1 year into commuting and I'm heavier than I've ever been

Headhuunter

AndyManc wrote:

Once you have conquered your commute your body will not need to burn the calories it once did.

I'm the same, not losing weight, my commute is p easy and yet I still eat loads, as I've said in other posts .. jam butties and chocolate biscuits

Want to loose weight ? , visit the gym 3 or 4 times a week, have an good overall workout, it works, I lost 2stone, stopped going , and put 1stone back on :oops:

So back to the gym for me.


.

You may have conquered your commute as in you can do it at a steady pace but to burn more calories do it at a faster pace. Raising the intensity will increase calories burned. Alternatively take a longer route round the houses rather than giong straight to work. There's no real need to go to the gym as well, although of course cross training is good.

Clever Pun

Il Principe wrote:

DDD - sod the gym, other sports etc. These will cost you more money. You've just spent a load of wedge on some lovely carbon, now you need to get out and ride it. By ride it I don't mean commute and I don't mean 2 laps of RP, I mean proper long weekend rides - 60+ miles, building up to 80/90. Combine this with a few weekday morning rides 15/20 pre commute and you will see a difference - both in body fat and in your fitness/ability on the bike.

You are ideally positioned to take advantage of the Surrey Hills - either pop your bike on the train at Wimbledon, or better still just ride out - Crocknorth, Winterdown, Ranmore, Boxhill etc are all out there waiting for you, take advantage of them while the weather is decent enough, otherwise it'll be winter before you know it.

I'd suggest setting a Sportive as a goal, perhaps this one:

http://www.kentcyclosportive.co.uk/

It's on the 13th Sept so leaves time for some good training. Either way, set some mileage goals - it's important to have something to aim at.

Good call but the gym doesn't take personal time away from you... 3-4 hours in the saddle on the weekend does. Depends if he's allowed

il_principe

Clever Pun wrote:

Il Principe wrote:

DDD - sod the gym, other sports etc. These will cost you more money. You've just spent a load of wedge on some lovely carbon, now you need to get out and ride it. By ride it I don't mean commute and I don't mean 2 laps of RP, I mean proper long weekend rides - 60+ miles, building up to 80/90. Combine this with a few weekday morning rides 15/20 pre commute and you will see a difference - both in body fat and in your fitness/ability on the bike.

You are ideally positioned to take advantage of the Surrey Hills - either pop your bike on the train at Wimbledon, or better still just ride out - Crocknorth, Winterdown, Ranmore, Boxhill etc are all out there waiting for you, take advantage of them while the weather is decent enough, otherwise it'll be winter before you know it.

I'd suggest setting a Sportive as a goal, perhaps this one:

http://www.kentcyclosportive.co.uk/

It's on the 13th Sept so leaves time for some good training. Either way, set some mileage goals - it's important to have something to aim at.

Good call but the gym doesn't take personal time away from you... 3-4 hours in the saddle on the weekend does. Depends if he's allowed

Gym time is a poor substitute for saddle time though...

DonDaddyD

My girlfriend would prefer me to join the gym, I would prefer not to spend £75 a month (maybe for 3 months in the winter Nov, Dec and January).

Truthfully, my weight will only be an issue once I hear back from the doctors on a seperate issue that got me cycling again in the first place.

My blood pressure, sugar levels and heart rate are good and family is full of naturally heavy/strong/fit but not fat people so I'm not overly worried.

I do need longer rides, what I can't get my head round is not getting lost and actually using a route that doesn't have me end up on the motorway.

I wouldn't mind finding a club or riders around my level or performance. Don't fancy Dynamo, Kingston Wheelers seems too far, DeVer is a possiblity but I feel bad as my bike isn't from them.

Goals:
Do some long rides - maybe charity.
Do a Sportive
Join Club

moonio

Why dont you try yoga, it lengthens the muscles and burns fat.

il_principe

DonDaddyD wrote:

I do need longer rides, what I can't get my head round is not getting lost and actually using a route that doesn't have me end up on the motorway.

Here are a couple - starting in RP, ending by Wimbledon Station:

http://www.bikehike.co.uk/mapview.php?id=11489

http://www.bikehike.co.uk/mapview.php?id=11490

DonDaddyD

OK I do have all that bike and am not doing anything with it...

So I'm going to do the following:

Going to attach a cycle computer to my Kuota, was waiting for a Garmin but not having one is doing more harm than good.

Doing one of Principe routes - hopefully this Saturday or Sunday. Am aware of the hills, but its not so much weight that is the issue, but the technique I use to climb the hills, if I choose too low a gear then I won't be creating enough forward momentum to counteract my weight slowing the bike down and I'll have to pedal harder making me more tired. If I use too high a gear same effect. Its about using the right gear and cadence.

Gonna set a date for a Sportive, possibly in September.

If I can realistically stick to my goals this year, then I can begin thinking about joining some of you guys for next years rides and perhaps joining a club if team SCR isn't up and running.

il_principe

DonDaddyD wrote:

How do you think I should approach it

Solitary

However you like/whatever you prefer. You're welcome to come out with me for a ride one weekend if you like, otherwise have a crack by yourself or with a club. I like to mix riding solo and riding with others. Solo can be much harder work of course!

Headhuunter

You could also consider Dulwich Paragon, they meet up in Crystal Palace and are a friendly bunch, I often go out with them. I have an appalling sense of direction and no Garmin/GPS so going out with a club is ideal and cycling with others helps helps you keep going pushing your fitness levels

moonio

Ahh those are the peeps I bump into when doing my sunday ride into kent, they usually wizz past me somewhere in the wilds of Keston whist I'm feeding the horses.. :oops:

Greg T

moonio wrote:

whist I'm feeding the horses..

Is that a Euphomism?

Also

how do you spell Youfomism?

lost_in_thought

Greg T wrote:

moonio wrote:

whist I'm feeding the horses..

Is that a Euphomism?

Also

how do you spell Youfomism?

You-farm-ism

moonio

No its not about farm joy or whatever...I just always stop to feed the horses on North Pole Lane

Headhuunter

Ah yes, North Pole Lane! I've whizzed by there plenty of times with Dulwich! I love the names of the lanes round there, there's one called Jackass Lane somewhere round that way! Also Bomber Lane, perhaps named after a bomber aircraft shot down in WW2

moonio

Hehe yes Jackass, love it round there...plus there is Corkscrew Hill and Laymans Rd..makes me wonder what the locals used to get up to in those parts :?

dUNC

Bit late to the party* (just for a change ) but having read the thread I felt inspired to respond to the cardio v resistance discussion about half way through. I don't have any qualification on this, just my experience and opinion (which was based on a lot of research a while back that I'd struggle to reference now!).

Whilst it may seem counter-intuitive to suggest that lifting weights for an hour is better for losing fat (not weight, although for many of us they do go hand-in-hand) compared to doing a completely knackering 1-2 hour run/cycle/football, etc in my experience it is very much the case.

The whole point of weight training to lose fat is to build muscle, not to turn you into Arnie (good luck with that!). As your muscle mass increases over time your metabolic rate increases also - which basically means when you're sitting around doing sod all your burning more calories. So you can't measure the calorie deficit of weight training v cardio by the hour, but looking at it longer term.

By comparison, whilst you might build some muscle through doing cardio, you are only likely to make small improvements (high reps, minimal resistance as per cardio has minimal muscle building potential) and may make losses in other areas (e.g. your body sacrifices muscle in other parts of your body that aren't in use). Cross-training and "hard efforts" in e.g. the big ring, climbing hills, etc where you've high resistance will make these muscle improvements more substantial but not to the same extent as dedicated weight training, and it's probably fair to say that most of us (particularly when commuting) aren't trying to make the ride as difficult as possible to get maximum muscle building benefit.

Obviously that's not to say cardio won't get you anywhere, but rather in pure efficiency weight training will trump it.

Speaking from experience I used to weigh almost 23 stone (140kg) and managed to lose a great deal of that through pure cardio (x-trainer, cycle commute, football, squash) but hit a plateau at about 17 stone (105kg) whereby I would do as much cardio as I could manage and not get much further - I would be so tired/hungry that to replenish myself I kinda undid my work. I wasn't being scientific about it and bad habits still persisted to a degree of course, I didn't have the dedication of an Olympiad!

But just to say that replacing some of my cardio activites with 3 or 4 1-hour all body weight sessions was what moved me (very quickly!) off that plateau and down to just under 14 stone (88kg). With the combination of both I could, without raising a snigger, call myself an athlete with great fitness and good physique. And I could manage the combination of the weights and cardio without feeling the need to constantly refuel to the same degree as a pure cardio regime.

Unfortunately I had to move for work (albeit out of London so that's good!) and my good habits were broken, and over the past 2 years have descended into bad and I'm back up to around that 17 stone mark . I've been on my bike doing my 34 mile roundtrip commute once or twice a week and I'm now pushing to do that every day as my preferred route to weight loss. But I've noticed the same thing as before - you feel so drained that it's very difficult to maintain the energy and enthusiasm for that, and feel the need to eat loads. I'm fitter than ever on the bike (59 min PD this morning for 17 miles commuting into Manchester from the Peak District ), but I'm not skinnier than ever. I'll see how I get on with it, and of course I could start by looking harder at my diet, but am already working out how to get weights into the equation.

Btw I'm not a weights junky at all - I would much prefer to spend all that time and more on the bike or playing football or squash. But I do appreciate that it has the biggest potential to get my weight back down (for me; and it's important to remember that everyone's body type is different). Ultimately it's all about balance and I think cross-training with a variety of different sports and activities reaps the best rewards (though obviously harder than "just jumping on the bike").

Sorry for the length of this (as I say to the missus ), as I say it was something I was inspired to respond to.

(ps I used to spend a lot of on the Mens Health Weight Loss forum where there's was loads of info - and misinfo - on this so if you were interested then you could have a look over there)

* edit; sorry just realised just how late! Sorry for reigniting an old thread, I ended up here from the Horrified thread and just posted...

spen666

DDD

Stop eating all the pies!

Cakestop is meant to be a virtual place, not an instruction

tailwindhome

@ DDD

Sounds like you need a 10 week Challenge

jimmypippa

dUNC wrote:

(59 min PD this morning for 17 miles commuting into Manchester from the Peak District ),

Am I likely to see you on the A6 then?

dUNC

I'm afraid not mate*. I'm further up than that - I come in from Glossop along the A57 to the M60, round the Fallowfield Loop to Chorlton then on to Salford Quays:

http://www.sanoodi.com/routes/work-and-back-123975/

Where do you come in from?

* I say "afraid not" but I've heard the A6 is a bit of a mare traffic-wise?

jimmypippa

Chapel

click on the picture in my sig to see most of my commute...

From a previous discussion:

I am pseudoanonomous, and assume anyone with enough interest could look me up if they really wanted to.

However I doubt they would.

I woork on the assumptionthat anything I say on the internet could be traced to my real identity, so don't say anything that I wouldn't admit to in real life...

DonDaddyD

Never followed up on this.

Went doctors for a blood test - to find out why I'm so heavy and get back some numbers on the properties of my blood.

Everything was as expected. My cholesterol levels are OK, could be lower but a damn site lower than they were before I bought my road bike (proof they improve lives).

The doctor is convinced I'm developing muscle - I probably was never built to be a whippet cyclist - but this I hoping preceeds weight lose. Incidentally I agree with the developing muscle: if 'me now' had a fight with 'me 6 months ago', 'me now' would win on strength alone...:shock:

I do need to work on my stomach/core and toning it up. Yoga with the GF, yay...

I must point out that my Dad was never 6ft (around 5'11) and then between 28 - 31 he grew to 6ft'1, got stronger and wished he'd continued high jumping at a national level as though he got heavier, he got stronger and was able to jump higher.

tailwindhome

DonDaddyD wrote:

Incidentally I agree with the developing muscle: if 'me now' had a fight with 'me 6 months ago', 'me now' would win on strength alone...:shock:

However DDD 2010 is wetting himself laughing