Dear Rouleurs,

MMT has been overwhelmed by really crappy May. Knocked over by the early flu season, MMT has been struggling with illness and just juggling all the balls that life, work, a pregnant wife and three year old can throw in the air. So there has been no time for blogging and a lot less cycling happening. To top it all off, the Melbourne weather has turned nasty on the back of an old fashioned Antarctic blast…life moves on.

So on top of the early flu season and nasty weather, a recent article that appeared in the local Australian press, made MMT wonder whether his days as a cyclist are numbered. The primary factor in MMT’s growing sense of fragile morality and dread, lay in a report released by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW).

What did this report contain that so rattled MMT? The answer being statistics. That hardly sounds lethal but a recent study has shown conclusively that more MAMILs (ie male cyclists over the age of 45) are finding themselves in the back of an ambulance and in hospital, than ever. Check this out this direct steal from the Sydney Morning Herald on the 8th May 2019.

“The rise of the MAMIL — middle-aged men in Lycra — has led to soaring hospitalisations and a doubling in the number of deaths for cyclists aged over 45.”

“A new report from the AIHW looked at injury and death rates for cyclists from 1999/2000 to 2015/2016. It found that:

1. there was an average of almost 10,000 cyclist hospitalisations a year, with the most recent figures showing three quarters were men.
2. The number of cyclists aged 45 and over taken to hospital grew by nearly 500 per cent from 728 to 4120, more than a third of all cases.”

“The number of people aged 45 and over killed while riding a bike doubled from 41 to 81 deaths.”

FTW….MMT is wondering whether he needs to bump up his hospital and life insurance. MAMILs may not be a endangered species, it is certainly one that’s being threatened by injury.

Until next time, please take care out there in this horrendous weather

MMT