Hello everyone!
I wanted to Thank everyone for the helpful advice I've seen so many of you giving during the last week while I've been doing some HEAVY reading on the forums here and in this section in particular. I started with MANY questions, being new to cycling, but during the week I waited to get approved and verified I found the answers to most on my own.
A little about me.... I'm 44, 365, 6'1...I have not been on a bike since I was 14. I know NOTHING about most of this fantastic new world and am eager to learn!
My wife ( also an Athena at 250 ) and I decided we had to change our lifestyle....if for no other reason than to be around long enough to see our son raised. My son is 8 this week, and is my whole world.
I was a long haul truck driver till he was born, years and YEARS of sedentary lifestyle took its toll on me, hey, its hard to work out when confined to the cab of a rig 6 weeks at a time between 3 day breaks! My wife has had a sit down office job her whole life, and was showing the effects of an inactive lifestyle as well. When my son was born...I realized I could not raise a family over the phone so I came home and got a local driving job that allowed me to be home every night. It was a physically demanding job however as it was for a home improvement chain...I drove out large lumber orders to folks building things as small as a deck, or as large as an apartment complex....however, when there were no lumber loads to run, I tried to help out the home delivery guys as much as I could and this often required dragging 500lb fridges up 3 flights of stairs....being too old for that kind of work ( imho it's a young mans game ) and having been so sedentary my whole life in the cab of the truck...it was not long till I herniated 3 disks in my lower back. I was able to make it another year or so before my back simply would not allow me to preform the work any longer and with heavy heart I resigned and became a school bus driver instead. Since then, due to my pre existing poor condition coupled with what has become a VERY bad back...I'm EXTREMELY limited on what I can do physically....High blood pressure and early diabeties have become facts of life, and what little muscle mass I once had is rapidly leaving me.
Enough was enough, life had to change, at this rate I will not make 50....and at 50 my son will only be 14.
I looked at fitness options for someone in my condition and size....came up with 2 viable options for low impact fitness.... swimming, and cycling. As I live in a small town with no real public pools to speak of, not even a YMCA, and as I am just almost out of work ( bus drivers work on average 4 hours a day ) I have no money to sink my own pool....cycling became the clear choice.
I found this forum 7 days ago, and applied for membership, I'm intent on making this work for us....ANY physical activity will be a step in the right direction. I had not even thought about my weight being an issue on a new bike, I had intended to just pick up a couple 150.00 specials at the local discount big box, but some reading informed me that would just be wasted money as the bikes they sold could not support my girth. Reading existing threads asking for suggestions, I found that MOST suggestions were WELL out of my price range, especially as I am looking to buy 2 bikes, one for me, and one for momma....
I did enough research to land on Worksman cycles as our best option....so we spent several days deciding on options and ended up ordering 2 cruisers with their 3 speeds. Momma selected a nice classic red woman's frame, white wall tires, chrome fenders and rear rack, sealed crank and 36 tooth sprocket option. Myself I replicated the retro cruiser bike, black, red rims, chrome rear rack and fenders sealed crank and 36 tooth sprocket, assuming I'd need the extra real estate I also selected the extended seat post and extralong handle bar stem.
My back is only going to allow me to ride straight up cruiser style so these bikes were a good fit with those options, they are also extremely heavily built which will not only support our weight but will also act as extra resistance to increase the effectiveness of our " workout ". We will only be riding on city streets in Small Town USA and everything here is nice and flat...we are hoping our selections bring us years of use and will help us achieve our weight loss and general fitness goals.
Comfort being a large issue, as well as wanting to maintain the look of our retro cruisers, having seen them recommended so highly from so many people on the forums....we ordered Brooks 190 saddles. These are limited to an upright cycling position, but so are we, so they are a good fit as well I believe and I hear the larger seats do not require quite the break in of the smaller seats like the B17s and such. They should do nicely.
Worksman bikes are built to order so we are still 4ish weeks away from shipment of our own bikes...sadly, we are very excited to get out and get active again!
One mistake I may have made while ordering my bike....I was so drawn to the retro cruiser look that again, I did not even think of my weight and ordered it as they show it, complete with springer forks in the front =o/ I have no idea how well the worksman springers are built, but I get the feeling they are simply an aftermarket fork added to their existing bike and not made in house to the same load rating of their standard steel lugged tube forks. I've anticipated issues however and looked at their spare parts selection and if the front springer does not appear to be up to snuff, I can order a replacement standard steel lugged tube fork for 45.00 and replace the springer till I have shed some pounds and it is again safe to use.
I plan to commute to work on my bike in the AM...its about 3 miles each way, so 6 miles daily 5 days a week or 30 miles a week just from the AM commute....add to this our new plan of all 3 of us taking family rides in the evening for an hour or two every night, and longer rides on the weekend and I'm hoping to honestly put 100+ miles a week on my bike.
Any thoughts? suggestions? thoughts on bike and seat choice combo either from an esthetic standpoint or mechanical standpoint?....what do you think my odds are of being ok on those springer forks? Also, do you guys think those Brooks saddles will be ok with me at 365?.....should I use another for the first months till some weight comes off? I'd sure hate to break it =o(
I'm glad to be part of the forum, and thank you all for having us!
Hawgsnawt
This bike in a 3 speed
with this seat
