fat guy on a bike
I just finished Heft on Wheels:A Field Guide to Doing a 180 by Mike Magnuson.
The “180″ Magnuson is referring to is turning himself around from an obese, alcoholic, chain smoking, chain junk-food eating couch potato into a lean and uber-healthy, booze and smoke free cycling enthusiast.
The picture on the cover is that of a very large naked man in profile riding a bicycle. It’s so outrageous that I thought it to be a staged shot but it is in fact of Magnuson himself when he started riding seriously but before he gave up all his bad habits. The picture was taken to accompany an article he wrote for Gentleman’s Quarterly.
The author’s approach to training was an unconventional one. He started out, from the very first, at 255 pounds, riding with an experienced and fit group of riders that met at the local bike shop for rides 3 days a week. Even though he was hopelessly outclassed by the other riders he wouldn’t give up and always finished the rides even if far behind the others.
He also chose the hardest endurance rides he could find, like the 110 mile Bridge to Bridge Incredible Cycling Challenge in the Blue Ridge mountains of North Carolina with over 6,800 feet of climbing. As he says, he could have seriously injured himself doing these rides in the shape he was in but that’s the way he does things; all or nothing.
As you can imagine there’s a lot of humor in his account but a lot of wisdom too.
I found the book very inspiring, not that I want to do what Magnuson did, but that I can certainly work a lot harder than I do and not die. 
It also underscored to me the importance of group riding to spur me on to push myself harder than I do when riding alone.
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Cycle - 3.4 hours - 03/30/2008
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 03/30/2008
- Time: 12:30:00
- Total Time: 3:22:20.00
- Average Heart rate: 131
- Calories: 1772
- Distance: 35.28 miles
- Average Speed: 10.46 mph
- Ascent: 306 ft
- Descent: 308 ft
This is my 35 miler. I did my usual 25 miler plus a lap around my 10 mile route. Beautiful, sunny day in the high 30s. No wind. I felt like I pushed it a little harder than usual, lower gearing up the hills and more out of the saddle climbing. My quads certainly feel it but still only averaging 10 mph! This on my steel Ross “mountain” bike with knobby tires. I’m sure I’d do better with a real road bike, lighter and with slicker tires.
Filed under: Cycle, General Cardio
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Why I like to read
It’s really great to get reminders and encouragement from various sources. One of them being authors. I’m in the middle of reading Joe Friel’s The Cyclists Training Bible and I am reminded to cross train and build up slowly during the winter season. I have been getting a little hyper about “real” bike riding as it’s so much fun and so much easier to train on a real bike on a real road! After a messy winter here in the northeast I am itching to get out there and I have, in fact, been able to get out on a few nice and not so nice days but then we have had some nasty weather again and I’m frustrated and feel I’m not getting my “proper” training in. So reading Joe Friel today about periodization and the base period, which I am currently in, helped me to relax about going back in to the gym and even not worry that I didn’t get an upright bike (which is most like what I ride) and had to use the recumbent. It’s actually good to cross train and maybe even use the elliptical, the rowing machine or the treadmill plus a little strength training with the free weights.
It’s good to have a reality check once in a while even if I don’t have a real live coach!
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recumbent stat bike workout
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 03/28/2008
- Time: 06:00:00
- Total Time: 00:45:00.60
- Average Heart rate: 105
- Calories: 280
- Distance: 10.19 miles
- Average Speed: 13.58 mph
- Average Cadence: 89
- Max Cadence: 140
couple inches of wet, heavy snow on the ground this AM and still coming down!
Filed under: Cycle, General Cardio
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Best ski day so far this season … and first tracks!
Monday we went skiing at Butternut in Great Barrington, MA. We had the best day of the season so far. I’m not surprised. Based on last year’s experience, the closer we got to the end of the season, the better it got!
Weatherman was predicting partly cloudy, slight chance of light rain or snow.
Never happened! 100% perfectly clear, cloudless blue, blue sky almost the whole day. Warm temps, no wind.
And best of all …. First Tracks! Yeah, the triple chair lift on the right side of the mountain as you face it (don’t know what the directions are there) didn’t open up until 11AM. As it turned out, we got right in line behind a couple of snowboarders. At the top, while the snowboarders were fiddling around we hit the trail, Freewheeler, it’s the dark blue on the right in the map below, and quickly realized we were the first ones on it that day. Sweet! I’ll tell you, I put the pedal to the metal!
A bluebird day!
View from the triple … spring is coming! Bittersweet! It’s great skiing but it signals the end of the season.
Your’s truly … Freewheelin’!
Hope you all had a nice Monday at work! Ha ha!
Oh, by the way, $20 lift tickets. 
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Late afternoon bike ride - much better
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 03/26/2008
- Time: 17:00:00
- Total Time: 00:57:31.10
- Average Heart rate: 128
- Calories: 401
- Distance: 11.83 miles
- Average Speed: 12.34 mph
I left work early for a hearing aid appointment. Got out of that early enough for a ride before dinner. Beautiful, sunny and warm. How could I refuse? 180 degrees from the morning ride: sleet, wind and dark.
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Bike ride - early AM
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 03/26/2008
- Time: 06:00:00
- Total Time: 00:41:35.40
- Average Heart rate: 118
- Calories: 307
- Distance: 7.11 miles
- Average Speed: 10.26 mph
Sleet, wind, dark. Can’t see the HRM or the computer. Good practice for the half-century since it will go on rain or shine.
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stat bike Zone 2
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 03/25/2008
- Time: 06:00:00
- Total Time: 00:45:04.40
- Average Heart rate: 109
- Calories: 294
- Distance: 11.63 miles
- Average Speed: 15.48 mph
- Average Cadence: 87
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Brutal ride revisited …
Now that I look at it, the elevation of that river ride is more than I thought initially by just a cursory look at the elevation plot. I think the 10 miles of steady climb, combined with the headwind and my lack of pacing, is what did me in. It goes from an elevation of 46 ft near the river to 655 ft. over a 10 mile stretch, pretty much due west which is where the headwind was coming from. My 25 mile ride, on the other hand goes from 210 ft. to 541 ft. and it’s pretty much up and down over a series of mostly short climbs. Visually, the elevation plot of the 30 miler looked easier but when I dig down into the numbers a bit, I can see where it took it’s toll.
Now I just hope I can recover enough in one day to enjoy skiing on Monday!
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Why was today such a brutal ride?
Rode my first 30 miler today. Nice day; high 30s; sunshine. I mapped out a new route which went south and east to the Hudson river and then back out west then north and home. From the elevation plot (MapMyRide) I thought it would be a little easier than my usual 25 miles through the hill country but it wasn’t. I’m not sure what it was. It’s not even the extra 5 miles cause I was already beat half way through. There was a stiff headwind about half the ride as I was exposed going west but not that strong. Maybe I didn’t pace myself. It was my first time on a long ride with my new cadence computer so maybe I was too focused on keeping my cadence up rather than with how hard I was working. Took the camera but I was too annoyed with my fatigue to bother with pictures. Wasn’t fun!
Anyway, here’s the route:
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