Jan 17, 2009

i'm fat and i suck



it's definitely sucking!




The finger is pretty much on the road to healing up. Stitches come out next week, so figured there was no harm in finishing up work early on thurs for a ride. Beautiful day out! This was mine and Greg's first adventure into Mtn. Biking in the McDowells. Have been rockclimbing out there for years, but never just hiking that much, nor biking.

The climb up kicked my butt.

No other way to put it than I'm fat and outta shape. I love the feeling of being light, fast and strong, but I hate the pain, the starving yourself, the sacrifice to get there. Once you pass 40, the body just doesn't respond to training like it used to. I have to put in a full summers worth of road bike riding just to drop even 10lbs it seems!

When I first moved to Phoenix in 1990, I was a 25yr old tub O goo at 185lbs. I bought a Trek 1400, joined up with a local Cycling Club in the West Valley and started riding. By the time labor day of that year came around, I was back to what I weighed in High School (155lbs) and my thunder thighs from running (I ran the 200m/400m, long jump) had morphed into the svelte, shaved and spindly legs of a cyclist. My remote 'sorta girlfriend' at the time, came out to visit after that summer and was amazed at the transformation from March of 1990 to Sept 1990.
Of course, my calf muscles had atrophied to the point that I pulled the left one mowing the grass one Sat. but hey, we all have to make sacrifices :-)

Kept it off through the 1990's by throwing myself into rockclimbing. The company I worked for at the time (Honeywell) was far too inflexible with their 'flex' time to allow for enough training to become anything more than a Cat4 road racer, and I had started to tire of the whole 'roadie' mentality anyways. Climbing/hiking with 40lbs on your back nearly every weekend is a great way to stay in shape. Total body workout for sure! I touched 148lbs in 1997 after a two week hardcore trip to Wyoming, climbing in the Tetons, Wind River range, Devils Tower, and the Black Hills of SoDak. Lighter than I was in high school even.. oh why didnt I keep that momentum up!?

Job got more intense, promotions, responsibility, kids etc: and the weight slowly came back on.

165lbs that seems to be my set point okay fine.. that's only 15 over when I was 'hardcore'.. hey what happened? After the first pregnancy I was up to 170lbs! That second pregnancy is hell on the body I tell ya!

Jumped back on the road bike after it had sat in the closet for 12 years. What? there are triple cranks on the front now? 10speeds in back? STI? no more reaching for the downtube? Hmmmm.. Droped 5-8 lbs relatively quickly, but that just seemed to stoke the fat fire for the next round of inactivity. At the height of all my intense travel for work (to/from San Diego weekly) I was pushing 188lbs.

That's a great story problem for my 9 yr old. "If Tim weighed 148lbs in 1997 and now weighs 188lbs in 2008 what is the average weight gain per year?" Show your work and how you arrived at your answer!!!

Made it through the holidays at 178lbs and holding.. maybe there *is* hope afterall!?

Back on the bike.. but I find that I like road riding less and less these days. It seems.. well uh, like a 'workout' (kind of like how I really got burned out on running after all those years of track and field?)

So, I need to get on the Mtn Bike and grind...

Thursday *was* a grind. Of course the two slices of Ray's pizza (I *LOVE* pizza) didnt help!?








1 comment:

chollaball said...

pulled your calf moving the lawn -- SO true :-)