Jim's Place

My longest ride in years

On Saturday 9/26/2009 I headed back to the coast to see how many miles I could do on the bike even though I wasn't feeling too chipper...

Smilin' perty...

Got some new teeth today and couldn't wait to show 'em off...

4 week Body-for-LIFE progress slideshow

I just completed my first 4 weeks of this Body-for-LIFE challenge. I created a slideshow with before/after photos and stats. I also rode the bike a total of 420 miles in the same 4 weeks including a 56-miler yesterday... 

50 miles!

After breaking through the 40 mile barrier last weekend, I headed to the coast on Saturday (9/12/2009) to see if I could do 50. After the ride, I reflected on just how far I've come from the rough start to 2009...

The quest for 40 miles...

On Saturday, 9/5/2009, I headed to the coast to see if I could do 40 miles on the bike...

Another day, another night ride...

I had a big day today. I got a late start - partly because I needed extra sleep, but mainly because of my topsy-turvy sleep cycle. When most people are asleep, I'm hanging out with the vampires. I got up about 1:30 but was still tired. I laid down on the couch and finally made it to the gym a little after 5PM and completed a strong lower-body workout. I brought my RC glider with me and got in a nice 15-minute flight - catching a few thermals, just like I used to...

I ran out of daylight, so I once again transformed into my alter ego - the "Night Rider"... It was an enjoyable 12 miles of easy pedaling under a full moon. I thought to myself "My, how things have changed...when a night ride is routine..."  Here's a jazzed-up photo from tonight's ride...

22-mile night ride

I'm really getting serious about this night riding! I did four night rides last week and have done two so far this week. Tonight's ride was 22 miles, my longest night ride since 1995. With the temperatures being so hot during the day, the night riding option has really been a plus, enabling me to continue to make progress on the bike and of course my fitness overall. I keep careful graphs and records of my rides and the speed is going up while the heart rates are going down.

It's funny that while I am so determined to improve my physical conditioning, in one way I'm trying to reverse conditioning. After countless comebacks being derailed by illness over the last 13 years, a certain kind of conditioning has been imprinted emotionally and mentally. My outlook is very positive but yet there's that conditioned response that expects things to fall apart any day now. But I have to just keep on trucking and have faith that this comeback is for real and will last... Here's the Garmin chart from the ride...

A breakout month...

What better way to cap off a breakout month than with yet another bike ride! 

Today, I had a marathon dental appointment - two hours in the chair! In the past, because of illness I usually wouldn't have had the energy to do much else. But I went straight from the dentist office to the gym and completed my lower body weight training. About an hour later, I hopped on the bike and went for a 12-mile ride. When I got home it hit me how rare this was...

Even in 2005, when I had a good run of working out and losing weight, I wasn't able even back then to do weight training at the same time I was putting in a lot of miles on the bike. It's hard to believe how big of a turnaround is taking place in my body. Evidently, Celiac was having a huge impact on my body even back then.

I looked at my Garmin reports and for July, I rode the bike a total of 56 miles...but I jumped up to a whopping 327 miles for this month! I'm frankly stunned that I was able to improve that quickly...but man! I'm so jazzed to finally be moving ahead full steam!

Since starting my Body-for-LIFE challenge last week, I've dropped 6 pounds and an inch and a half in the stomach! I've got a long way to go, but I'm really stoked with my progress. But I've got to admit that there still is some concern that there might still be something else medically being overlooked...but for now I just have to go with what I know and keep on truckin'!