I just finished reading "Heft on Wheels" by Mike Magnuson. It is not among the normal genre of books that I would read, but after I discovered how much my friend Chris was inspired by the book I had to give it a shot. My copy of the book arrived in the mail on Friday evening and a day and a half later I have read the entire thing cover to cover.The book was fairly light and easy reading, but it was a lot of fun. I think that it was particularly interesting to me since I could identify with Mike's fight against his weight and his desire to turn his life around. It was also fun because I was familiar with some of the geographical settings in the book: Milwaukee, Eau Claire, Mankato.
Competitive cycling isn't really my thing, but the way that Mike describes how he feels about cycling is very similar to how I feel about hiking. I'm tired of my weight getting in the way of things that I love to do. I almost laughed out loud as he described how he used to rationalize his comparative performance on a bike to his friends who were thinner and in much better shape:
So if I'm out there riding with you, and you think you're a badass cyclist, a hammer, a machine, and you're feeling all smug about yourself because you're a few hundred yards ahead of me on that long, long hill, let me tell you, buddy, if I can see you on the road ahead of me, if I'm anywhere close to you, I'm really kicking your ass.It amuses me because I've had the same thoughts going through my head on the trail. Sure, some 19 year old punk just jogged past me up a 20% incline. But what is that guy, a buck twenty? He's not doing any work hauling his ass up this mountain. Thinking about it that way, I'm probably in better shape than he is or at least than he would be if he was hauling around all this extra weight. Yes, it's a rationalization. And yes, it's absurd.
The most depressing thing about reading the book though, was the realization that I am just now, after working my ass off to lose 55 lbs over the last 5 months, still 15 lbs heavier than where Mike was when he started his epic quest. It's not that I want to be content with where I am permanently. But it would be nice to be content for long enough to work up the motivation to lose the next 50 lbs. I'm not ready to hate myself that much yet.
2 comments:
So is the moral of the story that if we all ride our bikes naked, we'll be motivated to stay in better shape?
The author had that picture of himself posted alongside an article that he wrote about cycling in GQ magazine. He does actually recommend to the reader that they get a picture of themselves naked published in a magazine with a readership of 300,000 people. He said it was a huge motivation to lose weight when everybody you knew had seen a humiliating picture of you naked. Now if only I can get GQ to publish a picture of me naked.
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