After a lifetime of cycling, Bob Mittelstaedt was starting to lose enthusiasm. He was 70 at the time, and the steep hills around his Marin County home were getting harder to climb — he worried he might get out there one day and not be able to make it back.
A friend had bought an electric bike a few years earlier, and Mittelstaedt had privately scoffed. It seemed like cheating to him. But he borrowed the bike one day, and after four hours on the trails, “I was sold,” he said.
“When I started doing this, I was riding less and less because if I didn’t feel 100%, I was afraid I’d get out there and not feel strong enough to keep going,” said Mittelstaedt, now 77, who lives in Fairfax. “Now I don’t have that excuse. If I get out there and don’t feel as strong as I’d like, I just put it into a higher motor gear.”…