Born to Bike

Owen Moore
Director of Dining Services
New York University

Hometown: Milburn, N.J.

Education: Graduated with a business leadership degree from NYU

Lives in Maplewood, N.J. with wife, Patti, and two daughters, Kelsey, 12, and Lindsey, 9

When an injury sidelined Owen Moore, director of dining services at 12,000-student New York University five years ago, he needed a safe way to get back into shape. Cycling provided him with a way to rehabilitate and, now that he’s healed, have a lot of fun.

“From 1987 to 1992 I ran food and beverage operations for the Reach Resort in Key West, Fla., and during that time, I became fairly active in triathlons, which was my first introduction to any type of competitive cycling. When I moved back up north, I continued to do some mountain biking. Then about five years ago, I was in a very bad skiing accident, where I broke my right leg in seven places. So after eight months, it was time to start thinking about ways to rehab my leg and my doctor recommended I set a goal for myself since I’d always been an active person. I couldn’t run and I couldn’t play basketball because of the pins in my leg but I could ride a bike. So I went out and purchased a brand new road bike and I started using it as a way to rehabilitate and get back into shape and it took off from there.

I started meeting people and when the weather got nice, that’s when I really started focusing on riding. I ride only as an amateur and I actually ride with a group of my friends for a lot of charities. We ride as a team and we ride for three main causes: cancer, diabetes and multiple sclerosis. For example, last August, my fellow riders and I went down to West Virginia and did a tour called Mountain Mama. It’s a 100-mile race that travels through the mountains and there is a lot of climbing, which is pretty challenging. You wouldn’t do it as a normal rider, so that was a big highlight.

When I travel, I always try to bring or rent a bike. I’m 45 years old and my goal is to ride in all 50 states by the time I’m 50. So my motto around my house is 50 by 50. I only started during the last three years and I have already ridden in 17 states. During the summer, I’m planning how I can accomplish another five or six states. For example, out West you can go to the four corners, where New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado and Utah come together, and ride in a big circle so you hit all those states at once. That’s how you conquer the Dakotas too. My favorite places to ride so far have been California, Virginia and West Virginia. I also had the opportunity to ride in Japan and Turkey.

In the winter, I teach cycling or spinning classes three days a week. Those classes are 60-minute classes, which start at 5:45 in the morning. When the weather is nice, I average about 125 to 150 miles a week by riding about three or four times a week before work. Last year alone, during the calendar year, I logged 3,000 miles on my bike.

I had always wanted to ride 100 miles at once, which is called a century. A friend of mine decided we were going to do it together to see what it was like, but it was always difficult to find time because we’re both married and have kids. Riding 100 miles will take you anywhere between six and seven hours, so we had to figure out how to take that time out of our weekends, so we decided we’d do it on Father’s Day. It was our day so we could do what we wanted. We started at 5:30 a.m. and rode into western New Jersey, where we rode our 100 miles, and we were back by noon. We called it the Father’s Day Century. The next year we had eight people ride with us, the next year we had 14 people, and this past year we had 17. It’s strictly an amateur ride and this year we’re anticipating anywhere from 25 to 30 riders—all fathers who are just saying that riding a century is how they wanted to spend their Father’s Day.

Cycling is great meditation. It gives me time to really think through any type of challenges or problems I’m having. And from a physical standpoint, it’s a great stress reliever.”