My wife and I are both 59. I have been involved with cycling and motorcycling my entire life since the 60s. I worked in the bicycle industry as a factory sales rep for Cycles Peugeot. When they left the US, I owned a couple of retail bicycle stores. I have never been a competitive cyclist. I have always been a recreational cyclist with not enough ability or drive to do more. I have done some epic rides, but at my pace. My wife is way less committed to cycling than I am, but enjoys it too.
Now as a left below knee amputee brought on by 50 years of type 1 diabetes, cycling is the only form of exercise I choose to do. My cycling is my therapy. When I read threads in this forum comprised of older riders, I am amazed at ride distances, speeds and abilities. I average 12-14 miles per hour and like to ride for a couple of hours at a time. With the 25% loss of efficiency and strength, I choose my climbs carefully. I cannot stand and pedal and I don't have the strength or endurance to get up them hills. We live in a very rural setting 20 miles out of the nearest city of 25,000 people. We have a 4 mile dirt/gravel road to our house, so many rides on our road bikes or tandem require hauling to the start/finish of our rides.
We have severe enough winters to have to curtail our riding from Dec to April. We will soon be in highs below freezing and lows below 0. I ride my 29er to the mail box, I have my Roubaix ready to go on a trainer, and we take our tandem out during breaks in the weather or we haul it 300-400 miles South with our 20' camp trailer and get in a warm up in Death Valley or Mesquite, NV.
We don't have hurricanes or tornados, we don't have humidity above 20% very often, and when the daytime temps get near 100*, the temps cool off by 40* at night for good sleeping. But it is remote and there are not many cycling opportunities or pretty sceneries. There is wind and sagebrush and narrow roads with no shoulders. I do a fair amount of riding on I80 on the shoulder. It is what it is and I like reading about all of your experiences too!
Pedal on and keep me entertained this winter!
Bert and Sue Fox
Elko, NV, USA

Don't let the amputation stop you. I remember riding a big masters stage race back in the late 80's. The first stage started in Bishop, CA and went up the long grade along Hwy 395 to Mammoth Lakes. As usual, I was popped off the back and trying hard to get back on. I'm a sprinter, not a climber! And then I get passed by Pete Penseyre's brother, who is a double amputee. He's got these metal rods for legs, and he just glided smoothly past me, and all I could do was look over at him and marvel. I couldn't even grab his wheel. What a guy. So let that be a lesson to you!

Luis

No ****, huh? I feel blessed to have my limitations. We all pay a price to get through this journey. As I look around, I feel fortunate to have the challenges I have! I enjoy every day. I just finished a 2 hour ride with unseasonally warm November temps, partly cloudy and no wind. What a GREAT day to be on a bicycle.

Pete's brother also rode a tandem with his wife . . .
Met one fellow from Australia that had one leg (no prosthesis) and he rode just fine on a tandem as stoker with a crutch strapped to the lateral tube.
Where there's a will, there's a way!
Pedal on!
Rudy and Kay/zonatandem

All that matters Is your, 'In Da Wind'

How you pull It off is simply a Zen thing.

Sounds like you are doing just fine. Whenever I see someone engaged in sports with a prosthetic leg (or two) I wonder whether I would have the self discipline to make that kind of comeback. I hope so.

I really like/liked Peugeots! I have a PXN10 as my roller bike - I got the frame new in 1981.

Good for you to keep on bicycling. Many folks would be rocking on the porch.

A story about Nevada:

Many, many years ago - I was still in High School, so it must have been around 1956 - a group of us went camping about Easter - headed to a ghost town named, I believe, Goldfield, or Goldpoint NV. We went camping through Death Valley (DV will freeze your butt off in the winter at night). Somewhere along the way the 1953 Ford started acting up so we pulled into Tonopah, NV, and the guy there said we had a cracked carburetor. (For you 50 year-olds, the carburetor mixed air and gas and got the mixture into the cylinders and was replaced by fuel injectors). Anyway, the guy at the junkyard replaced the carburetor with one from a wrecked car and charged us a grand total of $5.00. Praise be to NV!!

Pedal on!!

I wished I would have kept a couple.

Goldfield is on 95 the main highway. Goldpoint is a unique western ghost town abot 25 miles off the beaten path and is still a viable place to visit.
I was born in Elko and can remember a lot of times like you described.
NV is one of the only "outback" places that still exist.

OGoldpoint

+1!

It's great that you've continued.

I can imagine a lot of people in your situation would have given up. For those who would like to continue bicycle, but have issues balancing (or just don't want to worry about it), I highly recommend investigating recumbent trikes. You get almost all of the benefits of bicycling without worrying about balancing.

Cheers,
Charles

Charles,
In 2009, we bought 2 ICE T recumbent trikes. We rode them for 2 years. Then we moved to a rural setting and decidied it was too difficult to transport them to riding areas in our VW Jetta wagon. We sold them and kind of got away from cycling. In Jan of this year I had the amputation and decided to really commit to cycling as a lifestyle. Since we found ourselves living in a rural setting and needing 4x4 during the winter, we bought a 2012 F150. Now we really miss those trikes! They are slower and heavier, but there are many advantages and we are slow recreational riders anyway. I suspect we will eventually return to tadpole trikes. It solves all of the issues with riding with a prosthetic including having the best seat in the house at all times, whether your moving or not!

BW,
Well another Fox family here at 50+, must be good people with that last name (quit grinning Denver and Nora.) Welcome to 50+ if I haven't already done so, great to have your experience and knowledge here on our forum. If you have not already checked it out the Adaptive Cycling Forum at the top of the Bike Forums page has some great people there with many good ideas and questions/answers for most any type of disability. A great group of various amputees there and super cyclist to boot. It is great to have people like your self overcoming disabilities and still enjoying our sport. I had to beat paralysis in my right leg from a work accident in 1989 with a 2004 surgery, now overcoming many surgeries and CRF, but still riding. Members such as your self inspire me to keep riding and not to feel sorry for myself, ever. Things could always be worse and I feel blessed to have bicycling and the friends I have made here.

Post a picture of y'alls tandem when you get a chance, we really love pics of bikes here. Oh, BTW, we need to know y'alls choice of post ride Pie type. This is a key factor for all of the 50+ members. Hope you find us to be a good group of people that love bicycling and enjoy the fellowship here too.

Bill

The tandem is undergoing some refit. Waiting on a few parts to come in. Once it is done we will get some pics up. I have never met a pie I didn't like yet, but I do tend to favor the low sugar apple ones with a small bit of ice cream and a bit of insulin...

One thing I have noticed as I get older is that it takes more effort to do the exerting rides. Difference is I now know my limits and get more enjoyment out of those rides. When a little less mature I used to put too much into the hard bits and then had to recover on the easier parts so the rides probably took around the same time as they do now. That body that used to be able to take punishment is beginning to have a few faults come in. The back is getting weaker and the joints are beginning to fail occasionally so I work to those limits and it seems to help.

By knowing my limits and trying not to exceed them-I still get a few harder rides in. May be a bit slower than I used to do them but the "Smiles per Mile" is still way up there.

But that Tandem--How did you get the wife to ride on it with you? Mine took one look at the speed we had on a fast downhill and looked at the hills we still had to climb and vowed never to get on it. And she never has.

Mid-fifties here and didn't have a FI vehicle until the 1990s..but never have purchased a new auto either.

My first 2 vehicles were a 63 Air Force surplus Econoline (HS) and a 51 F-1(college). Know all about naturally aspirated engines.

And vapor lock, too.

I had a similar experience earlier this week - a one legged woman without prosthesis and a crutch strapped to the bike. Tough and admirable.

I have an '89 Peugeot 'Bordeaux', a 12 speed in mint condition, love it.

Hey, Bill, I thought the plural of y'all was 'all y'all?'

Great to see you here, bwfox. I'll add that we have an above knee amputee here in the Phoenix area, Todd, who totally kicks ass on his specially configured road bike. He beat me on a 70 miler last year, though I stayed ahead of him this year. Cycle on...

Pete's brother passed and dropped me on a climb in a race in '91- the Death Valley-Whitney Portal stage race. Dude was pretty fast.

In this years' Everest Challenge (two days and 29,035 feet of climbing, out of Bishop) we had a single leg below the knee amputee in my field. He had a really trick carbon fiber prosthesis that he'd made himself, painted to match his bike. The 55+ field was pretty big and the 45+ field was the largest of the race.

BWFox, I'm pleased to hear that you are making a go of biking, again. I am down and out for a while, myself. But, I will have all limbs.

I am not a racer either and don't care who passes me. I like to sit mostly upright and enjoy the ride and the scenery. I take pictures of flowers and cows. My wife, like yours, doesn't have the passion that I do, but she started riding again last January and truly enjoys our time on the roads and especially, the bike trail on the American River from Folsom to Sacramento, California. We live in a rural area, too. The roads are paved, but rather rough. The wife and I switched from road bikes to Mountain Votes in 1983. Loved them for 18 years.

We have switched to Hybrids. I ride a Marin Sausalito and she loves her Trek 7300 (WSD). We have lots of hills around here, too.

That brings me to the thought of Tadpole bikes. I talked to my Dr. about that and he says "You are not quite ready for that, yet". However, that is still in my mind. The thought of falling terrifies me and injuring that leg, again. I'm months away from recovery and maybe my attitude will change. I'm going to start out on my BikeE recumbent. I also, have a Giant (Girl's stepthru). I bought that Girl bike 2 years ago when I was getting back into riding, again, after a long lay off. I just didn't feel like I could hoist my leg over the seat (with bad knees). My wife told me "well, sweetie, you are an older dog, now and can't hike your left up to pee as high up the tree". What could I say? Well, the point is, I'm worrying that I may not get back on the bikes that I love to ride. (I have 5 of my own. My wife only wants one).

We ride the bike trail on the American River, where we've met tricycle and tadpole riders. I recently had my mind blistered when I saw a "Greenspeed Magnum" for sale on Craig's list. They claim that the bikes will fold up and fit in the back of a small car. They are still heavy, I think.

Outstanding bwfox. I used to see a guy around the Seattle MTB scene, Brett Wolfe, who had lost a leg. He was amazing, faster than most two-legged riders and he competed in some big races such as the Trans-Rockies, Test of Metal, etc. It was always inspiring to see him.

Here is a article about him that is a few years old:

https://www.seattlepi.com/lifestyle/a...on-1138244.php

The Burley is a recent aquisition. We were lucky to stumble across an older one that had only 300 total miles and had been hanging in the garage for 20 years and still owned by the original owner. We had gotten into tandems 10 years earlier and then let enthusuiasm for cycling go on a roller coaster. We are now retired and hoping to make cycling our main passion and lifestyle. My hope is that we will really enjoy the tandem and want to buy a new modern one...