How a Childhood on Two Wheels Shaped Luís Altenfelder
In a conversation on XTREMMA Sports, the psychiatrist recalls his first rides in Pacaembu, the 1980s BMX boom, and a lifelong passion for bikes.
Luís Altenfelder reflects on how growing up in the 1980s, cycling around USP, and competing in duathlons shaped his enduring love for bikes. From BMX culture to everyday urban commuting, cycling remains central to his life.
For Luís Altenfelder, his relationship with sports began early on, inspired by his father, a road runner who took his children to the University of São Paulo (USP) campus on weekends. While his father logged miles, Luís and his siblings explored Praça do Relógio on tricycles and bikes. Born in the late 1970s, he experienced the height of Brazil's 1980s BMX craze firsthand, watching his older brother race heats on Monark's dirt tracks and dreaming of mastering the same ramps and tricks.
From sports initiation to federated basketball
Before focusing permanently on the world of cycling, Luís built a diverse motor foundation. He joined Med Esporte, a traditional youth sports program based at the Oswaldo Cruz Academic Center (CAOC) at USP's School of Medicine. There, he tried various sports from ages 7 to 11 before dedicating himself heavily to basketball, inspired by Michael Jordan's peak in the NBA. His dedication turned him into a federated athlete, enduring intense training routines of up to three hours a day.
He later switched to handball at Esporte Clube Pinheiros, playing until age 16 and eventually earning a 30% athletic scholarship for medical school at PUC Sorocaba. Alongside training sessions and classes, cycling solidified as his primary mode of daily transportation in São Paulo, connecting the Pacaembu neighborhood, Vera Cruz school in Alto de Pinheiros, and the clubs where he trained.
Duathlon racing and transitioning to road bikes
In the late 1990s, around 1997 and 1998, Luís witnessed the emergence of duathlon races organized by Companhia Atlética near Shopping Morumbi and Marginal Pinheiros. He began competing on a mountain bike, inspired by leading figures on the national circuit like Cris Carvalho.
A desire to transition toward triathlon led him to purchase a road bike to train at USP and step up his running. Although swimming was never his strong suit—keeping him from making a full leap into triathlon—competing in multi-sport events cemented his passion for endurance sports and the road cycling lifestyle.
A collection of memories and 1980s bike culture
A hallmark of Luís's relationship with cycling is his preservation of his personal history: he has kept every bicycle he ever owned throughout his life, never selling a single model. His first bike was a 16-inch wheel Caloi Totica. Later, one Christmas, he and his brother received Caloi Light bikes—Luís got the red version and his brother the blue one—complete with matching helmets and gear from the Caloi Cross line.
Growing up on the streets of Pacaembu captured the adventurous spirit of the 1980s, where neighborhood kids rode all day, jumping curbs and exploring median strips. Back then, the most feared punishment was being grounded from cycling, usually handed down by parents whenever kids crossed boundary limits on busy thoroughfares like Avenida Sumaré.
Urban mobility and autonomy in São Paulo
Echoing host Shubi Guimarães, Luís emphasizes that bicycles have always provided an irreplaceable sense of autonomy and freedom. Today, the doctor relies on a bike for virtually all his commutes around São Paulo, often using pedal-assist e-bikes to navigate the city's hilly terrain.
His aversion to sitting in traffic in private cars or rideshares leads him to ride across the city even on rainy days, equipped with rain gear, reaffirming the bicycle as an essential tool for daily well-being and urban mobility.