Practicing some self-control...

Friday, December 14, 2012
Holly and I would be attending a Christmas party at Kirtland Country Club in the evening and I knew the menu would include many rich foods and hollow calories.  In other words, it would all be delicious.  With that in mind and knowing the state of my willpower, I took the opportunity to get in a 2-hour ride in what turned out to be a pretty decent December afternoon.  Temperatures were in the mid-forties, so I went with biking shorts only on the lower body and my long-sleeved under armor and my riding shirt on top.  I decided the isotoner gloves would be enough to keep my hands warm, but I wasn’t completely accurate on that score.  I can wear two pairs of socks on my feet and barely get them in the riding shoes, so it has to do.  It didn’t either.  What is comfortable while preparing the bike is not necessarily warm enough when riding two hours creating a chill factor from the mid-twenties to the mid-thirties.  My hands and feet suffered, but I manned it out.

I ran into a couple of old high school classmates at the party and they were familiar with my workout routine.  I had one agree to join me the next morning…he’s done it before…but the other looked, well, scared.  He asked me for an overview of the workout, and grinned.

“Tell you what, John…you and Bruce go down to the park in the morning and if I’m not there, go ahead and start without me,” Karl said.

“Hey…Karl…you can handle it.  Do as many push-ups or whatever as you can.  I’m not trying to get you to puke or something,” I said.

But really, I probably would have beat him up pretty badly.  I’d known Karl since eighth grade CYA football when he was playing for another school.  At that time, he outweighed me by about twenty pounds, and with his twin brother, Kurt, had spent an afternoon plowing into me across the line of scrimmage.  It was only 45 years later, but never too late for a little retribution.  No matter how much sweet talking I did though, he was on to me and declined the offer.

I skipped all the fancy h’dovres and the rolls…sticky and dinner…placed on the table.  Dinner was steak and lobster with melted butter, green beans and some kind of potato thing.  I handed my butter to Holly…she’ll drink the stuff if you don’t watch her…and passed on the potatoes.  There was a dessert bar too, but I never even looked it over.  I was rather proud of myself because this was a party where I could have easily consumed over 2,000 calories.  Not bad for someone normally worthless and weak.

Bike Duration:  Two hours.
Training Heart Rate: 120 bpm.
Calories burned during workout: 1700 .