My geezer hero

Hope I grow up just like him!

Perhaps it's not surprising that a lawyer who rides his bicycle to work every day can find splendor in a snowstorm.
Ronald Wallenfang, 62, is an indefatigable bicycle rider.
In a rare instance when he can't pedal downtown from his home in Germantown - a round trip of 42 miles - he'll find time to get miles in during the day.
He's cycled around three of the Great Lakes - always starting from Milwaukee. He's taken two extensive bike trips in Europe. In 1998, he rode from Los Angeles to Milwaukee.
The highlights are many, including shivering alone in a cold thunderstorm on a desolate road on the north shore of Lake Superior.
"At first you feel you are going to die," he said of his Canadian ride. "And then you're afraid you're not."
He owns three bikes - a Trek 520 touring bike, a Trek 7500 hybrid and a single-speed Redline with wider tires that performs best in icy conditions.
When a storm in late March coated Milwaukee's trees with a blanket of snow, Wallenfang was ecstatic.
"For sheer beauty, my bike ride to work today was about as good as it gets," he wrote to an online chat group for recreational bicyclists.
He described how the Oak Leaf Trail was cordoned by snow-covered flora, bright as flocked trees at Christmas. He likened it to "riding into the entrance of a magical kingdom."
Of rides and religion
Since 1993, Wallenfang has ridden 238,000 miles - an average of nearly 50 miles of cycling a day.
He does it with daily rides to the office - a trip that includes long stretches on Bradley Road and the Oak Leaf Trail. Some days he picks longer routes.
On Saturday mornings, he takes a shortcut down Fond du Lac Ave. to serve Communion at Old Saint Mary's Catholic Church downtown.
His vacations often are solitary sojourns in which he sets his own pace and spends much of his waking hours pedaling from one hotel room and a warm shower to the next.
A self-described "compulsive churchgoer," the only thing that will stop him is a Mass.
One of his daughters who books hotels rooms while he is on the road has been known to use the Internet to look for Masses as well.
The highlight of all his rides was pedaling into suburban Atlanta late one summer night in 2005. He was riding from Philadelphia to Savannah, Ga., and coming through Atlanta to visit his son and family on his way to Milwaukee.
His daughter-in-law Charlotte was pregnant and 10 days overdue. He was awakened at five the next morning as Charlotte and his son were off to the hospital. At 8:30 a.m., the baby was born. He rode his bike to see mother and baby at the hospital and continued his ride to Milwaukee.
The most picturesque trip was in Germany along the Mosel River from Koblenz to Trier. As he followed the undulating Mosel, he passed vineyards, quaint towns and Roman ruins.
"An added bonus for me," he wrote to his chat group, "is that after I got a room in a nice little Gasthaus a few miles from Koblenz, had a bottle of the local white wine together with my pork whatever, and gone to bed, I was soon awakened by a 20-piece band playing marches and other songs on the street in celebration of a local guy's 80th birthday. So I went out and enjoyed that."
Keeping the streak alive
Wallenfang is not one of the Lycra crowd who races up and down Lake Drive. He averages 13 to 15 mph on his commute. His chief attribute is his endurance, and sometimes he trades his touring gig for something more competitive.
In 1999, he finished first in the 55-to-59 age group in the National 24-hour Challenge in Michigan, when he rode 326 miles.
Last summer, he came in seventh and covered 301 miles. Leg cramps slowed his pace after "I tried to run with the hounds. This is the kind of thing that teaches you a lesson."
Cycling, he admits, is an obsession.
His wife, Mary Ann, sometimes calls the bicycle his "iron mistress."
A math major in college, he uses a pocket calendar to detail his daily mileage and temperature outside.
He whiles away the riding with little games of calculus, figuring out how many miles he's gone and how many to go as the scenery and his variables constantly change.
His cycling is a "combination of enjoyment - it takes your mind off work - there is the physical fitness aspect to it and the environmental consciousness of saving gas," he said. "You put that all together and it becomes part of your self-identity."
Wallenfang, a partner in Quarles & Brady, has worked at the law firm since graduating from Harvard Law School in 1969.
He starts his commute at 6 a.m. In the winter, he begins before sunrise, outfitted with bike lights and reflective clothing. It takes 1 ½ hours to get to his office at the 411 Building on E. Wisconsin Ave.; his winter commute can take two hours.
When he gets to work, he cleans up with handy wipes and puts on clean clothes that he keeps in his office. If he has a business appointment 3 or 4 miles from his office, he will get on his bike.
His first cycling trip was in the summer after his second year of law school when he rode home to Milwaukee from Cambridge, Mass.
Then came a long period of wandering in a sedentary wilderness. His weight ballooned to 240 pounds on his 5-foot, 9-inch frame.
He didn't start riding seriously until his six children were older, and four were already out of the house. On business or family trips, he will bring along a bicycle or rent one to make sure he gets in some riding time.
He does it all to keep up his streak. His latest is relatively modest - he's ridden his bike every day since Aug. 6, 2005.
His longest streak - from March 6, 1998, to March 21, 2003 - ended abruptly when he was hit by a car in Whitefish Bay and separated his shoulder. He was off the bike for three weeks.
In another car accident, he broke his shoulder blade in 1990.
The potential of accidents or injury must be balanced with the obvious health benefits of riding, he says. At 200 pounds, he is built solid, like a tree trunk.
"The advantage of riding is that maybe I would be dead from a heart attack," he said.
Still, he thinks he is riding a little slower than a few years ago and he feels aches and pains more than he used to.
On his latest trip - a 2,218-mile ride from Key West, Fla., to Savannah to Arkansas to Milwaukee from April 21 to May 6 - his average number of miles per day slipped from 170 to about 140.
His knees also bother him from all of the riding. "I have trouble genuflecting in church," he said with a chuckle.
But the hunger to ride hasn't subsided.
He still needs to knock off four states that he hasn't ridden - South Dakota, Wyoming, Alaska and Hawaii.
And then there's this little trip he is planning in Europe.
He wants to ride from Nordkap, an isolated village at the northern tip of Norway, to Gibraltar, at the southern tip of Spain, a ride of 3,400 miles.