Fat Ass Cyclist

Big Unit's Cycling Journey

Three Week Check-in

by Leave a Comment

It’s roughly 3 weeks since I started cycling and progress had not been that great, but I’m still motivated and quite enjoying it.

Unfortunately I was in bed with a nasty cold for almost a week (from before Easter weekend until after). And other than that I commuted (cycled to work) one day, which my body wasn’t ready for yet so that took me off the bike for a few days.

These are not excuses, this is just what happened. I’m not giving up, so no need for excuses and in fact, I’m just getting more and more excited about cycling.

Basically in the last 3 weeks I have done 15 rides ranging from 1.1km to 8.4km. Very happy with the comfort on my bike, I was expecting to have a lot more pain based on what it was like on my previous bike. I’ve had the handlebars raised, fitted a 1.5L Camelbak water bag to my stem so that I can sit water from a pipe rather than having to bend down to reach my bottle and I’ve got some good lights for both front and back of the bike.

Up until this weekend it’s felt like riding a mere 4.6kms, my legs were getting more and more tired each day. I know, it’s such a short distance, but this is where I’m at right now. However, now I’ve cycled for 4 consecutive days and today I’ve felt stronger than yesterday instead of feeling more tired and I’ve managed to record my best time for that 4.6kms. It’s a mere 17.8kph, but it’s faster than any of my other rides up to now.

So it’s been a slow start, but I’m getting things sorted and now just have to keep putting in the effort until these short distances get easier. Next goal will be to attempt another commute and see if I can recover from it more quickly.

 

Improving Visibility On Your Commute

by Leave a Comment

I cycled to work once about 2 weeks ago, but I wasn’t happy with my visibility on a very busy road. So that together with being sick for a week and being very unfit meant that I haven’t tried to commute again since.

Then someone asked about these Lezyne Laser lights on a local cycling forum and I decided to give one of them a go.

Here’s a brief video showing it flashing on its brightest setting. Note that I’ve got my old light mounted above the Lezyne and also going at the same time. If I do commute, it’ll be early morning and I’m a little obsessed with being seen, so I’ll run both of them at the same time.

In my opinion, this is bright enough and probably I don’t need the second light. However, I think the “Lazer” part of it is absolutely useless. who’s going to see those thin little lines on the road next to you? Maybe if you’re touring far away from city lights, but I don’t see them serving any purpose if there are other lights around.

Improving Visibility On Your Commute

These bright, flashing red lights are important to get motorists’ attention, but don’t underestimate the effectiveness of reflection. I wear a high-viz vest when cycling to work and my pannier bag has some reflective strips in it.

In my experience while driving in my car, I can’t always tell what I’m looking at when I see a flashing red light and also, you can’t always tell how far the object is away from you – especially when there are other car headlights coming from the front. But reflective strips shining your own headlights back at you make it easier to identify the cyclist and how far they are away from you, in my opinion anyway.

I was looking for an image online to show what I mean, which I couldn’t really find, but this image does give you an idea. The guy’s clothing is much more visible to identify than the little red light.

Got it from this article and it might be worth reading that – https://cyclingtips.com/2016/06/does-reflective-and-fluorescent-clothing-make-us-safer/

Some interesting stats about how motorists perceive cyclists based on what you’re wearing in there.

 

Commuting For Overweight Cyclists

by Leave a Comment

Well, I got my new bike last Friday and I thought I was tired at the end of the 2.5km cycle I did on that first day, but that was nothing really.

Yesterday,one week later I cycled to the office which was 7.86kms to get there and a slightly different route coming home at 8.28kms. My legs were hurting on the way to the office and slightly burning for a few hours at the office and I wasn’t sure how I’d make it home with the return route having considerably more uphills than the morning’s route. But, I did fine.

I enjoyed the afternoon ride, but I’ll be honest, I did not feel terribly safe on the morni9ng ride. It was dark when I left home at 5:30am and while I have the usual flashing light on the back of my bike, I think I want to upgrade that to something more powerful and visible. I had a high-viz jacket on, but I don’t think it is reflective, just a bright yellow-greenish colour. Anyway, the point is that safety is important and I think a bit of effort and money on making yourself visible is worth while.

The other thing is being able to shower at the office or at a gym or something close to the office. I’m fortunate that our office has a single shower (although I’m only on contract there for another 2 months) and I have a waterproof pannier bag that I fit my clothes, towel and toiletries into. I think most overweight people like me sweat more than others, so I probably wouldn’t cycle to work if I wasn’t able to shower. As an alternative I might take a train to the office and then cycle back home.

I think I may have overdone it a little bit though. As I mentioned, my legs took strain on the way to the office and much more so on the way back. Today it’s so much worse!! My legs hurt every time I get up, worst being when I get up from the loo! But this will pass quickly… I’m resting today and planning a short 2-3km ride tomorrow and then planning to do 2-4 days commuting next week and by the end of that my legs should to used to doing a slow pace to the office. I’m not saying you’ll get fit so quickly that an 8km ride becomes easy in 2 weeks, but for me personally based on where I’m at at the moment, I think it’ll be considerably easier by the end of next week. For now the aim is just to get comfortable doing this 8km route, twice daily for 2-4 days per week, then a few weeks down the line I can up the intensity by trying to go faster.

I haven’t really given you much advice here, but hopefully you’ll take this as some encouragement. I weigh 145kgs (320lbs) and my TomTom Sports watch says “You are less fit than 80% of men your age”!!! If I can do this, then so can you. I’m surprised at how much progress I’ve made in this first week of cycling. I thought it would take a few weeks before I could cycle to the office, but really it doesn’t matter how slow you start or how slow your progress is. The important thing is to keep at it and know that with every ride you’re burning fat, giving your heart some much needed exercise and fighting insulin resistance. So just get out there, do it and enjoy it!

UPDATE: Looks like it’s not going to be that easy! I cycled to work for the first time on Friday, yesterday my legs hurt every time I stood up from the loo or from infront of the PC and today I thought I’d just go for a casual 4.6km ride. Well, my legs are still very tired from Friday’s ride and had no strength in them for anything other than a casual glide around the route. I definitely won’t be riding to work tomorrow… I’ll do a short ride again tomorrow and try again for a commute on Tuesday. Guess it’ll take a while before I can do this 3-4 times per week:)