The Man Who Would Stop at Nothing Long-Distance Motorcycling's Endless Road

by Pierson, Melissa Holbrook

• ISBN13: 9780393079043
• ISBN10: 039307904X
• Edition: 00
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2011-10-03
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Summary

For the 50,000 members of the Iron Butt Association#xE2;#xAC;#x1D;also known as the "World's Toughest Motorcyclists"#xE2;#xAC;#x1D;long-distance motorcycling is not a pastime but an obsession. These men and women push the limits of human endurance, often in rides of more than one thousand miles a day. Perhaps the most determined of them is John Ryan, a diabetic and a man who even in late middle age loves nothing better than riding impossible distances at no small risk to himself. But why? Melissa Holbrook Pierson, herself a longtime motorcyclist, chronicles the gratifications of long-distance riding as well as the challenges and solitude that accompany it. In seeking to understand why people strive so mightily to reach a goal with no reward other than having gotten there, Pierson gives us an intimate glimpse of a singularly independent yet supportive community and a revealing portrait of its most daring member.

Table of Contents

Foreword	p. ix
A Damnably Labyrinthine Branch	p. 1
Ingesting Road	p. 19
This Near To Hellfire	p. 33
Pause: They Endure	p. 61
A Circle Back	p. 67
Those monumental Days	p. 83
Why?	p. 95
Pause: Motorcyclists Endure	p. 113
A Difficult Road	p. 119
A Family Bound	p. 135
More And More Detached	p. 147
Only these Rides	p. 165
Afterword: There Is Only Forward	p. 187
Acknowledgments	p. 189
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