Advanced Accountability

Throwback Thursday

On August 18, 2012 I posted on Facebook that I had started walking and would start riding soon. I'd lost 61 pounds at that point. I got some positive feedback but I said it then and I said it now, I wanted to make it harder to quit. I was halfway to the spot I got to a year later but I hit a wall and even though I feel better than I ever have I want to finish this journey so here I go again ... 

Help wanted

I signed up for the pace group at the Hotter than Hell Hundred this year. It's a group that rides the rally in less than 5 hours, non-stop 100 miles at over 20 miles an hour the whole way. The thing that stands in between me and that goal is the last 20 or so pounds I've been dragging along since I hit this level in 2013. I'm asking Paul Mossa to help me with this challenge. All the years of excess weight has created a condition called spinal stenosis in my lower back. Oddly enough, I can ride for hours but can barely walk to the kitchen every morning. I am much more comfortable leaning over than I am standing up. 

The only cure that isn't surgery is to strengthen my core, lose these last 20 plus pounds and by doing that, I will also be able to ride faster and further so the Pace Group made sense, I am signed up so I am all in. I'm also telling my friends on Facebook about it so it will be harder to quit, or sneak lemonade into my green tea or to grab a cookie instead of a banana. 

Added incentive

Plus Craig Hodges said he'd tattoo my name on his ... fanny over 25 years ago if I ever got my weight under 200 pounds and everyone knows there is no statute of limitations on stupid dares so I've got that out there. I'm not sure I want my name on another dude's buttocks but if it's got to go on anybody's it might as well be his.  Paul and I are looking forward to making him squirm. 

The Usual Suspects

I've also got Doug, Jeff, Jim and Ozzie out there riding with me. Oddly enough Jeff was one of the guys that commented it was awesome that I had started walking, three years later he borrowed a bike and started riding with us, I'm picking him up at 7:30 tomorrow morning. Circle of life. 

Most of all I have my incredible family, Katie, Will, Andrew, the AshMan and most of all my bride, Linda, there with me. When I quit drinking, so did she, when I quit cheeseburgers so did she and when I decided to take on this challenge I knew she would be there, picking me up, helping me find something I set down, sacrificing something tasty so I won't be tempted.   

So here I go again, looking forward to the journey with you. 

Never Ride Alone

A Common Mistake

Every once in a while we make a mistake and say we did something alone. Today I was reminded that even when I don't ride with others, I never ride alone. Today I met Jim Harris and some of his friends in Coppell and rode a while with them. I wanted some extra miles when they were finishing so i headed south into Irving to ride through Las Colinas and then back up Luna. I was on Royal Lane heading east through Irving and was putting my water bottle back in the cage when my front wheel caught a rut. I barely had one hand on the handlebar and my bike jerked hard to the left into the left lane. I came as close to the concrete as I have ever been without falling, somehow i corrected and yanked hard back to the right, popped back up, messed my britches, and ended up back in the right lane. I use a garmin which tracks where I ride from a satellite orbiting the earth at what i assume is pretty far away. The satellite picked it up as you can see in the picture with this post. See if you can guess where that rut is.

Location of Rut

From somewhere, I have always imagined even higher than Garmin's satellite, God could pick this up as well. Except he's a little more impressive than a Garmin because he knew that in spite of this incredible brain he gave me, i never really grasped common sense, so very busy Royal Lane would be the perfect place to get a drink of water and take a hand off my handle bars. He was definitely there because after I leveled out, collected myself and checked my shorts, I looked ahead and saw the cars ahead of me, i looked over my shoulder and saw cars behind me, but at that spot, on Royal Lane, it was just me ... and Him. if there was anyone else, i probably wouldn't be posting this now. 

In the past, when asked who do i ride with, i would say "I generally ride by myself." It is pretty ostentatious of me, to ignore the creator of the universe taking the time to watch out while I ride my bike, just to make sure I'm not a hood ornament, if it were just me, I would long since been in someone's grill. if you don't believe me, Ask Doug Walker. He tells me that every time we ride.

Today I Didn't

It's part of the game

One of the tougher things I have found in trying to lead a healthier lifestyle is rebounding from a bad decision or from a period where I can't exercise. Sometimes it's related to injury, or weather or just life making me busy. I hate those times, I really do but rebounding is part of the deal. 

Rebounds in basketball are opportunities you get after you miss a shot, they are good things. Players that can capitalize on their teams “failure” and give them a chance to reset and try again are essential to the game. If general managers and coaches put together teams with nobody that could effectively rebound under the premise that they just will make all their shots, it would be a disaster. The teams would fail, they would only take shots they knew they could make and those incredible long range bombs would be replaced by a painful to watch layup drill. Defenses would pack the paint, lay ups would disappear and we'd watch a 8-4 junior high girls game. It wouldn't be fun. A league built on only taking shots you can make wouldn't take many shots. 

Good teams are built to overcome missed shots, to grab a loose ball and try again. Ever seen a guy put up a point blank shot and clank it off the rim, grab the rebound and put it up again with a similar result and then again and again and again until it finally drops in? What if he failed and said I quit after he missed the first or second or third shot and walked to the bench or just headed back to play defense, unwilling to grab the next rebound because he would just miss again. The fans would boo, the coach would pull him and he would be flipping burgers before you knew it.

Isn't that what we do when we make poor choices in what we eat or when we don't exercise? We think, dang I missed a shot, I should head for the bench, I knew I would miss a shot. The crazy thing about that for anyone that has struggled with obesity is that we may have gone a long time doing the right thing, making shots. Maybe it's been a week or two, maybe it's been a month or a few days that still would be 3 days of eating right, making good decisions not only what to eat when you eat but passing up opportunities to drink a coke, or scoop up candy out of a dish and taking a walk. One day could have a dozen good choices in it, three days could have 30 good decisions, that's 30 made shots in a row and we miss one and call it in. 

We are used to eating McDonalds for Breakfast, snacking on chips, fried chicken and no exercise. It wasn't one missed shot that made me weigh 350 pounds, it was all of them. In the middle of it, I might grab a piece of fruit or mix in a salad or veggie plate but I knew that didn't offset all the bad decisions I was making. Why do I give that kind of power to one bad decision when we've made so many good ones? Maybe it's because we made so many mistakes we expect them to multiply. Maybe you're like me, no middle ground, either I'm in or I'm out. I failed, I quit, pass me a cheeseburger and a big bag of Cheeto’s, I just put ranch dressing on a salad. We are that coach that's plan for the season is not to rebound, just don't miss any shots. How dumb is that?

I don't watch much basketball but I believe the Sixers are pretty bad this year, everyone knew they'd be bad and they went out and set some sort of record for most losses to open the season. It wasn't like they won the championship last year, everyone knew they were bad but that coach had a plan for handling his teams failures and in the eating right category, back in 2012, I looked a lot more like the Sixers than the Spurs or the Heat but I headed down the road the Sixers are on with a plan to make every shot. 

The crazy thing is I went on a long streak of making every shot but no matter how good I get, I'm going to miss a shot and sometimes it's because all the shots I can take are of the half court prayer variety. Recently we've had some cold wet icy weather in Dallas. It's also tax season so I'm working a lot of hours, I'm tired, my back hurts, there is lots of pressure so on Sunday when everyone is rushing to the grocery store to prep for iceageddon I called Pizza Hut and I didn't ride, I worked from home and I ate pizza and looked  at a computer screen all day. Monday was icy so I worked from home, ate leftover Pizza and didn't ride. Tuesday I had a big project finishing up, it was still icy, I didn't ride, worked late, ate Taco Bueno and some sort of pasta dish for dinner.  So now Its Wednesday but it feels like the Monday after Thanksgiving, the energy is low and when I put on my pants this morning, go figure, my belt felt tight I actually need a new belt, I've been in the smallest hole for a while now but after today, it feels like I'm going the other direction. 

Almost immediately I went to “See? I knew you were going to fail and you took all our fat guy clothes to Goodwill. Now we have to wander around fat and naked because you swore we were never going back to Casual Male. Way to go Obama.” 

You think I'm kidding but if you can quote a thought, that's what my brain said to me this morning. Every word of it, the me who couldn't get his head around this would get tired of beating myself up, so I'd lash out at someone else so even the Obama part happened. I was pretty frustrated so I went right to the top. 

But I had a plan this year, I was going to figure out how to get some videos done, I was going to post some updates on Today I Can and keep mentally in the game. I wasn't thinking about what I was should do when I missed a shot but I was thinking about how to better use my time. I'm traveling today and the in flight internet turned off and I was stuck with nothing to do, the battery on my laptop died so I thought I'll write a post for Today I Can, on my phone, but I was stuck - what do I say when Today I Didn't? So I wrote about that. 

Interesting side note, by expressing this spot I was in, I learned these lessons, I saw how silly that failure idea was and I felt a ton better about my situation and progress. My belt didn't feel as tight, I had a turkey sandwhich with my client, skipped the fries and then I rode the exercise bike at our hotel. My today I didn't got turned back around and that was a definite rebound and score. 

Seems like a pretty good answer for the next Today I Didn't. 

A couple of videos

Updates from the Blog

I haven't blogged near enough and i am committed to doing more of it this year, in warming up for it I have been tinkering around with iMovie and been having fun making a video or two. I guess that makes this a video blog now. 

Anyway, I have a couple of offerings that you might enjoy, the first one is a video from the Big Sur ride south of Monterey we rode last summer on my ride from Canada to Mexico down the Pacific Coast Highway. It was absolutely an amazing ride, i can't wait to do it again.

We have started training for a couple of things we have planned for 2015 and one of the most awesome things happened earlier. i was able to ride with 2008 World Champion and member of the 2012 US Olympic team, Amber Neben. Just an incredible opportunity, here is a video from that ride.

What a ride!

14 riders, 30 miles, countless smiles

What a treat this morning was, after meeting at the church we decided to head North instead of the route I posted last night to save the wind for the end of the ride. I had a plan B ride put together. After getting out to downtown Frisco and posing for the shot below we decided to split into two groups. 

Doug took Pete and the fast group up to Panther Creek and I hung with the steady group and we made it out to El Dorado. We went over to Teal Parkway and headed back south with the wind at our backs. That wind helped us finish up strong in the steady group, we only lost one spoke, everyone ended up upright, so that's a plus. One of our riders took part in her first group ride and quite impressively never changed gears, oh to be 19 again. She and another rider set their personal best for distance ridden. 

We saw the fast group momentarily on Teal Parkway as we headed back in, they were enjoying a nice tail wind and making good time. Everyone was smiling so it looks like they were having as much fun as we were. Got a text from Pete after the ride and he said the group did really well but more importantly had a great time, which is what we were looking for.

Good looking group, in spite of that dude on the left

The consensus from the steady group, or at least the consensus from Sheila B and myself, was that coming back down through Frisco was a little more trafficky (that's a word, look it up on WikiFordia) than we prefer so we are going to stick with the southern route down Luna next time. Hope you can join us.

Thanks to Doug and Pete for making this ride a big hit, to the folks at Bicidichi for those sharp looking jerseys and especially thanks to all the riders for making it out today and helping spread the word that Today We Can!

Today I Can ride with Pete

and you can too this Saturday!

Hey everyone, my friend Pete Briscoe, Pastor of Bent Tree Bible Church is interested in helping me start a group ride for Today I Can and Bent Tree Bible and this week will be the first one. To help start it off with a bang Pete is going to ride along with us this Saturday, October 18 for the inaugural ride!  

Initially we are thinking it will be a no drop intermediate type ride that we can split off and create a beginners ride if we have some folks interested in getting into the sport, in fact that's why we are doing it, to get some beginners out for a ride. Everyone has to start somewhere, so give it a shot. We will gauge the ride (or rides) pace based on the feedback, don't worry, we won't be riding the whole thing at a race pace.


For those of you thinking of getting into the sport or intrigued by the prospect, there is no better way to do it than in a group ride. There is great camaraderie and you can get a lot of feedback on your strategies and technique. It is also a way to build up your strength and stamina. 


We will leave from Bent Tree Bible Fellowship 8 AM so plan on meeting there by 7:45 in the parking lot on the south side of the building near the entrance to the gym. You can even get a selfie with Pete in tight slacks and his Today I Can jersey for you to share with your friends on the Facebook! We will ride north up to Frisco, perhaps see the trains and then cut across and head back south, somewhere in the 30 mile range. If there are more advanced riders, we can add on to the end if anyone wants to go further. Of course, if we get any interest in a shorter route, just say something and we will add a beginner ride right away, that would be a great way to start off. 


I will post a link to a map of the ride later in the week in case you want to try and catch on as we ride through town. 


If you can please let me know you are coming by posting a comment on the Today I Can Facebook page or on my personal Facebook page. You can also give me a heads up on Twitter by tweeting to @TodayI_Can or @fordbaker.


Hope to see you out there and please share this with your friends on Facebook, Twitter or email, the more the merrier!

Thanks and remember, TODAY I CAN

Ford

Final Statistics from the Today I Can Pacific Coast rides

• There were 29 different rides on the tour.
• I traveled 1,873 miles on those rides. 
• There was 90,617 feet of elevation (riding uphill) on the ride. 
• The tour took 128 hours and 47 minutes of moving time to complete (only counted "moving time" doesn't include time while taking a break, taking a selfie or standing around holding a bike over my head). 
• The rides ranged from 50 miles to 100 miles.
• The most elevation I had in one day was over 5,000 feet twice, once in Oregon between Pacific City and Florence and again in California, on the Big Sur between Carmel and San Simeon. 
• Their were two long rides of just over 100 miles, once from Santa Barbara to LA and again from Arizona to Arizona State. 
• The Arizona ride included my best speeds as I was able to roll without traffic or big climbs for virtually all of the ride. My moving time was 4 hours and 41 minutes on that ride for an average of 21.5 miles per hour over the 100 miles.
• That ride also included my fastest 40 km (approximately 25 miles) at 1 hour, 2 minutes and 10 seconds for an average speed of 24 MPH.
• The lowest temperature was 50 degrees on the ride I crossed over from Oregon to California on July 11th. 
• The highest temperature was 114 degrees, two times, once between Fort Bragg and the Napa Valley on July 14th (a ride that began at 57 degrees before the temperature literally doubled as I rolled away from the coast) and again in Arizona, where it was just hot the whole darn ride.