Ballina’s Gordon Hayes is virtually riding 1,500 kilometres, to raise money for Save The Children.
A bike racer in his youth in the UK, Gordon is now 87. A few years ago he had a serious cycling accident which resulted in a spinal injury and chronic neuropathic pain. While he can no longer ride on the street, he’s still able to ride on his trainer in an upright position. An app on his phone, connected to his back wheel, replicates the terrain of rides in various parts of the world, and provides encouragement.
Gordon is currently riding one hour in the morning (over 35 km), four times a week, with the aim of raising at least $2,000 to help children in need. Today is day nine of his challenge, and he’s already raised $869. You can support him here.
The Echo caught up with him after a training session.
Gordon explained that when he went over his handlebars in Byron 15 years ago, after a morning swim, walk and ride, he was fortunate to land right in front of an orthopaedic surgeon who was having coffee, and provided the right medical attention before he was taken to hospital.
After a period of complete paralysis, he recovered the use of his limbs, but was left in severe pain, which he has gradually learned to manage. Because of his spinal injury, he reluctantly had to give up road cycling, but has since established a great training regime in his garage.
‘Having the phone up there allows me to look at it and relieve the pressure,’ Gordon explained.
‘Also I frequently cycle with my arms behind my back, just using my legs, so I can relieve the pressure in the back.’
Can you explain how the phone app works?
‘There’s a Garmin transponder on the axle, which goes to the handlebars, and a Bluetooth connection to the phone,’ he explained.
‘I have an app called Wahoo Fitness which gives me rides around the world, but I follow this one particular guy, Mike Cotty.
‘He got a double degree in mechanical engineering and computer science and was hired at the tender age of 20 or so by a Swiss cycle company to promote their product. And he thought, well, the best way to do it is actually by video, and he was a really, really keen cyclist.
‘He’d already established records for long distance events like riding through the Pyrenees non-stop, 1300 kilometers. So he knows the mechanics of the cycling business extremely well, and he also knows what motivates people. He’s got a really good, engaging voice.’
So it’s like having a training buddy? ‘It is, yeah, exactly like that. So I’ve been following him for some time, and then probably about five or six weeks ago, I read about this guy same age as me, an ex-boy racer like me.
‘When his wife died, he decided to set up to raise money for cancer. He lived in a little street in Cumbria, which is in northern England, and it has a slight rise. Street’s only very short, about 700 meters. And he kept riding up this street until he finally hit on the height of Everest. I think that’s phenomenal, nine kilometers.’
Gordon isn’t virtually riding that height, but he is covering some serious kilometres, as the state of his back tyre shows. ‘I thought 1,500 kilometers is a good distance, but I couldn’t do it in one hit,’ he explained. ‘I’ve found I can do 30 km or so in an hour, which means 50 times is 1,500 km.’
Having got his swimming and cycling buddies involved, as well as people he’s worked with, Gordon has now started a mailing list and is keen to get new people involved with his challenge.
Could you tell us why you chose Save the Children as the charity to support?
‘Children are innocent and defenseless,’ Gordon explained. ‘And they are affected by everything that we do; domestic violence, the crimes of others. They are rarely victims of their own making. It’s always someone else…
‘You see the devastation in Syria, in Lebanon, in Ukraine, and Save The Children work internationally.’
Has the ride also been a good thing for you personally? Does it help with the pain, or does it make it worse?
‘It actually doesn’t do anything about the pain, but what it has done is improved my aerobic fitness enormously.’
Gordon has always been interested in cycling. His father, who fought in the First World War, was a track cyclist, and built Gordon’s first bicycle.
‘It was a beautiful bike, black with chrome forks. And when I was at school, I used to cycle all over the place. We’d cycle to Stratford-on-Avon. I cycled to Oxford. Oxford from home is 60 miles, and so it’s a 120 mile ride, which equates to close to 200 kilometers. It took you all day. You didn’t think anything of it.’
Gordon’s cycling dreams were interrupted by the need to make for his family to make ends meet, especially after his father died, then national service, and then girls, but he finally found his way back to the bike, after a few years as a long distance runner when he lived in Sydney. One of his sons has also been a successful athlete in several disciplines.
Gordon’s wife Jan is still a keen mountain biker, who gets out each week on Ballina’s bike paths, and both swim regularly in Shaws Bay.
Have you got a message for other older people, who might have stopped being active for whatever reason?
‘I think that it’s really all in the mind,’ said Gordon Hayes. ‘People can, in fact, do anything that they want to do, if they just put their mind to it. I implore everyone, actually, to get off the couch and just do something.
‘Doesn’t matter what you do, just do it!’
You can get behind Gordon’s 1500 km challenge and support Save the Children at this link.
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