Clydesdales/Athenas (200+ lb / 91+ kg) - New to Biking

Hi! I'm a 32 y.o. female living in the Detroit, MI, area. I'm married with two young children. I'm 5'8" and 375lbs. I've never learned to ride a bike. Probably about 5 years ago (and about 100 lbs ago), I first borrowed a friends bike to try to learn to ride. I was having fun with it and ended up buying a mountain bike from WalMart for myself. At one point I managed to actually "ride" for about 20 seconds. It was pretty exciting! I don't remember what stopped me from going out and trying again. I probably used the excuse of being busy with too much work and school.

My husband really enjoys riding and I would love to learn to ride so we can ride together. Seeing that there are other heavy people out there who can ride, and that there are products and equipment to make it easier and make us more comfortable is really promising.

I just wanted to introduce myself and just say that I'm really happy to have found a group of people who are in the same boat!

Welcome. This is a great group to ask questions and help and we have a lot of experience.

Hey AppleDipper! Welcome to the forum and biking.

Welcome aboard. Feel free to ask questions here. There is also an Athena forum for women, but I'm not sure how active it is. Is your husband "Clyde" status? Is he here somewhere?

Welcome!

welcome

welcome!!

Howdy ma'am, nice to have you with us.

Thank you everyone for the nice welcome! My husband is on the site as Altinos and he does qualify as a Clyde being 6'2" and over 200lbs. I'm not certain how often he reads in this particular forum though. I did see the Athena forum and plan on making a post there as well to see how active it is.

Well he is barely a clyde....but we will still take him since he is yours. :D

Apple Dipper, I just shot a message to the Moderators that can do this: You'll be receiving an invitation to the Actual Womens forum from one of them. The Athena thread isn't an individual forum. We do have one that's a safe place though for women to discuss woman specific issues. Meantime, welcome to this forum as well and you are welcome anytime! Any questions you feel comfortable asking are fine and I have a significant background in Anatomy and Physiology as well as motivational psychology. Any questions you don't feel comfortable asking on the open forum, I can be PM'd also if you prefer and I will respect your privacy.

Those kind of issues can also be addressed in the Women's forum as well.

Good to have you here and welcome to Cycling!

Welcome to the forum!

Hi, AppleDipper! Welcome.

Welcome Ms. AppleDipper. Plenty of knowledge around....lots of " biguns " in here.

Get your husband to register and join us too. :)

I'm new here too, I'm finding everyone to be very helpful and inspiring.

Welcome Blogcycle.

Welcome both of you!

Thank you everyone for the nice welcome! My husband is on the site as Altinos and he does qualify as a Clyde being 6'2" and over 200lbs. I'm not certain how often he reads in this particular forum though. I did see the Athena forum and plan on making a post there as well to see how active it is.

Clyde is a state of mind, not a state of body. He's welcome, and we are glad to have you.

I'm new here too, I'm finding everyone to be very helpful and inspiring.

Welcome, and thank you for the praise for my blog.

I recently taught my wife to ride a bike. She was 42, and had never done it. This is how I did it.

I got a bike that is way too small for her. I put the seat all of the way down, and I took off the pedals. I had her use it as a scooter for a couple of hours. She could scoot around the parking lot pretty good after about 2 hours. She got so she could lift up both feet and coast for quite a ways. Then we stopped for the day.

Day two, we did the same thing again for about 45 minutes. Then I raised the seat a little bit, and put the pedals on. Learing to pedal was easy, because she had a good feel for balance and steering.

It may be embarrassing to try, but it really worked. Now she rides everywhere!!!

Welcome to the forum. A lot of good information and support here.