The 50 Mile Ride (Part 1 - intro)

2 weeks ago, while on vacation in Iowa, I discovered a trail that runs 25 miles between 2 cities. It's a really nice crushed limestone trail, flat for the most part, and mostly shaded. People walk, run, and bike this trail and it's well maintained with mile markers and even some very primitive restrooms along the way. I had brought my bike with me from home with the hope of enjoying it up here in Iowa so I took it out for a ride one day. I rode 5 miles down and 5 miles back, which seemed like a lot at the time cause I can't ever remember riding 10 miles before or at least being aware of having done so. But it was in fact very easy to do. I decided that day that I would make the entire 25 mile trip from Dubuque to Dyersville, resulting in a 50 mile ride. I started riding my bike every day for an hour and then a week ago I went on a 2 hour/23 mile trip on the trail. Having completed that and still feeling fine, I decided to just go for the 50 (with a week of 10 mile practice rides in between). This may sound crazy to other people. It pretty much sounded crazy to me too. I thought 50 miles would be a distance you'd really have to work up towards. But the more I rode, the easier going 10 miles felt and I figure if I could go 10 miles and then rest a little there's no reason I couldn't go 50 miles in one day. So yesterday I did, and here are the photos and travelogue to prove it. But first, I want to pause to talk about a few other (related) things. I have been following (more or less) the Medifast plan since July 29 now. Had been doing pretty well sticking to it or at least to a version of it that was workable for me. The lowest weight I'd seen on the scale was 184.6, which made me very happy, but days kept going by without any scale movement. I was discouraged and getting annoyed about that. That's normal for me though, just a part of life when I'm on a weight loss journey and it's to be expected. Doesn't mean I need to give up, I'm just saying yes, the frustration was there. One thing that isn't exactly normal though and that I haven't confessed to anyone until now is that ever since starting Medifast a few weeks ago, I have dreamed every single night that I had gone and eaten something off the plan. Some nights it was that I dreamed I'd eaten an apple. Other nights it was that I'd gone for chocolate or baked goods. But every morning, without fail, I'd wake up wondering if I had really done that before realizing it was just another dream. What this tells me is that my mind is way too worried about food. I mean preoccupied to the greatest extent. My brain is obsessed with good food, bad food, right food, wrong food, being on a plan or off it, being perfect or not. This is disturbing to me because this never happened even when I was in the midst of losing 90 lbs with my band. I wasn't dreaming about food and I really can't remember a time in my life where I have. Maybe once or twice in the past while on a restrictive diet but I'm talking about every single night, the same thing? No...this was definitely out of the ordinary. So, Sunday, knowing that my big ride was coming up on Tuesday and that I basically had no reserves of anything except fat to burn in my body, something in mind just kicked into gear and I started to want to eat everything. And I can recognize the difference between a craving that is irrational and just needs to be ignored and something that's coming from a different place. This was like a primal need. Like survival instinct. That's all I can call it. Sure, it might have been misguided but my body was shouting at me loud and clear that I needed sugar and carbs like I haven't felt in a really long time. I analyzed it a bit and decided to give into it because truth be told, I wanted to successfully complete my ride more than I wanted to be down on the scale this week. Thinking about it carefully, I knew that I've never asked my body to work that hard for that long as riding 50 miles would be. I estimated that I'd burn about 3600 calories (my heart rate monitor ended up telling me I burned 4,131). I would have to eat 5 days worth of medifast food to not be in a deficit there when you add my normal daily caloric needs to that. And who wants to eat 5 days of medifast food in one day anyway? I'm not saying I needed to eat 5,000 calories in advance of my bike ride, that's not the point. What I felt I needed was to have some reserve energy stores in my system so that I could actually complete my ride without fear of passing out or having to just eat medifast food continuously the whole ride. If someone knows more about exercise physiology than me, I'd love to know your opinion. But needless to say, I did go a bit crazy on Sunday with eating all sorts of things I hadn't eaten in ages (and it was FUN and amazing, by the way, and really scratched an itch to just eat and enjoy it) but moreover, I was barely hungry on Monday and by Tuesday, I didn't need to eat much of anything to sustain me on my ride. I made some trail mix with nuts, granola, dried berries, and chocolate covered almonds and I brought a bunch of other stuff with me like beef jerky and cliff bars but I really wasn't hungry at all on the ride and just had trail mix every couple of hours to make sure I had energy. I could definitely feel the difference as time went on and I needed to refuel. So where does that leave me? Well, this morning my scale was at 188. I know that it's inflated not only from the sheer volume of food I've consumed over the past 3 days, the fact that a lot of it was carbs which add on "water weight", and also the amount of water I actually drank. I drank 5 liters yesterday. On a normal day I drink between 2-3. I know it's going to take a few days for my body to recover from this incredible task and maybe I'll end up back down at 184. Or maybe not and it takes another week to get there. I am ok either way. I realized something very important in the past few days. I have goals that do not revolve around the weight on the scale. Being healthy, being fit, being able to just decide to go bike 50 miles and DOING IT. That makes me incredibly happy. It doesn't make me feel less accomplished because I'm still a bit pudgy. But in terms of where I'm headed from here, I am back on "the plan" this morning and I am not craving or desiring food that I shouldn't. It was great to get it all out of my system in the few previous days and now feel ready to be back on that path. One other thing I'm realizing... I think I need to stop seeing myself as the fat person I once was. I often find myself thinking things like "Hey, I did that pretty well for a fat person." But that's just not true anymore. I'm sure there are plenty of people who are not in good enough shape to go on a 50 mile bike ride. And, without more than 2 weeks of practice at that! I should be proud of myself and grateful to my body for taking care of me and allowing me to do things that I want. That's the way I'm feeling right now.