Ultramarathon cyclist shares life story in new book
WINNIPEG, MB—Toronto’s Castle Quay Books is set to publish the life story of ultramarathon cyclist and philanthropist Arvid Loewen.
Arvid co-wrote When Quitting Is Not An Option: My Road to Cycling, a Guinness World Record and Making a Difference with his son, Paul Loewen.
The book chronicles Arvid’s development as a cyclist, and how he has used cycling to raise millions of dollars for Mully Children’s Family (MCF), a street mission in Nairobi, Kenya that helps thousands of needy children.
“[The book] is one more door that God has opened up to tell my story, and my story is that I’ve been called to be an ambassador for disadvantaged, impoverished kids,” says Arvid, 56.
Paul, 27, wrote the book based on a dozen interviews he conducted with his father over the course of a year. Paul says being Arvid’s son, as well as a support crew member on many of Arvid’s races, put him in a unique position to help write the book.
“I know him really well,” Paul says. “Our humour is similar, I’m an endurance athlete as well on a smaller scale, I’ve seen his pain, I’ve heard him speak a hundred times, I’ve seen him at his worst … so I think I have a pretty good handle on what he goes through. It was fun to write stories from his perspective.”
A member at North Kildonan Mennonite Brethren Church (NKMB) in Winnipeg, Arvid resigned from his position in senior management with Palliser Furniture in 2006 to volunteer full-time to create awareness and raise funds for MCF through cycling. In 2011, he set a Guinness World Record for the fastest bicycle cross of Canada, cycling 6,040 kilometres in 13 days, six hours and 13 minutes.
While Arvid’s list of accomplishments is impressive, he hasn’t always succeeded in every race he’s entered. Arvid says he and Paul deliberately chose to include stories of failure in the book because God works through both failures and triumphs.
“I’m as ordinary as can be,” he says. “I’m responsible to do my best and leave the rest of it to God. It may not always be a successful finish, it may not always be a Guinness World Record, but God can work through it.”
Arvid and Paul will celebrate the release of When Quitting Is Not An Option with a book launch on February 18 at NKMB as part of the Winnipeg Real to Reel Film Festival. For details, visit www.paulloewen.com and www.winnipegfilmfestival.com.
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