New Clydesdale, officially as of today!
 

Hi everyone. I just got my first bike today and I'm still cooling off from my first ride. I posted some before pics in the before after thread the other day and a little of this is repost from there. I'm excited to loose weight and get healthy!

I'm currently 220 lbs. and out of shape. I used to wrestle and play football, but I was a lineman and wrestled heavyweight. Neither were aerobic exercise much. I put on muscle but lost little fat. I weighed 240 back then and have been trying to loose weight but cant find an exercise plan that works for me. Running kills my knees, swimming is great but I can only do it at school and takes a lot of time out of my day (have to walk to the gym, change, shower, swim, shower, change, walk back, etc), and rugby, despite being the most thrilling sport I will every play, was played by what seemed like the wrong crowd for me (bing drinking and ego's through the roof.) My brother just got a trek 1.2, and he told me its awesome. I had mountain bikes when I was a kid, but never a road bike.

I just got my bike today, a used 08 cannondale caad 9, upgraded to 105 shifters and front derailer, ultegra real derailer, ritchy bar, and ultegra wheelset. It also came with a specialized seat, a basic sigma bike computer, clipless pedals, a bottle cage. The guy I bought it from needed to sell some stuff, his wife just got pregnant again. He looked sad to let it go, but it was mine for 700 dollars. He said the frame and drivetrain only had 15 miles on them, and the wheelset had 500. The LBS had the same bike, same size on hold for me without all the upgrades for 100 more. I went to them after I got the bike, told them what I ended up getting, but they were great about it and said no hard feelings. They asked if I needed any accesories, bought specialized shoes, new cleats, a kryponite lock, and a giro helmet. I'm really happy with everything.

Took the bike out for a ride, the clipless pedal business, while intimidating, wasn't to bad. I'm not the most efficient at getting locked in quick yet, but I managed. I only went 6 miles +/- half a mile, but it was fun. I even got brave and got off the back streets and road on the main strip. I have my motorcycle license (but no bike), so I know how to ride safe in traffic.

I'll be doing a test commute tomorrow, and soon I'll be commuting first time Sunday. Can't wait.

I'm going to get new gear as I loose weight, as a reward system. And if I gain past the threshold I'm not allowed to use that gear anymore.

Heres the system:
210: Gloves
200: Bike shorts
190: A jersey

Thats what I've got for now, once I get down towards 190 and know my needs I'll add to the ladder as fit.

Wish me luck!

Before Pictures:
http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-..._5252114_n.jpg

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/photos-a...03293_1804.jpg

I'll update any progress, I'm thinking about joining the biggest looser thread on Monday. Can't wait to loose!

Congrats on your new purchase and welcome to the club.... I might suggest that you get some bike shorts now though, and don't skimp too horribly. They just make the whole experience more tolerable. I hate riding in regular shorts, seems like the snag on everything.

I think you'll know from your MC days that nothing makes you more aware of what stupid thing a box driver is *about* to do than riding a MC. It is tougher on a bicycle because you typically can't see them coming and the rate of speed is different. One handy commuting tip - don't be TOO nice about sharing the road... cars will squeeze by you even when there's no room, so you need to leave yourself some room on the right. Of course, don't spend too much time worrying about it either.

Good luck out there

Welcome to the crew, and best of luck with your goals.

Just a suggestion; The 3 things you list as your reward items... 2 of them should be standard kit (IMO) if you're riding regularly. The gloves and shorts. Protecting your contact points is important; take care of your hands, feet and backside as a general rule, not only as a reward for meeting your goals.

For starters you can always get something inexpensive like some $10 gloves from Nashbar and some less expensive shorts from Aerotech or Performance, and then reward yourself with something nicer, later on.

I went ahead and got shorts today. I did a 10 mile ride and my @$$ couldn't take it. The gloves however, i only have 6 pounds to loose before I can let myself get those.

Hi. I saw your post in the newbie Athena thread about choosing between charity rides of 25 and 50 miles.

First, congratulations on your new bike. You should have a lot of fun with it. Second, your ass will get better. The "sit-bone ache" fades after a few weeks, so just persevere. Third, you're a young man so your body will probably react quickly to training. But a fifty mile ride isn't a negligible achievement for a beginner, and a route that long will include hills you don't encounter on your commute. So check out the route, and be very clear that you intend to commit enough time and put in enough training miles before signing up for the 50-miler. I'd reckon you'd want to have completed rides of at least thirty miles in reasonable comfort before moving up to a fifty. Hope this helps.

...And I hope you get into cycling. It's a sport that will last you a lifetime, because it maintains your aerobic fitness while being easy on the joints. There are guys in my club who are over seventy who can still ride fifty miles in under three hours.

Thanks for the advice chasm. I was planning on doing a charity 25 miler earlier in the month of that event, as well as ride that distance on my days off. I found somewhere a good gauge of your long distance potential would be to add up your weekly mileage. So after this week I want to see what kind of mileage I pull off now and go from there. I'll be going a minimum of 30 miles just commuting to work.

Here are the events I'm thinking of doing. They all benefit a charity or organization:
http://www.biketioga.com/index.php?o...tpage&Itemid=1 - A 2 day event. Lots of rides to choose from, I could do one each day.
http://www.harpoonbrewery.com/index....oint/pid/28554 - The one I was considering for the 50 miler.
http://www.bikereg.com/events/regist...?eventid=10580 - have a 75, a 50, a 35, and a 10.5.

If anyone wants to do any of these then let me know. My brother wants to do them as well, but I could always use more support!

Whoever wrote that didn't know what they were talking about, I'm afraid. Riding six or seven miles a day, every day, would not be adequate preparation for doing 50 miles in one go. So make sure you do those longer rides at the weekend. Good luck with it.

One way to reduce the squeeze bys, by cagers, DON'T HUG THE CURB, you want about 1m/3' between you and the curb, most drivers will match that on the other side, without even thinking about it. If the lane is very narrow then you may want to ride further out and force them to pass in the other lane. A mirror can be very handy in that you can see cars behind, if there are more then 3-4 then you may want to consider pulling off and letting them pass. A full lighting package is always handy for commuting, run them in flasher mode during the day, steady mode at night.

The key though, you need to build up mileage and that should be on a weekly basis. For example say you do 4 rides a week of 10 miles each, that's 40 miles, the next week, you want to add no more then 10% more add them all on the same day, so you get one day that is longer, the next week you do the same, you add 4 miles, (10% of 44 is actually 4.4. but the decimal points can end up driving you nuts, sound round to the nearest full number) you can add these on the same day as before, if you want to build to long distance riding. Set a couple of limits, the most you add at one time, and the most you will ride on a single day, reasonable limits are adding 5 miles (you add 10% or 5 miles, whichever is less) and 100 miles for the longest day. It's not unreasonable to add more days and lengthen other days, it depends though on life, work, family commitments, etc. Set at least one sabbath day, which is a day you do not ride, this should not be the day before or after the long ride.

For me, right now the long day is Saturday, and the off day is Tuesday. Just getting back to it after a 2 month medical hiatus so distances are short right now. If you live where there is winter, add a trainer to your list of things to get, doing 10 miles on the trainer 6 days a week, during the winter, makes spring a lot easier, and you can build back up pretty quickly. Trainer riding is mind numbing though, which is why I drop right back on distance, it becomes more about keeping the legs and butt from going stale, it also has the advantage of being able to smooth out you cadence.

You can generally, if you ride on a regular basis do your weekly distance in one shot, for example if you ride 10 miles Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and 50 miles on Saturdays, you can ride 100 miles, but it's not going to be easy. The key here is to take it slow at first, and build up over time, if you try to do too much, too fast, it ends up becoming work, and stops being fun. When that happens the urge to quit becomes very strong and before you know it your last ride was weeks ago, and then months and then years, then you sell the bike at a garage sale for $20 because it hasn't been ridden in over a decade.

Two things to do, one is to set up a simple way to track progress, forget speed, you only want to track distance, you do get faster over time as you get into better condition. The general thinking, is that long steady distance is better at fat burning then fast and short. Now if you get down to a goal weight and start eyeing full carbon bikes because you want to race, then worry about performance. Personally I would rather do 100 miles in 8 hours (12 MPH) then 5 miles in 8 minutes (37.5MPH), but we are all different.

Oh, the joys of a sore a$$.

It's a little counter intuitive, but harder seats are more comfortable (after you get used to them, that is!) and you don't want ultra-mega padded shorts either...

There's a reason people pay over $100 for bike shorts. I'm not sure what that is because I'm a little too cheap to do that, but I'm sure there's a reason. I can definitely tell the difference between my el-cheapo Performance brand shorts and my nice pearl izumi shorts though

Heres the current saddle on the bike. It's pretty hard = http://www.specialized.com/us/en/bc/...emId=0&eid=348

And I think these are my shorts - http://www.cannondale.com/usa/usaeng...Classic-Shorts

The shorts make things much better. I currently have little pain at all in my sit bones compared to before. Makes riding that much more fun. Drop bares instead of giving my rear a break when going townhill. :)

By the way, heres a picture of the new bike:
http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-..._5971328_n.jpg

Nice looking bike, now go get some miles in your legs. :)

I've finalized my ride schedule for this year, so I know what I have to train for. Here are my planned rides, feel free to comment, give advice, or request to join me! I know there aren't many of you in my area, but If anyone is interested let me know.

The Warm-Up Ride:
Bike Tioga
August 7th-8th: A very laid back ride, cheap, small, and a good place to start. For 15 bucks you do one ride get a water bottle and tee shirt and a 10 minute sports massage; I'm planning on the 25 or 26 miler for now, depending on what day I can get off from work. If I can get off two days maybe I'll attempt both or a longer ride on Sunday.

The First Well Organized Ride:
The Hoosic River Ride
August 21st: A well organized ride for a great cause, still pretty cheap at $40. I'm currently planning to do the 35 miler route, but leaving the 50 as an option. I will choose when it gets closer to the day of the event.

The End of the Year Big Charity Event:
Double H Ranch Camp Challenge Ride:
September 12th: A big charity ride for one of Paul Newman's Camps for Children with Life-Threatening Illness and Disabilities. I will be raising funds through everyone I know, as well as with the support of my Fraternity, Alpha Phi Omega (A co-ed community service fraternity, not a frat). I'm aiming for the Metric Century for this ride, which is a big goal, but From August 13th till the end of August, I will have no job or school, and besides driving my girlfriend to work and back, and spending time with the family, I plan on training, training, and more training. And school always starts slow, and I have three days a week with no classes, and only one class 2 other days of the week, I will be riding all semester up to this point. It will be a great opportunity to get to Metric Century Level (and loose a ton of weight too!) I will have a $250 fundraising commitment, but I plan on destroying that level.

The First Bike Race / End of the Year Event:
10KAN Run
September 18th: A non USACycling Race, also a 10k and 5k the same day, right in Oswego (Where I go to school). It's a 20 mile race, mostly flat. Hopefully by then I will be able to ride 20 miles fast enough to stay with the main group, my only goal for the race right now. Only $20.

Again comments are welcome, I will probably have plenty of updates for each ride when I'm finished, and questions while training for each. Feel free to comment on my choices. I love feedback!

Hi everyone, just letting you know that while for a short time I was no longer a clyde, i have gone back to where I started. My summer job ended, and I went home, did nothing but ride a couple times once I did, eat my italian girlfriends home cooking, and then went back to school. I lost the free time to ride, and have gained all 40 pounds back since summer.

I was wondering if anyone had any ideas for cross training this winter. My school does not allow us to keep bikes in our on-campus apartments, apparently they are fire hazards, I cant leave it outside because I go to school in oswego, and it will get wrecked by a plow and/or taken off the rack by University Police. The school pool is only open during my work hours, as well as the basketball courts. My only exercise until school starts is open skate once a week, and shoveling 10 feet of sidewalk when it snows. And jogging hurts my knees, and is dangerous here (between the ice and snow).

I'm just upset all my progress is lost. Not only is my weight back, but I am out of breath on the 1/2 mile walk across campus to work. I got winded at a fire over break too, and that is no good.

Any suggestions would be great, until then I'm doing my best to eat well enough to keep the weight from getting worse.

Thanks.

Snow shoeing is a heck of a work out and relatively inexpensive. As is hiking (until you start to take either sport seriously). My best advice, avoid a gym until mid February. That way there the New Years Resolutionists have a chance to return to whatever lifestyle prompted them to join the gym in the first place.

There are all kinds of body weight exercises you could do, you could even do something as simple as walk laps around the campus. Buy a sled or a snowboard and find a community hill you can go play at. Sound silly? March up that hill 20 or so times a night. For now, just get out and do something you enjoy.

Walking is one of the best exercises for losing FAT. All you need for gear is appropriate clothing for the weather, and a good pair of shoes that fit you in all the ways that matter. Shoe size (length and width) are only the beginning - find out if you under or over-pronate (or if by some miracle you're 'just right'), and get shoes to match.

Might be worth a $50 visit to a podiatrist to find out for sure what you need before you spend $100+ on the wrong pair of shoes. Wrong shoes (and increasing your distance too quickly) can contribute to a stress fracture that'll keep you from walking for 6-8 weeks.

+1

The rule of thumb I have heard is that you long distance number would be about three times your average ride for a week, not sum. So if you rode 4 times a week for 10 miles and 1 a week for 15, your average would be 11 and that would prepare you for a 33 mile ride.