Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! I read a tidbit in Bicycling magazine entitled 5 Things You Should Have In Your Car obvious stuff, really. It reminded me that I wanted to write about one of my experiments/resolutions last year. I decided (maybe this idea spawned ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! I like my Garmin Forerunner 305 but the call of a new tech gadget is strong! I’ve been eyeing the Garmin Edge 705 for a while now but the price has been an issue. Garmin recently announced the Edge 500 which looks to be more inline with what I want. I don’t often (never?) need mapping when on my bike. Kind of a nice-to-have that would probably be wasted and never used. Here is a VERY in depth review of ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! My friend John and I (yeah everyone else bailed on us and it was such a nice day for a ride. High 40s minimal rain. It does not get any better in January in Washington people!) rode 30 miles (out-back on the FootHills trail between Puyallup and South Prairie). We started at 8AM and rode at a pretty mild pace through 10 miles... then John pulled away for the last five miles. When we finally met up at the ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! Several people have asked me for a list of the supplements that I use. Well here is that list. My definition of supplement is anything I take or use that isn’t real/whole food. I try whenever possible to eat healthy whole foods but in this busy world it is impossible to eat right 100% of the time so I supplement with a great multi vitamin, EFAs, joint health compound and protein drinks and protein bars. ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! I hate to call what we’re doing “The Biggest Loser” because it seems whenever two or more people decide to lose weight and get healthy it becomes a Biggest Loser contest. One problem with a Biggest Loser style contest is that it favors people who are massively overweight. No one at Benchmark Plus is massively overweight and some people here are even in darned good shape! We wanted a way to involve everyone ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! Did two three workouts yesterday neither none of which were on a bicycle. *waits for faithful readers to get up off of the floor* The first was a Crossfit workout. Crossfit is an evil spawn of Satan workout regime. From the Crossfit wikipedia entry: CrossFit workouts typically call for athletes to work hard and fast, often with no rest. Many CrossFit gyms use scoring and ranking systems, transforming ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! In my previous Getting Healthy post I mentioned that "You have to be willing to challenge the status-quo even when you skinny friends look at you like you're stupid (I have a story about this but I'll save it for a future installment)." Well I suppose this is that future installment. It’s only been like 13 months… gimme a break! By challenging the status-quo I was specifically referring to the fact that ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! I’ve signed up for the 2009 LIVESTRONG Challenge in Seattle which will happen on June 21st 2009. Those of you not familiar with the event(s): The LIVESTRONG Challenge is the LAF's signature fundraising event. Whether you walk, run, ride, volunteer or donate, your participation is one more powerful weapon in the fight against cancer. If you are not familiar with the Lance Armstrong Foundation (apparently ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! I usually don’t blog about all of my bike rides but I’m pretty proud of getting out for some good rides here in October. The weather in the Seattle area has been spectacular so far this fall so that has helped quite a bit. In addition to the two rides I link to below I also had two rides where my Forerunner 305 battery died or was simply DOA… yeah for some reason my USB connection is not charging my Forerunner. ......
After the incredible experience that I’ve had the last two years I will be riding in the 2008 Dam2Dam Bike Tour. In 2006 I was able to meet and ride with Greg LeMond, in 2007 Derek and I completed the 50 mile route on a tandem. This ride is extremely well organized from the check-in process to the ride support, rest stops, sag wagons and post ride BBQ. The experience has been amazing so far and to This post has moved permanently to http://bargelt.com/dam2dam-... ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! This is my second try at a post to look at my 2008 goals. In the first attempt I was going to take the text of my 2008 Goals post and just mark it up and add comments but damn I wrote way too much and went into way too much detail in that post. Hopefully this will be much less painful. The first seven months in review: I'm down to 238 pounds. I'm very happy with my long-term progress and YES I STILL want ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! John is a much better writer than I am and he does a much better job of describing the 2008 Tour de Pierce than I would so take it away Johnboy! I had a great time even though it was way to hot for us Northwesterners. I was pretty dehydrated by mile 42 (the last rest stop) I tried to catch up and drink a few bottles of water there but we all know that it is too late once you're feeling the effects. At ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! Yesterday the Fat Cyclist (aka Fatty to his close friends strangers who read his blog) announced his Inaugural Fat Cyclist Triathalon sounds like an amazing event! I'd love to attend. So here is my proposed road trip from the Seattle/Tacoma area: Wednesday June 18th: Start out in my motor home, after work... like 5PM from Kent, WA. Drive to Boise, ID. Thursday June 19th: Arrive in Boise at about 1AM. ......
Good article in the NYT back in early December regarding willpower.
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! One of my goals is to compete with my friends in the First Annual DaBoyz Fit Club Triathlon: details from Kiltsurfer's Fitness Blog by Scott We have been talking about it for a while and decide on April 20th. This triathlon will follow the Biggest Loser on NBC style. We do a 24K triathlon. - Bike 20K (12.4 Miles) - Treadmill 3K (1.9 Miles) - Swim 1K ( .62 Miles)Technorati Tags: Fit Club ......
Great article entitled "No Gimmicks: Eat Less and Exercise More" on the New York Times site. I love it. People always ask me what I've done to lose weight and I tell them, "I eat less and I exercise more. I wish I could tell you it is easy but it is not." You'd be surprised how many of the people I give this advice to look This post has moved permanently to http://bargelt.com/nyt-arti... ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! Get my weight down to 220. My first goal is to hit 228 before the 2008 STP on July 12th Improve my eating habits Continue to: track my daily food intake at The Daily Plate avoid fast food track my weekly progress in my special Excel spreadsheet take my daily supplements (Nature's Plus Source of Life Liquid Multi-Vitamin and Udo's 3-6-9 Blend) eat 6 small meals per day read Men's Health and other health ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! I got rid of 20.8 pounds (9.43 kg). I am down from 266.8 pounds (121.02 kg) to 246 pounds (111.6 kg). Went from a size 40 to size 36 jeans (damned Dockers... still wear a 38... but they are a bit big!). I spent over 85 hours on my bikes: Completed the 2007 Chilly Hilly. It sucked. I'll never do it again. Let me clarify: I will ride the course but never again on the official organized day! Trained for ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! This is a posting of an email that I sent out to several of my friends a couple months ago. It was meant to be sort of a realistic, slap in the face, tough love, round-about motivational email to the best bunch of friends a guy could ever hope to have. We all struggle with weight problems. I have had some success over the past few years so I wanted to share so of my insight with them. The text has been ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! As read in RoadBikeRider's weekly newsletter: PowerBar's answer to pickle juice, Tums and V-8 (three of the many anti-cramp suggestions found at http://www.roadbikerider.co... is a new product called Magnesium Liquid. It comes in 25-ml vials, has a citrus flavor and contains vitamin B6, artificial sweeteners and, as you'd guess, magnesium. Taken daily and especially before a ride, the stuff ......
Today's numbers: 253.2 pounds. 23.3 BF%. 59 pounds of fat. 194.20 pounds of lean stuff.*
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! I realized a few weeks ago that I had never written down any goals for 2007 and I certainly never expressed them in a public way. So here goes (I sent this as an email to several of my friends a couple weeks ago - I've updated the list a bit since then): Weight: 228 by 12/31/2007. Start of 2007: 261. Current: 253.2. 25.1 to go. The biggest challenge here is that I need to lose 25 pounds over Halloween, ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! A big congratulations to Erick for completing a 30-mile ride today. Way to go, bud. John does a much better job of describing the ride on his blog. Today (8/4/07) (Erick's first ride): ...and some other rides from the past week Thursday (8/2/07): Broke my chain on the hill back up to my house so I decided to walk the rest of the way in my socks. Now I have huge blisters on the bottoms of both my feet. ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! Note: I want to publicly thank everyone who supported my STP effort this year. My team, my support crew, my friends and my family. Without you guys I'd be nothing. I do plan to blog about the experience but unfortunately personal stuff is getting in the way. Oh you say "well Steve you had time to write this fine post!" - to that I say - I wrote the bulk of this post almost two weeks ago. So there. My ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! Technorati Tags: Bicycling Fit Club ......
Awesome ride today. I want to try to stress how big of a deal this ride was to me. Typically I throw my bike into/onto a vehicle to get down into and back out of the valley. Today I rode up the hill from the valley back to my house. That was a huge deal for me. It is not nearly L'Alpe D'Huez (roughly 8.5 miles, 3650 ve This post has moved permanently to http://bargelt.com/dam2dam-... ......
Hit the road last night. Did about 22 miles. It was a fun ride but damn it was hard to get out of the house. I'm sure we all have these experiences from time-to-time. I could not find my GPS, I could not find batteries for the GPS, I could not find my biking shoes, then the sandals I wear in the car before and after the ride, then my socks. I was a total mess. Subconsciously I think that I wanted t This post has moved permanently to http://bargelt.com/dam2dam-... ......
Sorry for the lack of updates regarding my Dam2Dam training. Please know that I have been riding - just not blogging about it! I rode roughly 55 miles over the weekend! I took Monday off from riding but hit the weights with Brandon. Tuesday was a complete no exercise day. Back at it tonight! I've been trying to get a semi-automated ride update going and instead of bloggi This post has moved permanently to http://bargelt.com/dam2dam-... ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! 263.4 pounds with 22.9 body fat. Short post this week - but at least it is a post! Training Weights: Saturday & Tuesday. Had to coach baseball Monday and Wednesday nights. Cardio: Monday and Wednesday 45 minutes on the treadmill. Watching “The Shield” while I workout. Food Been good all week with the exception of Sunday – Mother’s Day. I BBQ’d up some baby-backs and damn they were good. Of course ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! 273.4 pounds with 23.1 body fat. As I predicted this was a tough week… no excuses but Microsoft does provide ample crap-food to conference attendees. Training Weights: Thursday, Saturday, Monday – typical workout all three nights. Only bummer is that I could have made this a 4–workout week and I didn’t. I got home late from the conference on Wednesday and just slacked. Oops. Cardio: Yeah. STILL need to ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! 271 pounds with 23.1% body fat. Recently it really hit me that no matter what I say about not caring about my weight and only caring about my body fat percentage – in the end when I see my weight on the scale and it is higher than my goal I get bummed - even if my BF% is dropping. Over the last few weeks I’ve gained all the weight that I had lost in the previous 8 weeks back. I have been pretty bummed ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! Johnboy does a much better job than I will describing our hike on Sunday. I must say that I am damned proud of John. He showed up, he gave it his all and damn it – he made it to the top! John – keep up that attitude and you are going to hit all of your goals for the year! Johnboy @ the top!!! I had a blast! It was so awesome to hike again… in 2004 I hiked like a fool then nothing – seriously nothing in ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! 263.8 pounds with 24.5 % body fat. I’m happy with the weight but that body fat # needs to budge!!! I knew going in that measuring my body fat coudl be hit-and-miss with my scale. I’m not going to sweat it. Training Weights: Friday, Monday, Wednesday – typical workout all three nights. Abdominal and leg work Friday and Monday. Extra bicep work Friday and Monday nights. Cardio: Sunday, Monday, Wednesday. ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! 266.4 pounds with 24.6 body fat. Actually I’m a bit disappointed that I didn’t drop more weight this week. I ate right, I added cardio to my workout regimen and I didn’t slack on the weights. A bit frustrating… but I won’t let it get me down. A few weeks like this and then maybe I’ll be a bit more upset. Training Weights: Monday, Wednesday – typical workout both nights. Extra abdominal, leg and bicep ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! Sorry I’m late with the update. 267.2 pounds with 24.7% body fat. Overall I’m happy. I’ll say it again – I don’t care as much about the weight as I do about the body fat percentage. This was a tough week in that I’m home with my new baby girl and not in my normal routine… but I did extremely well. Not too much snacking (which is always a temptation while at home). Training Weights: Friday, Monday and ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! 266.0 pounds with 26.6 body fat. I do not care about anything else this week. I have a new baby girl, Zoe!!! Training Weights: Nada. Cardio: Yeah. Nada here, too. I ordered my treadmill. Food Not too bad considering Brenda’s birthday celebration on Saturday. At one piece of birthday cake (carrot cake) on Sunday and one on Monday). Stats Today (1/12/06) 266.0, 26.6% BFStarted (1/1/06) 271, 25.3 BF%Here ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! 265.7 pounds with 25.7% body fat. I’m happy with the weight and body fat. This week was tough. I was starving all week and every morning I woke up feeling sick. Training Weights: Friday, Tuesday, Wednesday – typical workout all three nights. Abdominal and leg work all three nights. Extra bicep work Friday and Wednesday nights. Cardio: Yeah. Well I’ll just say that I need to improve here. For some reason ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! First weigh-in today. 268.4 pounds with 26.7% body fat. I’m very happy with the weight – considering I really didn’t start eating right until Tuesday. Yeah really happy with that number! Not so happy with the body fat. I think it was a fluke. I did it again and it was lower but I’m taking the first reading – heck it’ll make next week look better, right?! Training Weights: Monday, Wednesday – typical workout ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! Rob made me ride 15 miles today. Felt totally horrible. Seriously bad. I can't wait to do it again!Technorati Tags: Fit Club ......
Greetings! It was a tough decision but I have moved my blog to bargelt.com. Thanks for visiting! Thanks to my neighbor, Rob I am back on my street bike. Damn it hurts so good. I have a 1984 Trek 610 that Rob put a few hours of work and $150 worth of parts into - now it is a pretty descent ride... Rob and I did 19 miles last night (9/3)... and 15 on Tuesday (8/30). Just 34 miles in the saddle - I think I'm catching the bug again! Alexi Grewal had a lot to do with my biking bug the first time around ......