When it comes to weight and body dysmorphia, we cyclists can go toe-to-toe with any thirteen year old tween who has done their time flipping through the pages of Vogue and Sixteen. However fit and thin we might be, at some point it dawns on us that we’re not as light as we could be. The obvious solution is to buy lighter parts for our bikes, but eventually we will run out of parts to buy or money to spend. At that point, we’ll have no alternative but to start losing weight.
On the surface, this is a fairly simple matter; calories in minus calories out is the magic to any weight loss voodoo, right up to the point where it stops working because the “calories in” part deviates from our lifestyle or our metabolism decides we’re old and that since everything else is slowing down, it should too.
It is at this juncture that we ask ourselves how we can lose those kilos that seem unwilling to melt from our bodies. The answer varies depending on your lifestyle, body type, how loud your Awesome is, and your ideal riding weight. (By the way, similarly to the number of bikes to own, your ideal riding weight is one kilo less than your current weight, or weight ideal = weight current – 1). But assuming that you enjoy eating, alcohol, or anything else that doesn’t suck, it will require doing something drastic.
My journey through weight loss started with doing everything the same but riding more until that program stalled, and then I started doing sit-ups and leg lifts, both of which meet the aforementioned suck requirement. And then I cut back on beer and wine, which sucks even more, but that’s when things really started happening. A surprising side-effect of cutting down on booze, by the way, is that although you get less charismatic, you feel better in general and sleep better in addition to losing weight. It turns out that alcohol is a poison or something. Who knew?
But now that my V-Jersey isn’t stretched like a balloon on a pumpkin, I’ve moved on to worrying about my upper body, which is bigger than a typical cyclist’s thanks to 15 or so years of nordic ski racing. Which brings me to Ullrich’s sleeves. I have always had it in my mind that Jan and I are of similar physique, aside from the quads and calves and the devilishly good looks. But my stupid sleeves are always tight, and his were always loose. I take off my jersey, and sure enough, there’s that little mark that the sleeves made on each of my arms. Infuriating. The only solution is to focus completely on wasting my upper body into nothing.
Since I’m not doing anything outrageous like routinely lifting weighty objects or doing pushups, the only conclusion I can draw is that I’m carrying too many groceries into the house at once. I’ve therefor moved to a strict regimen of only carrying one gallon of milk at a time. It takes twice as long to unload the car that way, but all that walking is good for my cardio, you just have to push through the pain. I also alternate hands every few strides if I’ve parked more than a hundred meters from the house in order to avoid becoming lopsided.
Finally, if this latest program doesn’t work out as well as I expect it to, I’ve also realized that while carbohydrates are an athlete’s friend in terms of providing easy energy to burn during a workout, they are heavy on the fork, and repetitively lifting forkloads of pasta into my mouth may be what’s causing my shoulders to bulk up unnecessarily. I’m therefor on the lookout for a healthy food source that can be drank from a straw or something in pellet form that I can peck out of a bowl.
It’s drastic, sure, but drastic times call for drastic measures, and I’m determined to get there eventually.
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Holy Moly! I just saw this news (this is what comes from living in my Dad's RV in the middle of nowhere West Point, NY and having REALLY sucky internet- not to mention the five kids and the VMH and myself all bumping into each other continuosly in our ittybitty living space)! Man, never thought it would work out that way.
You just have to know that Lance realized that he would be royally FUCKED when all the evidence would be made public if he fought the charges so he decides that he will not fight it and just not recognize the USADA. Lord, the guy is unbelievable. I bet the UCI is on a phone with him right now asking for a few million in "donations" to also not recognize the USADA.
CRAZY!
@Oli, @motor city - I'd have to agree with the both of you. As much as I dislike the man for being a COTHO, the fact that he did as well as he did - with or without the dope - can't be waved away. He's accomplished some pretty good things (regardless of how valid they were). It still doesn't change the fact that he's a twatwaffle.
Well now everyone knows he doped and it's the dishonesty and cover-ups which I hate the most, but this quote from the man himself has a ring of truth for me (apologies for the font size)
USADA cannot assert control of a professional international sport and attempt to strip my seven Tour de France titles. I know who won those seven Tours, my teammates know who won those seven Tours, and everyone I competed against knows who won those seven Tours. We all raced together. For three weeks over the same roads, the same mountains, and against all the weather and elements that we had to confront. There were no shortcuts, there was no special treatment. The same courses, the same rules. The toughest event in the world where the strongest man wins. Nobody can ever change that. Especially not Travis Tygart.
@Rigid
True. Although Landis can say the same thing, as well as any doper ever caught in the history of the sport. Not arguing with you, just pointing that fact out which a lot of people seem to be glossing over.
@Rigid
On another forum I visit frequently (bass guitar) most people still believe he was clean. It is quite amazing.
The thing that gets me isn't that he doped (he did) or he's an asshole who skims money off a terrible disease and dupes people into believing that he is saving the world. That's all fact. Yes, everyone was doping. Yes, he beat them. But, pre-cancer, he WAS NEVER GOING TO WIN THE TOUR! Fucking FACT. He used cancer as his cover, possibly thinking he could die in a year, he risked it all and doped to a degree that turned a Classics rider/stage winner into a fucking TTing/climbing machine, probably to get just one Tour win before he possibly died. When he didn't die, he needed to keep the illusion going so had to continue to dope better than the actual Tour riders he had so surprisingly beaten. And that's why I hate him.
And all these fuckers that have covered for him over the years, they can all get fucked. I hope that every day Lance, Phil and Paul, McQuaid, Bruyneel, all those cunts who maintain the Omertà live with a gut wrenching guilt that they are part of the cancer and I hope the stress of deceit makes their existence a wretched one.
Just lost a lot of respect for Phil Anderson too.
@brett Wow you could have come forward with the FACT theory much sooner than now.
@brett
This.
Yeah, Phil Anderson just lost my respect as well.
Interesting that USADA has stated that Lance's blood values from his comeback are fully consistent with doping, especially in light of the fact that the UCI waived the required testing period (6 months was it?) prior to his re-entry to competition that would have enabled doping authorities to get a baseline. Might mean nothing, or it might point to the UCI aiding and abetting the most successful cheat of our generation.
Forget about how inspirational he was. Like OJ Simpson, he certainly was. Like OJ Simpson, now he's certainly not, and it appears that the weight of evidence that he was a total cunt is pretty overwhelming. Move on. Inspiration is a moving feast. No point in feeling like you have to defend him to honour your inspiration. That would be wrong.
@frank I know personally several people who have been helped in very real and practical ways by Livestrong, and one that I know of who was personally reached out to by Armstrong himself. In all these cases the help and support was very much timely and appreciated. I can't speak to the overall effectiveness of Livestrong's work, but from the above cases I figure they must be doing at least something right.
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus
Hath told you Caesar was ambitious:
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Caesar answer'd it.
Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest -
For Brutus is an honourable man;
So are they all, all honourable men -
Come I to speak in Caesar's funeral.
He was my friend, faithful and just to me:
But Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
He hath brought many captives home to Rome
Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill:
Did this in Caesar seem ambitious?
When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept:
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff:
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
You all did see that on the Lupercal
I thrice presented him a kingly crown,
Which he did thrice refuse: was this ambition?
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And, sure, he is an honourable man.
I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke,
But here I am to speak what I do know.
You all did love him once, not without cause:
What cause withholds you then, to mourn for him?
O judgment! thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason. Bear with me;
My heart is in the coffin there with Caesar,
And I must pause till it come back to me.