Weight update & the CycleOps Fluid 2

In the spirit of getting a post up as often as possible adding the fact that its Friday and that is traditionally a good day to "weigh in" I thought I would post a weigh in update for myself. I have been weighing myself daily since I started writing in this blog, Having a visual reference does a lot for me because of seeing trends with the ups and downs so I keep a text doc on my desktop with each days weight on it. Here is my starting weight and what I weighed this morning as it shows on my text doc.

379.4 LBS 12-28-11
376.4 LBS 12-29-11
374.6 LBS 12-30-11

4.8 pounds total since the 28th, I suspect that much of that is water weight from getting back into the whole healthy eating thing and that 374.6lb mark will be a more realistic number to gauge next Friday against.

While I was here I thought that I would post a photo of my new CycleOps fluid 2 up just for fun, so there that is. I did not ride on the trainer last night because of a surprise visit from a family member but the plan is to get a ride in today for sure. I am going to attempt to post the time in minutes ridden on the trainer somewhere on the side bar of this blog too, again because visual references work well for me. Something that I need to address is the noise coming from the tire on the trainer, When my wife bought the trainer she picked up a smoother wheel for me to use and though its not deafeningly loud the Michelin Country Rock is louder than I anticipated it being at first glance. I was planning on riding the trainer when the baby napped but our home is small and the loudness of this tire will be an issue in that department for sure. I am planning to get a pure slick to see if the noise level goes down so I think that a Bontrager road warrior select slick is in my near future and maybe I will post up videos showing the difference in sound between the two.

Not a bad re-start, the weight is coming down already and hopefully that trend keeps going the same way, I will be working on getting back into my "whole foods" diet again as I feel great when I eat clean... who wouldda thunk?

Trainer wha??

Ultimately I am hoping that I will be able to post about how I lost about 100 pounds by this time next year and can have a place to reflect back to see what worked for me, and hopefully not too much of what did not work. I have a plan in my head right now on how I am going to drop this 100 pounds, sticking to that plan is the hard part as I know that it will work as long as I do my part. I have dropped a lot of weight in the past few years but then life happened and I stalled which eventually lead to me gaining some of the lost weight back and I just ain't cool with those terms so here we are taking small steps in the right direction.

My calories for yesterday were 2150, I did get onto the trainer last night for a mere 10 minutes and I am counting that as a sort of feeling it out ride. The plan for tonight is to go for 15 minutes so that I can work myself back into respectable saddle time because the last ride that I took was 17 miles to give you an idea of whats "normal" for me. Riding for 10 minutes and feeling it was how do I say? embarrassing? yeah that's a good word for it, I mean I could have gone more but why? I am going to ease myself into the riding the trainer thing instead of throwing myself into the cage and hoping that the lion has mercy, we will get there.

Speaking of the saddle, the one thing that I will be changing on the bike is the saddle! I have a WTV Pure V race saddle on the bike that I am using on the trainer and its comfy enough for real riding but sitting still I am feeling it more than I think I should. Sure my ass is probably soft from the lack of riding for the last two months but at the same time I have a very comfy hybrid saddle that I can put on for trainer use so why not save myself some discomfort?

A successful day in the books so onto another, today the ride will be longer and I am fine tuning the food that I eat in an attempt to get back into the whole foods road that I was walking down not so long ago.

Here's to a lighter me.

The initial weigh in along with some thoughts

This morning I remembered that I started this blog so I hopped onto the scale for a comparison number, I'll admit that I did not like what that cold piece of glass and plastic had to say to me but it is as they say what it is. My baseline weight will officially be a portly 379.4 pounds and hanging off of my six foot four tall frame I am in every sense of the word what the cycling community would call a "Clydesdale", I cannot change the terms and conditions where my height puts me into that category but I can try to get the weight there.

I know what to do, I know that I am capable of losing weight and exercising, in fact when I get started the exercise gets somewhat addicting my problem lately is a timing issue along with some things in my life getting in the way and wedging themselves into my cranial cavity on an emotional level. Making a commitment to myself which in turn is making one to my family is my game plan and since riding my bikes is something that I have a great passion for I figure why not use that to un-round myself a bit, right?

I'm just a fat guy who knows that he needs to drop some pounds, I invite you to come along for the ride and you can cheer me on, just read along in the background or make fun of me while tossing rotten fruit at me, any way that its cut here it is. Three hundred seventy nine point four pounds is my beginning spot, I am aiming to be as low as possible by the time riding season comes around again, and though I haven't picked a goal weight yet I am sure that will come in a later post. My will, a bike trainer and some good choices where the food is the subject and I am on my way to some good results... as long as I do my part.

Feel free to leave a comment, or like I said toss rotten fruit if you must.

A good place to start

This shall mark the beginning, the beginning of what you ask? the beginning of a run for a goal that was set long ago in a fat mans dreams which is not so far away. In the beginning I weighed much more than I currently weigh and I slammed myself into a strict regimen that included a low calorie diet and not much exercise to begin with and that turned into a low calorie diet with lots of exercise. Somewhere along the trail guided by comfort and perhaps some cockiness I seem to have lost my way, but in that same time I found passion for something which was long ago forgotten, my love of being on top of something with two wheels.

I own more than a couple of bicycles and primarily ride mountain bikes on rail trails and around the streets in my very hilly very rural area somewhere in the North East United States. Normally I sit the winter out where bicycle riding is concerned and utilize the gym for my exercise but this time around things are different with the addition of a new baby in my life getting out to the gym on anything that resembles a regular basis is tough. My lovely wife bought me a bicycle trainer for Christmas and I thought it was a good starting point for a blog so here we are.

The Trainer is a CycleOps fluid 2 and is my first experience with a trainer, I will be using a mountain bike with a 26 inch wheel when I use the trainer and will report here my experiences with it along with my weight loss. My eating plan is going to be 2200 calories per day to start off (my last successful weight loss plan was a lower calorie allotment) and I will be posting my weight up in a post some time tomorrow for a starting point and I expect it to drop several pounds in the first few days/week because I know that I am a tad bit up from the Christmas eating and its just fluid weight. At any rate that's my story and I'm sticking to it, Hopefully I will pick up some readers as I could use the support if I am being honest and this will be a journal to show how a fat man and two wheels can in fact change his health.

So it begins.