Resident Dave Strehlow and a family member enjoy a ride. Photos: Saint Therese of Woodbury
Cycling Without Age brings the joy of transport to elders in the Woodbury community.
Ole Kassow, founder of Cycling Without Age (CWA), calls cycling the happiest means of transport. He’s not wrong. The CWA movement is a way to get elders back on their bikes. It started in Copenhagen in 2012 and has grown to more than 3,500 locations (chapters) in 20 countries. Saint Therese of Woodbury started biking its residents in 2021.
“I’m one of the instigators,” says Peter Grasse, volunteer pilot and pilot trainer/volunteer bike mechanic/volunteer grant writer. “I watched a Ted Talk on [CWA] at an E-bike Expo in 2019. After the presentation, I turned to my friend John Simmet and said, ‘We really need to find a place to do this.’ We knew folks at Saint Therese, so …”
On Saint Therese’s behalf, Grasse and Simmet applied for a Minnesota Department of Human Services grant. They were seeking funds to pay for a CWA trishaw, a three-wheeled bike designed to carry passengers. The trishaw they had their sights set on would be equipped with a power-assist E-battery, which helps with transport, hills in particular.
“I joke with the other pilots [that] if people have to get out to get up a hill, it’s going to lower their rating,” Grasse says.
Passengers ride side by side on a bench, sitting at the front of the trishaw. There’s a canopy, footrest and lap blanket, and the pedals are in the back. “You’ve got wind in your hair, you’ve got sunshine and you’ve got nice conservation,” Grasse says. “Our riders just love it.”
Resident Barb Hafiz and her daughter, Jackie, who also volunteers at Saint Therese of Woodbury.
The grant paid for half of the trishaw, plus maintenance. Fundraising, including donations from Grasse and Simmet, funded the other half.
While COVID-19 delayed the Saint Therese CWA rollout, the program has been picking up speed ever since.
“I gave a ride to a daughter and her mother, a resident at Saint Therese,” Grasse says. “The mom grew up in Iowa and remembered biking with her mom. She said her mom would stop at the top of a hill, yell, ‘No guts, no glory’ and then go charging down. During our ride, I stopped at the top of a hill, yelled, ‘No guts, no glory’ and then raced down the hill. They loved it.”
Resident Dave Strehlow grew up the youngest of 10 children and never really had a bike of his own. Last summer, he went on a ride with a daughter who lives in Woodbury. “She knew all the places,” Strehlow says. “She said we might see an eagle, and, by gosh, we did. It was sitting next to a power line. We even saw its nest.
“Everything about this program is beautiful, from making an appointment to signing the waiver to riding with volunteers who give so much of their time and talent,” he says. “It’s such a treasure.”
Volunteer services coordinator Elizabeth Anderson is in charge of recruiting pilots, aka the trishaw drivers.
“When I started, I was flummoxed; how do we get this to grow?” Anderson says. “We started small in 2021 with six volunteers, giving 37 rides. In 2022, seven volunteers gave 64 rides. In 2023, it was seven and 67. Last year, eight volunteers gave 135 rides.”
Anderson was one of last year’s riders. “I went on a summer ride with one of my favorite residents,” she says. “It was just grand.”
One resident went on 20-plus rides. “He was out there every day, watching and talking,” Anderson says. “If someone couldn’t make it, he’d fill in.”
Saint Therese of Woodbury
7555 Bailey Road; 651.209.9100
