Cheshire Fatty's Progress

nickcuk

Hi to all other wobblies - I look forward to interesting and lively chat as I shed my pounds and boost my stats

I got back from a family holiday in Ireland at the start of june and saw one of those photos that make you shudder - but the horrible creature was me

So out with my old Halfords Apollo MTB and out for 7 - 8 miles tides and managed 9 - 10mph average, feeling very chuffed. Did that most nights in the week - the weather always seemed to break about tea-time so somebody was watching over me.

After a few weeks, the bike had lost the left crank twice and the bottom bracket squeeled like a pig despite everything so Morrey's in Holmes Chapel sorted me out with a discontinued Raleigh M-Trax X1 that ticked all the aluminium / chainset boxes for only £179.

Since then, I've covered a very enjoyable 650 miles building rides upto 40+ miles and cranking the speed up to avrages of over 14 mph. I tend to obsess about things so I read every website I think there is about bikes, training, getting going, etc - and my enthusiasm has rubbed off on a mate who now tries to ride at weekends and we do the longer runs together.

I have tightened my belt by 3 notches and must have lost weight, although i haven't weighed myself. I keep a spreadsheet and record distances, times, av speeds, etc and use a 8 cals / min figure for estimating how much energy I'm burning but 3500 cals is in every lb of fat so there's a long way to go yet. I feel loads better.

I doubt this is much interest to most people but to any other fellow wobblies - two months have made a real difference and if I can pass on any of my limited experience to anybody else, lets swap hints.

Smeggers

2 Months - 650 Miles - Raleigh M-Trax ATB??!!!!!

Big respect to you my friend!!!!!

(PS:- I know Morrey's too)

ean

Hiya, you may want to have a look here

videoman

Good on you covering 650 miles in two months on a mountain bike. I am still trying to loose weight but so far have failed miserably. I am only averaging approx 90 kilometres a week.

I am originally from just down the road from you, Newcastle under Lyme where we still have a house, but at present living in Tenerife. Problem here at the moment is daytime temps of 30 degrees plus which make cycling a very hot and sticky business in the day. Unfortunately it does not get light here until 7.30am in the morning but I try to get out for a few hours before the sun appears.

baudman

Don't worry too much about weight either - it's more about belt holes and clothes sizes.

If you've been quite sedentary, you'll be putting on quite a bit of muscle over the next few months, and that weighs quite a bit - so you'll look like your losing quite a lot more than what the scales say.

nickcuk

The MTrax is a hybrid / Town and Country model - 700C alloy wheels with slightly chunkier tyres, flat handlebars, alloy frame, etc - but the first 150 miles I did were on the ATB. Thanks for the encouragement

nickcuk

videoman wrote:

. I am still trying to loose weight but so far have failed miserably. .

3500 calories = 7.5 hours of riding at a reasonable speed = 1lb of fat. No getting away from the fact that it's hard to shift what was so easy to put on

videoman wrote:

I am originally from just down the road from you, Newcastle under Lyme where we still have a house, but at present living in Tenerife.

What a co-incidence - my office is in Newcastle under Lyme !