Big Boys Club

[Archie]

triple post

5k season for us in late summer through thanksgiving. I have hit an old guy personal record every year except one injury year. so 8 out of 9 years and no races last year so after a 2 year lay off this year might be tough. I can't remember my exact PR at the moment but I know it was just under a 7 min pace for the 3.1 miles. I'd love to get under 21 at some point in 2021 or 2022 and 19:59 would be for 2023, provided we move to a warmer environment like we want and I'll be able to run year round without having to be tough

 

[Matty]

Good stuff Arch. My twin is into running much more than cycling. He's training to do a sub-24 5k this Saturday.

Strava seems to give more "fitness points" for cycling than it does for running. Joe Rain's fitness level is in the 50s while mine was at 98 after yesterday's ride. There's no doubt in my mind that Joe Rain's daily running efforts make him fitter than me right now. 🤷‍♂️ Cycling on flat ground is way easy compared to running.

I've tried running and it feels awful. Everything hurts after 30 seconds.

I may revisit if and when I drop below 180lbs but I doubt it.

 

[roguejuror]

^^^ but cycling burns more than running?

 

[Matty]

No it doesn't. Running always burns more. But cycling burns more than you think. It gets your heart rate up very quickly.

I burn 750-800 calories per hour for a moderate effort, and up to 1000 when I push hard. Yesterday was a 5/10 sort of effort

 

[roguejuror]

I'm going to get a cheapo one from Wal Mart to test out the lifestyle, I already have a route figured out in my head

 

[Tron]

I'm going to get a cheapo one from Wal Mart to test out the lifestyle, I already have a route figured out in my head

Instead of buying a new cheapo from Walmart I suggest a used less-cheapo that could be the same price

The bicycle market is tough, though, post C-19.

 

[Matty]

Don't get a vintage road bike. I would also recommend staying away from Walmart but depending on your budget you may not have much of a choice.

My Walmart bike is fine. Clunky but fine.

 

[Archie]

biked 10 miles hard. ran a couple miles, then took a refreshing "dip" in the lake at oak st beach where all the wetsuited triathletes train. I did 200 ish meters and my lats and Tris got tight and exhausted in a weird way. turned around a did a slow alternating breast stroke and front crawl back to beach. watched the thonged ladies and dried off and a slow bike ride home. couple PRs on way down

 

[Tron]

@Archie what’s a PR?

 

[Tron]

I saw a recent photo of @Matty off of the forum and for the first time I realized what a massive amount of weight you lost, pal. Very nice work. Did you happen to get blood work done before the transformation so you could compare the before/after blood work?

 

[Archie]

@Archie what’s a PR?

personal record

strava keeps track over various segments on your journey. most of them are stupid arbitrary because it takes me about 15-20 lights to get down to Lakeshore,so it's mostly about timing .

on Lakeshore it's about wind and congestion

these top 5 segments are the personal records. ( small sample of 3-4 rides on this route)

 

[Tron]

Ah ok.

Yeah I get crushed by traffic lights, too.

 

[Archie]

found my old man 5k PR

21:41 in a literal zoo with lots of turns.

will aim for 20:59 at 5k on Oct 2

 

[Archie]

wait that's only 5 ish weeks. no I'll be lucky to break 23. don't have many long runs in.

 

[Matty]

I saw a recent photo of @Matty off of the forum and for the first time I realized what a massive amount of weight you lost, pal. Very nice work. Did you happen to get blood work done before the transformation so you could compare the before/after blood work?

Nah. I just know that my blood pressure is way down, so much so that I was able to resume drinking two coffees a day.

Funny thing is, I don't see the dramatic weight loss. I used to be this weight, and I think people develop a delusion as they pack on the pounds, i.e. I pictured myself as being close to my healthy weight even the morning I weighed in at 240. But I was suddenly in utter shock and disbelief, not at my body but at the number on the scale. 239 was somehow acceptable, but 240 became a situation.

When you're overweight you do things like avoid having your photo taken, or if you do have your picture taken you develop a keen sense of the angles that will hide your extra weight the best. You also look at yourself with a "fat-removing filter". In my mind I was 190ish all along. I was just a few weeks of effort away from being my healthy weight (lol) - turned out to be 5 months.

I was at my in-laws' family reunion this weekend, and you know how not mentioning someone's change in appearance is a Thing That Polite People Do™️ now (hashtag body positive)? Yeah well everywhere I looked I would catch people looking away after staring at me. It got kind of uncomfortable after a while. Then the topic of cycling came up and someone said "Matt, you look like you've been cycling a lot lately" and from then on it was a deluge of "OH MY GOD YOUR FACE, YOUR BODY, IT'S SO MUCH SLIMMER!"

lol

Tell people they've lost weight, unless you suspect an eating disorder. I still have a gut and I eat like a pig, I'm just a healthy weight now you polite staring pricks.

 

[Tron]

Had to shorten the distance a little today because we have a new obstacle in addition to the 90 degree weather (Feels Like 97 degrees) at start time:

Air quality warnings weeeeeeeeeeeee

 

[Archie]

nice work.

got up to 96 here. I took the day off from everything

 

[Matty]

28C/82F feels like 30C/86F here, not too bad

Construction on one of my usual roads, had to take a gravel trail detour

I pushed almost 440W over a short hill, beat my previous PR by 4 seconds. I was rocking the Walmart bike too. 💪