Day...2?

OK, Body Weight Workout day two!

I'm sure some of you with a basic knowledge of how calculators operate are mentally calling me out right now. Well, call out, because you've got me. Right after my first workout, I took a trip down to my parents' house for Christmas. Also, the mysterious back pain previously mentioned made a return. I actually don't think that it was caused by the exercise, but I would be really unsurprised if the exercise didn't make it worse. So I passed on the exercise. I am a losing loser who loses.

But! I came back. Since my slightly-less-than-half-full kitty litter container didn't give me quite the arm workout I had wanted, I filled it the rest of the way up with water, giving a total weight of 28.8 pounds. Initially. It dsidn't take lonog into the actual dumbbell rows to learn that while the containers look watertight, and may be good at keeping water out, they don't actually keep water in with 100% effectiveness. I don't think I lost all that much though, but the carpet is now wet. Awww.

Tomorrow was going to be a combination bike-to-work and save-my-transmission day, but there is an awful lot of slipperiness on the bike path, and I just don't feel up to putting the studded tires back on right now. I might be able to wake up extra early in the morning and do it. Time will tell. Ideally I think I would also change my pedals so I can wear boots. It's a little cold out there for my cycling shoes now. Eventually maybe I'll work out some intervals that I can do on my commute. Probably could get some decent hill training in on the mile and a half slope I have to ride up. Somehow actaully training on the bike takes all the fun out of riding. And I like fun.

Anyway, I should probably work on sleeping soon.

Thanks for the support everyone! I'll post my weight in the morning. Spoiler alert: I bet it went up.

I did the Beginner Body Weight Workout this morning. Only managed two sets, but that's two more than I did yesterday, so there's hope for me yet. They are even harder to do than I thought they would be--which is good. Trying to emulate the milk jug full of water they use, I filled an empty liter box bucket halfway up with water, which ended up being 12.2lbs or so--I think next time I will fill it all the way up, because the dumbbell rows were what I had the least trouble with.

The back didn't bother me the whole time, which is good. Hopefully it will stay quiet.

After I finish my breakfast Slim-Fast, it will be time to hit the shower and get ready to head to work.

Today's weight: 282.6 (ugh).

What happened?

OK, so I slipped. Rather a lot. I lost my motivation and I made excuses, and I stopped biking. Haven't ridden to work in weeks, and last year I would go two weeks without driving my car at all.

I seem to have gained some weight. OK, a lot of weight. I think am currently around 285, which is the heaviest I have been in my life. I was at 225 two years ago, which was still overweight, but I wasn't too unhappy about it--I could be pretty speedy on the road when I put my mind to it. Right now I am very....not.

I did go for a ride on Friday, though. I think I did around 15 miles (bike computer was dead) and it was more work than it used to be, but atl east I still enjoyed it.

My plan now is to treat this blog something like the Fat Cyclist started out doing. Report on weight, exercises done, maybe even food consumption, and see if throwing it all out for the internet to see will help motivate me to improve.

In the morning I plan to weigh myself to get a starting baseline, then I may do a short workout--it depends on my shoulder, I did something to it last week and it's been giving painful spasms for the past 6 days. For exercise, I will either go with EA Sports Active for the Wii (which, unlike Wii Fit, actually gives you a good workout), or the Beginner Body Weight Workout from Nerd Fitness. I have a feeling they would both be of fairly similar impact, but the EA would be more cardio oriented and the Nerd Fitness would be more muscular, which makes it tempting. Having a virtual coach yell at me to do things is good for the motivation, though.

Soon I will have to try a ride to work to see how long it takes me--the last thing I need is to be late to work due to being too out of shape. Another fun thing: Reintegrating riding into my life when the high temperature for the day doesn't exceed freezing. I have ridden when it's in the mid teens and it's quite doable, but if I succeed at riding I may need some new gloves. My fingers get chilly around 20 degrees.

So, if anyone happens to read this, do me a favor and call me fat every now and then to keep me going. We'll see where this ends up.

Updates

Not too much to report recently. Still being encouraged to bike to work every day since my truck is in need of new tires and begins to vibrate madly at 40mph. Those will come Saturday, with any luck. Interesting event to report from this morning though...

They have been repaving along part of my commute. For those in the know, I am speking of Indian Ripple Rd, specifically near the North Alpha Bellbrook intersection. I come up N Alpha every day and then turn left to get to work. It is both lower in traffic and a less steep grade (though higher elevation change) than taking Factory to Indian Ripple and turning left.

Anyway, Wednesday's commute had me waiting for a little while at a four way stop while they worked on a bit of paving. The far side of the road where I would be riding had been done for a while, and thankfully I got through before they put the tar down on the near lane....I think riding through that would be challenging at best. I made my left turn and then hammered as hard as I could up the hill because I wanted to get through as quickly as possible and not delay other people too much--not only could no one pass me on the single lane, but traffic was stopped the other way as well becase only one lane could go at a time. So I arrived at work quite tired and sore. I need to work on exerting myself more on rides, right nw I just kinda cruise at a comfortable speed. Pushing myself is the only way I'll improve. But I digrress.

Fast forward to Thursday's ride. I get to the same point at the top of the hill, wait way longer, and then when traffic goes through....I sink. Apparently a big guy on a bike has higher pressure on asphalt than a big car with 4 wide tires on the ground. It was like riding into a patch of mud. When I turned the handlebars left, the front wheel washed out and left a big divot in the asphalt, like a big black sticky snowdrift. It was like sudedenly itting 3 inches of mud. I didn't go down since I got my foot down (I was probably only going 5mph or so at the time), but I ended up getting asphalt stuck to the end of my shoe as well. Thankfully it didn't stick in the cleat area so I was able to clip in with no problems. I ended up riding the .7 miles or so to the office with asphalt-encrusted tires, listening to the crunch of them on the pavement, hoping that there wasn't sticky tar and rocks all over my braking surface.

I wore my cycling shoes all day at the office, and whenever my right hand was free it was feeling asphalt off my left shoe. So there is a little pile of it next to my desk. It looks like the bike didn't come out of it too bad, just the tires got asphalted and the center tread is clear now after running on pavement for a few miles. There's still some on the sidewalls, but I am just going to leave it. It looks like there was just a little bit that got on the braking surface as well, but it scraped off pretty much immediately when I stopped the bike next, so that's not a worry either. Guess I came out of it all pretty well, considering. Maybe now I will finally treat myself to some new bike shoes. And brake pads, since mine are pretty much worn out.

Summary:

Funny. I had nothing to post for a long time, but now I have stuff to post but I keep missing chances to post it!

Saturday waqs the day to take my truck to the mechanic to investigate the mysterious squeaking noise. This means throwing the bike in the truck, driving to the mechanic, and biking home, since it's about a 1.3 mile ride and I really don't relish the idea of spending a few hours sitting in the lobby there.

A bit after arriving back home, I got the call that they had discovered the source of the mysterious squeaking noise: $375. Carrier shaft bearing. I like my driveshaft to spin.

I am never going to get to invest in more bikes if I keep pouring money into the truck. And now I'm at the point where I can't afford a new truck but I also can't afford to keep fixing this one. It will remain parked for all purposes except visiting the girlfriend, I think. This is the perfect time to go car free.

Sunday was a much happier occasion. Went to look at accessories for the girlfriend's bike (I already got her a water bottle, bottle cage, and computer, but she needs lights and fenders), then we went to the park for a picnic.

We actually got pics, something that this blog is sorely lacking most of the time!

Here's me cruising down the trail. Note the fat. Note lack of helmet. Almost always wear a helmet when I ride, but this particular path is completely free of cars. Plus Erin doesn't have one yet.


Here are the bikes at our picnic spot. Erin's brand new Cypress in the foreground, my travel-weary Long Haul Trucker in the background. Pannier contains blanket and KFC. Trunk bag contains an extra water bottle, a cable lock, some rain pants, pump, spare tube, tire levers, multitool, kitchen sink...


Another view of the bikes, this time with me holding one up.


We rode about a mile down the Mad River trail. There's downtown Dayton.


And there's the river. Grrr, mad.



All told, we did just shy of 11 miles Sunday, which is great for someone who just got a good bike and has barely ridden this year. I predict a happy summer full of more rides for us.

Yesterday was an extra long commute that took me to my brother's house for cat-feeding in the morning...that extended my full commute to 26 miles. It was nice in the afternoon though, a nice retiree rode up next to me and we talked for a while. I ride much faster when I'm with someone else, even if we're side by side. I think my speed went from about 14 to 18, and I wasn't straining much. It's just hard to convince myself to work very much harder when I'm riding alone.

And that's it for this update, hopefully I'll have more to write about soon, and not just end up doing a batch entry. Keep the rubber side down!

Who's a failure? I'm a failure!

So today is National Bike to Work Day!  And here I sit in Panera, after a refreshing....drive.

I tried hard though!  I did!  I got up later than I had originally intended, but I was on the road by 8--over an hour before my normal  departure time.  Why so early?  Free pancakes for cyclists at the 2nd Street Market downtown.

Upside:  Aweseom, free food!

Downside:  Where the heck is this place?

I knew the general location, so I headed off, opposite the location of my workplace.  After about 8 miles, 2 wrong turns, and questioning two people, I found it.  It was actually not hard to find for someone with rudimentary navigational skills.

The setup they had was pretty sweet.  Tons of (giant) free pancakes, lots of information booths, and a surprising number of people there at that time (around 8:45 I suppose).  I ate my pancake as quickly as I could, and was back on mybike at 9:00.  I was iffy as to whether I could make the 8 mile ride to work on time considering I also had to ride 8 miles to my apartment first.  Hmmm.  If I averaged 16mph and changed in under 5 minutes, I'd just manage it.  I was pushing into the wind on the wayback though, and my pancake-filled stomach and out-of-shape legs didn't like pushing me any more than 14 or 15.  Sadder yet, when I turned south on Creekside my left knee starting giving some pretty serious pain--I'm not sure what it was, but it was not good, and I cut my speed down to about 10mph, resigning myself to driving.

Oddly enough, Bike to Work Day was one of the only days I didn't ride last Spring as well.  I may have a problem.

Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures as my camera died before I could even take one shot.  Hopefully it just wants new batteries.

...I've been away

Been away from posting for far too long. After my deep snow commute I burned out on cycling for a while, and it's hard to start it up again after stopping for very long.

I think I've finally gotten back into the groove though, since I have been seriously enjoying the wonderful weather we've been having, and my girlfriend also just bought a Giant Cypress so we can go on rides together. That means more biking and more biking with someone else, which are both good things. Unfortunately she lives about 45 miles away so we can't see each other and ride every day, but we should be doing lots of riding on the weekends. I just have to make sure I find the right balance between taking it too easy on her and wearing her out so much she decides that she hates bikes and hates me.

I'll follow the advice I saw in Mountain Bike Action about taking new riders to the trail....I'll just ride behind her so she will set the pace she is comfortable with.

Today's commute was extra long. After work I jumped off the bike path and rode to the Performance store, which I reached at about 7:50. It turns out they close at 7:00. And open at 10:00. Coincidentally, I work from 10 to 7, so I guess I won't be going there on weekdays. I rode across the street to an outdoor mall called The Greene though, and visited a shop called roll: (the silly puctuation is all them). It's a pretty sweet shop, and I grabbed the GF (let's call her "Erin") a few accessories for her new steed. These will be picturd in a later post.

I think it's definitely time to update my mileage log, it looks like I haven't ridden at all this year.