HK -The place for sore tacos

Post up what you plan to do if you need to drop weight or what goals you have; short term or long term. That's if you need to lose weight. Please post background if you feel okay about that so we can all work/help together to help drop that weight back to a healthy weight and in result you will be better, healthier, and ride more in the process.

A video worth listening to, over and over again. To get it through your head.

Little background on myself. I used to be a very fit person about three years ago. Averaging around 165-170 pounds. Fast forward when I got out of the military my weight went up to 190. Add into another whole mess of stuff, divorce, unmotivated, dept, unable to find a job, my weight keeps growing. My weight leveled out last year around 240-235 but since this winter I've really haven't done much.

Normally I'm pretty good about keeping fit but it's been on the decline since about August of last year, riding didn't happen as much, I stopped weight lifting, just sat around. Maybe it's like a winter depression? IDK but add to fact all my work out stuff is just sitting in my basement I just keep sitting around, seeming unmotivated to do anything. It has never been this bad before. Add into the problem my basement has mold/dust/asbestos everywhere every time I would work out I'd be very sick the next day, I tried to push through it and moved everything into a small garage during the summer but moved it back inside just before winter but it's just sat there since. It's like my weight/fitness has become so bad I've become a screw it attitude. Maybe by putting this here I'll read it over and over till I get off my ass and do something about it. When I first moved back home I was wearing a size 34 in pants, very fit, happy, nice right? Now it's up to a 40-42, fat, always pissed. It's sad.

Anyhow, I've thought about moving the weights up in my room to start getting back in shape slowly but I don't know if the floors will support me and all the weights together. Seriously, it's and old house, not to mention because of my dept; living back home "people" don't approve of me trying to better myself. It's stupid, I wish I could move out but that's just not an option. Also the winter doesn't help being overweight, I get winded easy, add the cold it just hurts to ride right now.

Sorry for the rant and woe is me but after going to the store to get clothes yesterday I looked at myself in the mirror and just shook my head in embarrassment. I know what I need to do but I need to get this off my chest.... Hutch.

Stop eating so much. I'm 6-0 and hit 195 in January - up from 170 a year earlier. I was at dinner with my wife and she was telling me how she was going to drop 10 vanity pounds by using an app called myfitnesspal calorie counter. So, as we're talking I downloaded the app, put my info in and made a goal of dropping 25 lbs over 13 weeks

It came back stating I could have NET 1250 calories a day. No cardio, no more than 1250 calories - but, if I do, say 1,000 calories worth of cardio, I could have 2,250 calories that day - get it? So, I put my breakfast in, egg beaters, toast and orange juice - 700 calories. Lunch at Buffalo Wild Wings, 8 wings, fries, bleu cheese and water - 1,500 calories. Dinner at Mexican restaurant, Fajitas, massive Margarita - 2,000 calories.

I was blown away. I ate like that, and worse, four or five times a week. I'd go out and eat and drink for six hours straight sometimes. Probably taking in 1,000 calories an hour.

That was it. I buckled down and followed the program. Lost five pounds within five days. The next five took a couple weeks. I plateaued for a couple weeks and then lost the last five over a couple weeks after that.

I lost 16 pounds in eight weeks. Not stellar fast, but it wasn't easy. I've taken a little break for my sanity over the past week, but I'm going to get back on it Monday. The thing that motivates me is I set a goal to complete a 100 mile MTB race within 12 hours sometime this year. If I don't drop the weight and train, it ain't happening. I refuse to not accomplish a goal - so I make it happen.

I am 6ft 2" and weighed 363 about 3 or 4 years ago, can't remember exactly. I was a smoking, high functioning alcoholic, Chinese buffet consuming, desk jockey. I was on a pathway for a short lifespan. Then I got fed up. I am not sure what happened really, just tired of being fat. Fat, drunk, and stupid was no way for me to go through life, especially with a young daughter and wife who need me over the long haul. I bought a bikes direct 29er and some Chantix, rode a mile and wanted to cry....I just wasted a $1000 dollars. Some encouragement from my buddy Ralph, a trip to get my seat bones measured and some new shorts and a saddle later I was able to start riding for 20 minutes at a time.

I slowly worked myself up to where I could ride 20 miles on the trails. Now I am not limited by my body but more by my current schedule. I presently weigh around 230, I swear that scale almost said 229 this morning. This is the lowest of my adult life. It's not easy, every pound is a fight. I run a 5k on the treadmill a few times a week and lift 3 times. I live in Indiana and don't like riding in the cold, so I am anxiously awaiting spring. I have not smoked in 3 or 4 years. I have been sober for 75 days (work in progress) I have given up everything I use to find comfort in, Alcohol is my last vice.

Before


After/ This is sometime last summer, I am probably 15 lbs lighter now.

Holy shit - that's awesome! How'd you do it?

6'2" and 50 years old here. I was fairly active until career and family consumed my life in the 90s-00s. Before I started cycling again in 2008 I was in the 220s and fairly non-active. I would really like to be around 185-190.

Last spring I started a 137-mile, 6-day backpack trip at 198 and came home at 186. I lived on 2,000 calories a day. Taking in 100 calories per hour (energy drink) while moving is magic. That would be a good topic in another forum, actually.

I'm 205 currently. That's up about 10 lbs from where I was almost 6 months ago before I wrecked my knee and was off exercise for 4 months. At the end of April I've got another long backpack trip planned (112+ miles and >26,000 ft climbing). I hope to lose at least 5 lbs. training and up to 10 more on the trip. Going to cut out a lot of the beer and fatty foods.

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There are 2 types of people in this world:
1) Those who can extrapolate from incomplete data

I HIGHLY recommend the MyFitnessPal app or website--it really opens your eyes to how much your body needs, or doesn't need, which is more likely.

I'm 5'10", a former HS cross country runner and coach, and I let myself get up to 240 at one point about 10 years ago. I trained for a marathon, got down to 205ish, but plateaued big time (btw, I've found marathon training isn't a good way to lose weight). Only after starting a consistent run/bike routine (with HIGH intensity efforts) did I finally drop the rest of the weight. I got down as low as 148 a couple summers ago when training and dieting hard core, and it was VERY hard work to get there, but I felt too scrawny, so I purposely went back up to 155-160.
However, after that, I got [mentally] lazy with maintaining, and as of the first of this year, I was back up to 190. I'm tired of not feeling the way I want to, so now my goal weight is 155-160, and I'm already down to 175.

The toughest thing for me now isn't keeping my calories down (I'm consistently keeping a caloric deficit, but my weight still stagnates), but knowing what calories TO eat, and what calories NOT TO eat while exercising regularly. Like all of us, I want to burn fat and build muscle, and thus lose weight the right way.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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N00B DIY'er

If you run too large of a calorie deficit, your body will stop burning fat and will eat high energy muscle.

I'm 6'1" and used to be 300 lbs. My first year of mountain biking got me to 240 lbs. Currently I'm probably around 250-255 lbs because I've been slacking off this winter, but it's a guess since I don't own a scale.

I was fed up being fat, huffing and puffing just from walking to the mail box, and I wanted to stop the slide before my knees would go pop and diabetes set in.

At first I bought a quality rowing machine and started rowing. I'm no good with gyms and fitness centers. When I feel like exercising I have to be able to start NOW, not having to drive to the gym, get suited up and so on. At home I can be on the rower in 60 seconds. I rowed for a year.

Two years ago I bought my first mtb, just as an alternative to the rower on sunny days. Again, I can be on the bike within a couple of minutes, so the delay from "Hmm, weather looks nice" to actually riding the bike is minimal - that works great for me. On top of that, I only have a mile to the trail head. As a pleasant surprise I found out that I loved mtb'ing. The rower was just a "I need to do it"-chore, so discovering mtb'ing by accident and loving it was a great plus.

But it has never really been about weight for me. I don't care what weight I am as long as I feel good. Riding and dropping weight really made a lot of things much easier, so naturally the weight has an effect, but I don't own a scale and don't really care what number a scale would show if I got on one.

When I started riding I found out I could improve a lot over a short time. I could feel my body changing, getting stronger, less huffing and puffing, better sleep patterns, a general improvement all round. THAT's what keeps me going. I don't care about having a six pack or looking good in swim shorts, I care how I feel.

It's important to me that every change I make I'll be able to do for the rest of my life. I could eat powder for 3 months and drop some fat, but I know I'm not willing or able to do that for the rest of my life, and as soon as I get back to eating regular food I would gain the fat again. Same with calorie counting, might work great short term, but doing that for the rest of my life? - forget it!

Riding my mtb is something I can easily see myself doing for the rest of my life. It's fun, I love being out in the nature and I feel great after a ride. I'll happily do that for the remainder of my life.

As for eating, I LOVE food. There is just so many exciting flavors out there, I'm not giving up on that to go vegan or eat bland powder, hell no. What I do instead is eating smaller portions and using healthier ingredients. As an example, my local shop have 7 kinds of canned tomatoes, 6 of those have a dose of sugar for conservation reasons, so I pick the sugarless kind when needed. A lot of bread have sugar in it, but the bread without sugar tastes just as well, so why not pick that? Eating smaller portions and picking ingredients more carefully is something I can live with for the rest of my life. Sticking with salad and wheat crackers for the rest of my life, no way!

I'm already ahead of where I started out and I will probably improve a lot more by keeping the effort up. I would like to hit the 200 lbs mark at some point, but it's not paramount. The important bit is that I feel good with myself and live, eat and exercise in a way that I can sustain for the rest of my life. I'm 43 now and plan on being the leanest, toughest 80 year old in the retirement home..

Great stories from everyone, thanks for sharing. Seriously, the weight improvements you guys have dropped is awesome.

i'm not a clyde at all, obv. but a serious depression made me LOSE a lot of weight. being sick, having no appetite, etc. i lost 35 pounds very quick and i wasnt overweight to begin with, just a little "thick". well, i liked being skinny, so i was determined to keep it off. thats around the time i started riding a lot more. Also, i became an obsessive label reader. i told myself, keep it under 1500 calories. Now, for somebody small like me, thats doable. For you big guys, that's probably too little to maintain (it would make you lose weight, but most big guys cant survive on that). my metabolism sucks, and my thyroid has issues, so if i eat more than 1400 calories, even when riding, i gain!!!. People always assume the riding made me lose weight, but i try and tell them, the riding only made me maintain weightloss. Diet has been the big thing. you can go online and see the nutrion info for many popular restaurants and you'd be appalled at how bad they are. There was an entree that i used to eat once a week, that easily totaled 1900 calories in just one meal. Once you read labels, you realize just how much more you're taking in that you had no idea.

after all this, i've put on 10 pounds in the last three years. i WAS too skinny at one point, but i'd like to knock off five again, because my clothes fit better when i weigh a bit less. I got to get back into better eating habits becuase these days, i hang out with people and we "socially" eat out a lot. thats a killer.

Good luck homie.

The myfitnesspal app has a barcode scanner that you point and it pulls all the info in. After a while, you can just find what you typically eat and it's just there. It also has the largest nutritional database in the world. When you go to a restaurant, you just type the name of the restaurant and it pulls the entire menu - most of the time. Then you can make a pretty good decision based on that.

It's pretty easy math: calories in - calories out.

Knock five off? You looked very skinny today Nicole.

i USED to be 15 lbs less! but that was un-maintainable, and probably not the best look. its a matter of ditching all my bigger clothes, and only having clothes made for being 5-10 lbs less. i'd rather fit back into them than buy a new wardrobe, hah.

Starting this week

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There are 2 types of people in this world:
1) Those who can extrapolate from incomplete data

Got back to MTB after a 12-year break primarily to keep up with the foster kids. Enjoyed it so much since it gave me my solitude breaks that I need (aah... peace and quiet). I went from 3-4 miles street riding on my bike to 10-12 miles of trail every day until it got cold...

I used to 195 lbs and I'm now down to 178-185 depending on how soon it's been since I ate Mexican food. Hypertension risk runs in my family and I figure all that exercise will help keep that in check.

-S

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SKITTLETITS!!! That is all.


mmm bacon.

http://battlelog.battlefield.com/bf4/user/Shibiwan/

I started riding last year when I weighed almost 270. Ended the season at just under 235. Still hovering between 235-240 now, which I dont understand. I dont eat the greatest, more carbs than I need for my activity level, and I started smoking again over the winter...might be why I keep the weight at an even keel, but it is going to ruin my day when I start riding in earnest again.

I'm 6-4, so I want to get back down in the 210-215 range like I was when I was a young, strapping Marine. I *can* do it, I just don't know if I will be able to pull it off with what my schedule is looking to be like for the next several months.

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http://about.me/bigterry

A bit of extra weight is not always a bad thing. What matters is the body fat percentage. MTB can be a workout for the whole body so if you do it right, weight gains in the muscle department are to be expected. OTOH, MTB has not been exactly known as the best method to lose weight, or has it? I see a lot of fit and accomplished riders on trails who are not exactly slim.

Here's the main reason I'm dropping weight:

http://slowroadie.com/watts-per-kilogram

i see a lot of beer-gutted MTB'ers. since i hang out with many of them, i think i know why. First of all, i noticed after a hard ride, I'm ravenous! it's easy to undo a workout with a monster burrito. Also, 99% of MTBers i know, are beer fiends. Their diet tends to be pretty bad. Then again, many MTB riders are riding for fun as well, not purely exercise (it's just a nice side effect). It seems to be a contrast to the roadies who tend to be more into fitness and weight. they're always doing things to remove weight from their bikes, including slimming their bodies.

Great info, thanks Wmac!

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N00B DIY'er

This is true in my experience, as well. Getting skinny doesn't happen with working out, it happens with how you fuel your body. Ask any bodybuilder, and they'll tell you they get cut in the kitchen, not in the gym.

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N00B DIY'er

yeah. after my big weight loss, people were like "oh its because you bike all the time". Actually no...i dont even bike every day. just a few times a week. They dont want to hear the part about watching what you eat. sometimes a workout will only burn you 250 calories or so, especially the treadmill walkers. its easier to just NOT EAT that amount of calories. Both are best though. i'm so much happier being in physical shape, vs sluggish and tired like i was years ago.

I believe in a high protein / low carbs diet. I lost over 30 pounds in two months two years ago by following dieting instructions from this book plus a bit of exercise: http://www.amazon.com/4-Hour-Body-Uncom ... 0307704610

Sadly, I did not become a superhuman though. My body wants me to both exercise and eat well, if I do not do both I grow large in days.

I stopped drinking full-leaded soda.

Down 10 lbs in 2 weeks.

Now at 253, 28% bodyfat (eeeeeew)
Goal is 210, 14% bodyfat by 4th of July

I've done it before, I'll do it again. Eating less crap, more greens and lean meats (these don't taste nearly as good... ), a bit on the cardio and weight training (adding muscle is WAY easier than losing fat to kill off the BF% ). The more lean muscle mass you have in your body, the higher your base caloric is. That is, that magic # of calories that you intake to gain/lose NO weight, without doing anyting.

I stopped drinking soda and anything eating anything with High Fructose Corn Syrup. Then, I stopped buying any and all Coca-Cola and Pepsi products if I can help it - for several reasons. Add up all the money you spend with these companies each year and you'll probably stop too!

For the most part, I drink water or sweet tea with cane sugar.

And, with all that money you save... Liposuction.

What's everyone's take on riding road vs mtb for burning calories? Doesn't matter if you ride your mtb on the road but for me in the past riding on the road burned more fat and calories compared to mtbing. Don't know why but it has.

Back in 2005 after a horrible long term relationship followed by a horrid depression I hit the road with my GT. I was up around 270 pounds. In the morning I would ride, come home, work out and keep a strict diet. After 3 months I was down to 180 pounds.

Major part of the reason I'm trying to get a road bike this season. Also any time I ride on the road it helps me MTBing as my stamina gets better, just hitting the trails gets me there but it always levels out until I hit the road more. Anyone care to share their thoughts?

Settle Xion FBRB. I think it's a great training bike. I was riding my Univega Zig Zag on the road for a while, then my MTB and now my FBRB.

It seems like I burn more fat while riding on the road. I don't have any science to back it up but I think I get more sustained effort with consistent increased heart rate on the road. I have been told by more than a few people that real fat burning doesn't really kick in until appx. 90 minutes into the exercise due to glycogen levels in the blood. I do know I was consistent in riding every day possible and tried to go for 2 hours whenever I could. It wasn't until I got close to 200 lbs before I started to paying some much needed attention to my diet.

Much of the weight I have lost since hitting 200 lbs has been through the simple understanding that 3500 calories equals one pound...so to drop a pound a week means you have to short yourself 500 calories a day. I still eat some crap occasionally (keeps me from craving) but less often and much less of it. For the most part I have been maintaining my weight since mid Nov. and at my current exercise routine I have come to the conclusion that I can either have beer OR dessert without gaining...not both I don't like choosing between two of my most favorite things in life. I am still learning how to live at the size I want to be.

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Life is Short...Ride Hard!