Cycling’s low-impact exercise attracts boomers

But the 54-year-old past president of the National Speakers Association of Las Vegas gave up running, he said, because of the pressure it placed on his knees, back and hips.

“I decided to stop running in 2006 so if I ever really needed to run, I still could,” said Rayburn, who often relies on his wry wit to capture the attention of his audiences.

The switch from running to biking is something Mike Bishop sees frequently among baby boomers at Broken Spoke Bikes in Summerlin.

“We’ll sell bikes to many baby boomers who’d been runners — they tell us they want something low impact,” Bishop said.

Between 1995 and 2009, the most recent time frame for which National Household Travel Survey statistics are available, the increase in biking among people aged 60-79 accounted for 37 percent of the total nationwide rise in bike trips.

Cycler Stephani Preston, a police officer for the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, says she wants the growing number of cyclers to understand the rules of the road, which include stopping at stop signs and lights just as cars do.

Every effort must be made, she said, to ensure that cyclers have reflectors and lights and even wear bright vests so motorists see them.

“A lot of motorists don’t respect cyclists,” she said.

Rayburn, who enjoys riding at Red Rock Canyon and Lake Mead National Recreation Area, had taken only two 30-mile bike trips before deciding in 2000 that he could ride a bike from San Diego to Brooklyn, New York.

The 4,010-mile trip, labeled the first cross-country concert tour on bicycle, took 78 days with his wife riding behind him in an RV support vehicle.

Rayburn performed on 30 college campuses, doing parodies and comedy that showed off his guitar wizardry on Led Zeppelin does Dr. Seuss and Bob Marley plays Garth Brooks skits .

He’s still using the $2,500 Trek racing bike he rode on the trip.

“You can cover a lot of ground on a bike surprisingly fast,” Rayburn said. “I love the endorphin rush it gives me.”

Paul Harasim’s column runs Sunday, Tuesday and Friday in the Nevada section and Thursday in the Life section. Contact him at pharasim@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-5273. Follow @paulharasim on Twitter.