All of my life, I have played sports. I played soccer (in my opinion, a gateway sport), baseball, football, basketball, flag football, softball...
In August 2004, my weekend warrior days came to a crashing halt as I laid on the floor in the Plano YMCA gym, waiting for the ambulance to get there. This time, torn quad tendon. Now, this was not my 1st knee injury. I was able to return to action after and ACL reconstruction in 1988. But, an 18 year old knee is quicker to heal than a 33 year old knee. So, for the next 7.5 years, I sat around, ate lots of bad food, drank a fair amount of beer, and gained weight. In my late 20's and early 30's, I maintained a weight of 200 - 210 lbs. By 2006, I was up to almost 240 lbs.
Realizing that I felt like shit and needed to lose some of the weight, I began to eat better, but, still not much exercise. I was able to get my weight down to the 215 - 220 range, but, knew I needed to do more. So...I bought a bike. I bought my bike March 24, 2012.
I went into the purchase a bit tentative, as I knew that I wanted to spend enough $ on the bike that it would not become a dusty fixture in my office, but, not so much that, in the event that cycling did not "stick", I would not be out thousands of dollars.
After a fair amount of research, I purchased a Trek 7.2 FX Hybrid. It had be to ordered by the LBS (Local Bike Shop), because, it turns out that bikes for guys my height can be difficult to come by.
First order of business...White Rock Lake. WRL is a 9.2 mile loop. I needed to determine 2 things: 1) could I even ride 9 miles without dying, and 2) how could I avoid being the reckless jack ass on the trail that was running over innocent joggers and such.
The following Monday (3.26.12), Off to the lake I went. 41 minutes later, I completed my loop and was, in fact, alive. Off to a good start. Over the next 90 days, my distance and frequency of rides increased. As a matter of fact, last week, I logged over 200 miles on the bike.
I am off cholesterol medication, am maintaining a weight of 190 - 195, and feel great. I have begun to price and research road bikes, as I suspect that I could log more miles and time on a lighter, more comfortable bike.
I feel great, because, I bought a bike.
