Health and bike have been studied as a cooperative concepts: The more cycling (under some limits), the better health. Indeed, more and more doctors recommend riding bikes to maintain a healthy personal state. Some of them also prescribe bike rides. Such piece of news has leaded me to investigate who are the oldest bicyclers in the world.
It is not easy an easy task to determine what riders are the oldest. Commonly, local newspapers or websites announce feats made by senior citizens, although it is difficult to establish which ones are the oldest. Nevertheless and as you can imagine, speed is not a point to keep in mind here. Better, I have focused on their age. At the time I am writing this post, the Guinnes World Record recognizes Lynnea C. Salvo as the older woman to cross the USA between Oceanside, California to Bethany Beach, Delaware, on 23 October 2016. She rode 5,090.37 km through temperatures which sometimes exceed 37.78 degrees Celsius. Cheers for her!
Another senior citizen who was in shape was Rush, a Dublin man. This retired teacher was the oldest person to circumnavigate the globe by bicycle. Native of Dermot Higgins, he spent the first nine months of his retirement pedaling 31,000 km in an attempt to break a world record and raise funds for Trócaire. The USA, Portugal or Spain…, he has not limits with his beloved bike.
And the oldest person on a bike I have discovered is Octavio Orduño who rode his bike being 103, at least. This hero was born in Long Beach (USA) and as a youngster, he always wanted biking and back in 2019 would not accept changing his bicycle by a car. Good choice! He probably continue taking a ride everyday around the neighborhood, similarly as he has done for the last four decades. Due to his age, he had to trade in his street-bike for a three-wheeler, on account of his faltering balance. He is such a biker example that when his wife proposed gifting him an electric wheelchair, he refused it: “Why would I [use a wheelchair]?” he asked. Here, you can see a video about he.
