Okay....

I turfed the Kona Big Unit idea. It was a fun exercise but after pricing out what I wanted to do, it'd be a fun bike to ride with a Ferrari type of price tag. Not what I wanted, and not a good use of my money. Instead, I'm going to pick up a Cyclocross bike for the Paris - Ancaster race. The 29er is huge but its a pig to lug for 60km of road / fire road racing. Great for everything else. Not so much for this.

I need a few more years of actual endurance and mountain bike riding before I can justify that kind of purchase for myself.

Weekend was a complete poopfest for eating but I guess metabolism is up as I didn't gain anything. I also had a pretty large amount of beer. I'll call this my yearly blowout, and move on. More training this week. I'm going to aim for a 2 hour ride somewhere Saturday or so to get into the mindset I'll need for P2A.

Also I'm going to try running again with my patella guide on. My knee didn't like it so much the last time I ran. Sucked though cause my knee gave me problems way before anything else even came close to registering on the "you sure you wanna continue" scale.

I saw a picture of myself the other day. I never notice anything in the mirror. But the picture really made me realize how much I've actually shed off this frame. I have a bunch more to go still but it was pretty encouraging.

Looking forward to the sweat fests this summer though, that's going to be fun.

Things that happen.

One of the things that happens when I go to the gym while restricting calorie intake to heavy protien and high fiber is that my body is forced to burn glucose and fat because when I finally get to running and cycling from my afternoon lunch, there isn't much left to draw on. I'll run for about 30 or so minutes, and then bike for about an hour.

Once I get home I have to force myself to shower and calm down before eating, but once I get to eating its like turbo charged fork to the face. Subconsciously my body is craving food so badly it speeds up intake. It doesn't take much to satisfy though, for example a bunch of water, a can of tuna, some mayo, mushrooms, slap it into a sandwich and I'm totally fine now. But at that moment, holy crap.

I'm trying an experiment... 2 actually. One is to cut out most refined and processed carbs out of my diet. I'm also trying to get rid of any sodium spikes too. I read that insulin tolerances in bigger people need to be controlled pretty harshly for us to drop weight. Sodium is just terrible either way you slice it. So right now the only carbs I'm getting are from vegetable juices.

The book said try it for 2 weeks and see if you get rid of some of the symptoms of carb intolerance, as well as sensitivity to sodium. Bot of which are things I crave all the time. Which is pretty much the first symptom he lists. Still craving it, but there are other symptoms like hard crashes in the afternoon, feeling lazy all the time, headaches, and such. These I do get, no headaches since starting, and I have more energy in the afternoon.

Clean diet works.

Experiment 2, Cooling BAT around the nape of your neck. I read that cooling brown adipose tissue actually increases thermogenisis in your body which in turn also burns fat. While I'm not all for kook science, after reading up on it a bit, it does make sense. It also gives me a reason to throw an ice pack on the back of my neck. Which is kinda nice in its own right anyway.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brown_adipose_tissue

Anyway, as of tonights pre gym weigh in it was 265, we'll see if that sticks.

How

I just want to drop a note about my wife.

I'm not exactly the easiest person to understand or get along with when I get on a crusade like I am this winter / summer. With Anna in our lives now, and the day to day everythings that go on, I manage to find time to work out, research bikes, and training.

The only reason I get to do this is because I have a very supportive and understanding wife. She keeps the crusade in check, but also lets me do what I do because she knows how passionate I can get about something.

I can't really begin to say how much support she gives me, and the amount of hours I've spent trying to understand my new found infatuation for biking and endurance racing..... eyes glazed over, she always nods her head. Either out of fear, or understanding... I'm not quite sure yet.

Either way, I'm just as passionate about her as the day we got married. So if you ever wonder how I have time to do what I do, its cause I have the wife that I have.

Here is the blog for the 2011 race season. What I'm doing, what weight i'm at, etc.

I need an outlet... so here it is.

I weighed in this morning at 268.5. After a weekend of shiatty eating I actually lost weight. Good on me. Too cold to ride.

I'm waiting on my Kona Big Unit to show up, but already have the parts in line for my singlespeed monster for this year's race season which is coming up quickly.

I'm already on board for the Paris - Ancaster event which I hear is more grueling then anything. There are some technical sections. I may actually go geared for this race, but we'll see. The ride is 60KM long.

I've already signed up for the 8 Hour relay at Hardwood in May, and the 24 Hour Summer Solstice in June.

January has seen some pretty good gains in base heart rate training, but I need to start working on some muscle endurance, and core. This will progress over Feb / March in prep for April's race and the ensuing race season from May and forward.

Keep tuned for pics and race thoughts, or just rambling incoherency.