43:47; 34 mph max; 11.1 mph avg; 8.1 m trip

I had to put some effort into this evening's ride.

I had a belly full of Negra Modelo and chili colorado (with tomatilla.... mmmmm), and by a half hour into it, I found it necessary to tap into some motivation reserves I don't normally need to tap.

I also got off to a late start (7:42 pm) and found myself literally in the dark before the trip ended. That meant taking off my sunglasses and getting lake bugs in my eyes.

And my brakes rather suddenly started making a rough noise I haven't yet identified. They still worked, so my best guess is that some kind of debris is involved. I'll have to get to the bottom of that in the morning.

My heart monitor reports a Calorie rate of 5 kcal/60 min. That's higher than usual, but I never really understand all that stuff anyway. I just keep collecting data.

If nothing else, saving all this heart monitor data to the PC and reviewing all the charts does give me some information about myself. I can, at the least, maintain a realistic idea of how often I exercise, how hard, and for how long (at least when I don't accidentally delete an exercise session in the attempt of getting it uploaded.... grrrrrr).

Last few times I've stepped on the scale, I've weighed in at 231 and just now at 230. I honestly can't recall the last time I weighed in at 230, beyond it having been a span of years. I stopped looking at the scale when I got/stayed up over 255. It was just too depressing.

My best bud seemingly never tires of pointing out that there's no point in weighing in. He insists that weight and fitness aren't really meaningfully related. So I guess I'll spew my thoughts on the matter one good time.

My understanding of weight loss and fitness pretty much matches up with information in this article, which states:

The good news is that you don’t have to reach your ideal weight to lower your risk of developing obesity-related medical problems.

• Losing even 10% of your total body weight can significantly lower your risk.
  
• If you weigh 250 pounds and lose 10% of your total body weight, losing those 25 pounds can have a meaningful positive effect on your health.
  
• Losing 10% of your total body weight is a good goal to start with. You can always continue and lose more weight once you have reached your initial goal.

I look better already. I feel better. People notice and comment that I look better.

I've even started looking in the mirror again, which I'd stopped doing for a very long time.

I'm Trekking Bob (a title I only use in the blog, BTW), and I just don't see how carrying all that extra weight can do anything but hold me back from my adventures.

So cheers to 230. That's a damn fine number in my book.