Photos courtesy of Larry Walsh

By Steve Sears

In 2018, Mendham’s Larry Walsh was undecided. After losing his job, he wanted to take a coast-to-coast bike ride, but at the same time sensed the responsibility of seeking another job. 

He sought advice from the wisest advisors he knew. “We were at the beach on July 4, 2018; me, my wife, Kelley, and my three kids – two older daughters (Tara and Jaclyn, and Tara’s girlfriend Kelsey) and a son (Brian) – and I asked them, ‘What do you think? ‘And they said, ‘Dad, YOLO.’  I was like, ‘What? What is that?’ And they said, ‘YOLO. You know, it’s like, you only live once.’”

Walsh laughs at the recall, but it hammered home the message. “From there, I was in a zone.”

Decision made, Walsh then pedaled 7,300 miles through 17 states and 528 towns across the United States in two separate trips, chronicling the treks in his current book, Suit to Saddle: Cycling to Self-Discovery on the Southern Tier, and in a forthcoming offering, Forty to Finish.

As a youngster, Walsh was always trying things that tested his physical abilities, and after losing his job as well as suffering a foot injury, it was a tough transition. “I lost my funk,” says Walsh. Seeking to regain some confidence, he bought a bike and travel gear and prepared for his initial trip with a group called Adventure Cycling Association. “I talked to someone there and they said there was a tour coincidentally about two months later going through the southern tier, which is exactly what I wanted, because I always just envisioned this.”

He prepared by bicycling through the hills of Mendham, and then headed to San Diego. “70 days later, we arrived in St. Augustine,” he says of the first trip. “A long, cross country bike ride is sort of the pinnacle of a long cycling career, and not the first step. But for me, it was the first step. And I had no idea how I was able to do this or whatever, but I did a decent job. I enjoyed the heck out of it.”

Walsh, who is also a United States Army veteran, was preparing to head back to work after the first ride. “Get it out of my system, if you will,” he says. However, his social media-posted photos and videos got a following, and he found he loved talking about his cycling adventure.  “People were just mesmerized, and I at that point realized, ‘You know what? I still have the cycling itch.’ So, I searched and searched and found a race, and it’s called the Transamerica (Trans Am) Bike Race.”

The second trip was 4,200 miles, from Oregon to Virginia. “Completely unsupported – every decision is the racer’s,” says Walsh, who saddled up again. “We had a satellite spot device that tracked us, and 73 of us from 16 countries left Astoria, Oregon on June 2, 2019, and I arrived at the Yorktown Victory Monument 38 days later. I averaged 109 miles a day.”

Walsh wrote a manuscript just to capture everything about both cycling trips. “When I’m six feet under, I figured future Walsh generations would be able to read about what their crazy uncle did or whatever,” he says with a chuckle. However, after submitting the manuscript to his publisher, a structural editor looked it over and had some further news. “They got back to me and said, ‘You have two stories, not one, and you should separate the stories into two books.’ I ended up rewriting the first and now I’m in the throes of writing the second. The first is a travelogue memoir, and the second one’s going to be a lot more about just the testosterone of a race.”

Published by Cabin Fever Press, Suit to Saddle: Cycling to Self-Discovery on the Southern Tier is available in eBook and paperback, and can be purchased on Amazon, Kobo, Barnes and Noble, iTunes, and Google Play. Forty to Finish will be released at a future date. For more information, visit www.Larry-walsh.com.