As I savored my Sunday morning coffee, I read the story in the new issue of Bicycling about a guy who lost 331 pounds by riding a bike. There’s a point in the story where they talk about the “aha moment” in every successful weight loser’s life. I’ve been thinking about that all day today.

I spent part of my adult life fat. Like 80 pounds fatter than I am now. I remember my “aha moment” like it was yesterday, instead of almost seven years ago.  I was reading yet another article on weight loss and there was a quote in the middle of one of the columns of type. It read, “When the pain of being fat finally outweighs the pleasure of eating, that’s when motivation translates to action.” I ripped that out of the magazine, and to this day I carry it in my wallet.

The years I spent dragging that extra weight were pretty unhappy ones, and I knew the weight was only a symptom of other things that I needed to work through. I lost the weight the right way: getting my ass out of bed early to be at the gym at 5 am, eating the right amount of food, and working through some really tough issues. Once I did that, the weight seemed to fall off. But every now and then those fat girl insecurities surface. It happened this past summer.

I rode with a great group of people in preparation for the century in September, but I didn’t know any of them prior to the first training ride. I remember riding the six miles from my house to the meeting place with all those old insecurities bubbling from my subconscious and landing squarely in the pit of my stomach. What if I couldn’t keep up? What if I embarrassed myself? I’ve had only had this bike for two months…what on earth was I thinking?

I rode up and checked out the group: with a few exceptions, most of the people were probably 10 to 15 years younger than I was; some looked really fit, some not so much; there was really expensive gear to big box stuff. Polite hellos were exchanged. So far so good. Time to ride and the group split into three based on speed; I picked the middle. We rolled out and the nervousness subsided. I remember I hung towards the back on that first ride, unsure of both my group-riding skills and my stamina, but as the weeks went on I was not only keeping up but at times setting the pace and definitely doing my share of pulling the group.

After two months, in a moment of insanity I decided to go with the faster group. It was a 70 mile ride that day. At about mile 50 I started to unravel, and by mile 60 I had to give up and go it alone. I watched as the group rode away. I had no choice but to let them go.

I admit I felt pretty bad physically as I rode those last ten miles alone. But I also learned something about myself that day. I didn’t die of embarrassment or discouragement. Quite the opposite. I learned about my limits and what consequences pushing them would have. About pacing myself and learning to listen to my body when it needs me to do something: eat, drink…slow down!

In those three months riding with the group I gained more confidence than I did in all those years of solo gym workouts. But more important, riding alone and with others is giving me something better: the inside is finally matching the outside.

And that fat girl voice? I haven’t heard it since that day last summer.

Tagged with: bicycle • bike • chicago • cycling • empowerment • fat • fitness • goals • group • group ride • london • paris • pedal • ride • training • weight • weight loss
 

This entry was posted on Monday, December 14th, 2009 at 9:26 pm and is filed under cycling. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.