Seniors cycling group looking to expand in Fredericton

FREDERICTON – A group of energetic retirees in Fredericton plan to cycle through their golden years.

“Folks on Spokes” is a seniors cycling group that is looking to expand. Coordinator Ruth Baird says all newcomers need to bring is a bike and a zest for life.

“We have ages 50 to 80,” she said.

The group pedals though the capital city on a common mission: to retire from work, but not from life.

“The goal of the groups is healthy active living for seniors as much as physical activity is perhaps getting together as we go into retirement,” she said.

At 69 years old, Gordon Smith says he wasn’t much of a biker before joining the group four years ago.

But, since then, he’s shifted into high gear.

“I could only do a couple of kilometers a day and now I can do 130 or 140 and I am comfortable,” he said.

“It’s important to me because I don’t want to spend my old age in a hospital bed I want to be out on my bicycle.”

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Baird says the group meet several times a week to ride.

“We go on tours and the last two years we’ve done four tours a year,” she said.

Some of which she says last days at a time.

Folks on Spokes started 15 years ago with only few of handful of riders. Now, the group is almost 100 strong and is looking to expand.

Vera Stewart recently retired and joined the group to get out, exercise and meet new people.

“I am the turtle, they are fast. Hopefully next year I will be as fast as they are I am slow,” she said.

The group hope to one day meet up for tours with other seniors cycling groups across the Maritimes.

“We are finding too that when new people come to town they join us and it’s just them a social circle top start with,” said Smith.

And join a group that is unwilling to let age slow them down.