A Messy Saturday – And An Unexpected Probblem…
Embracing the Sucky
You can see by the picture, today didn’t turn out quite like it was supposed to according to the weather report. That’s me and my running buddy Dennis… I rode down to the running club and beat the rain by about 15 minutes – we ran all 7.2 miles with it either pouring or sprinking – we earned our man-cards today. I’ve run into another problem that I wasn’t counting on though. When I arrived at the running club I weighed in as I do every week and I’d dropped another 2-1/2 pounds, I’m down to 153.6. When I started road cycling (as opposed to riding my mountain bike) I was hoovering between 156 and 158 and I was perfectly happy there. I stopped by the bike shop today to order some brake pads and asked Matt about it – he laughed and asked how close I was to the 2 lb per inch rule (A typical pro climber weighs 2 lbs for every inch, that would be 144 lbs)… I explained that this is all well and good, but I really don’t want to look like Andy Schleck – he’s awesome and all, but that boy is way too skinny. I’ve got some research to do on this, but he said it’s just a matter of eating more of the right stuff, though he didn’t know what the right stuff is, he suggested possibly upping the protein. I’ve been trying to manage my weight for the last year and rather than trying to micro-manage this, I’m going to simply try to eat more – maybe a little better breakfast, a standard lunch and then I’ll make sure and double up on dinner and see how that goes. I can tell you, having to learn to eat more is an interesting problem to have. I started at lunch today before I really thought it over and managed to stuff down about 3,000 calories. I’m going to double up on dinner too. The major problem, as I see it, is that I got used to heating enough to keep my weight neutral when I was putting in the 13-16 mile daily rides but when I started ramping that up with 25’s, 35’s and 40’s on a regular basis, what I’m used to eating just isn’t enough. I’m also going to start looking into some more intense weight training. Now, there’s another option here – I could cut down on my mileage, but that’s just not going to happen.
Continental Gatorskins – 1,000 Mile Review
On March 1st I installed two brand new Continental Gatorskin clincher tires on my road bike – yesterday I rolled my 1,000th mile on those tires so I figured I’d take a minute to write a quick review.
Fortunately, this won’t take long as I’ll be heading out for today’s brick workout (bike, run, bike) to put another 30 miles on those tires… They’re perfect. 1,000 miles and not one flat. Of course, I run them at their recommended pressure (125 psi) so they’re very fast but not very forgiving on bumps. I’ve rolled over gravel, sand, glass, metal – you name it, and I’ve only ever had one very small pebble imbed in the rubber (which I did remove).
You’ll recall that I did have a flat last Friday, but that was due to an obvious defect in the tube, not a problem with the tires.
They’re wearing very well, they’re still very “grippy” and I haven’t got a complaint. What a great tire.
The Funniest, Most Stereotypically Horrific Commercial – Ever!
Now this is going to get a touch racy before long folks, but a) it’s not all that bad and b) once you see this for yourself, you’ll have no choice but to laugh – or become angry and call you Congressperson to demand somebody do something!!! (if that is you, if you’re the call you Congressperson because of the idiocy of this stupid commercial, please do two things for me… Look to the upper left of your browser – see that little “unfollow” or “-” button? Yeah, click on that. Then go to the upper right… See that red “x”? Yeah, click on that). I’ll wait…
Now that we’re in sane company, let’s look at the funniest damn diet commercial I think I’ve ever seen, and we’ll do a little take down on it:
0:02 – that’s right folks, two whole seconds into this commercial! You’ve got three models with blonde wigs on… Really? Swedish chicks are all stereotypically hot, and you couldn’t find three for the stinkin’ commercial? Well that get’s me to thinking, who makes this stuff? Ahh, Health to Happiness, Inc. – Largo, Florida…but the website is .uk… Oh I don’t know, maybe they are Swedish, maybe they aren’t (I don’t particularly care and the stereotypes go both ways in this commercial).
0:08: If it can help you lose weight, why not try it? Oh my, this ad preys on the incredibly stupid.
0:012: A system of steps that are fun to follow! Like change your diet to a healthy one, exercise 20 minutes a day and take our pill (rocket science this is not, you’ll obviously lose weight without the pill).
0:16: Two drinks a day that are easy to swallow… Rewind that and check it out again – the choreographer has one hell of a sense of humor, that’s freaking awesome and hilarious at the same time! 90% of male respondents agree!
0:25 Say ya, to the amazing Swedish Diet, it’s at your local store so run out and buy it? Well there’s a good reason to blow $25! It’s in the store!
0:30: Again, the choreographer is either a genius or a dope.
Ah, the amazing Swedish Diet. You should notice that at no point in the commercial does it actually say that the pill will help you lose weight, it just poses a question: if it will, why not buy it. The commercial does say that changing your diet and exercising will help you trim up though.
So here’s my take-down on why I think this is a foreign made commercial: Foreigners typically believe the bad press that most Americans are completely stupid. The typical American is not stupid. Let’s face it folks, we went from start-up to top of the world in 200 years. That’s pretty freaking excellent and if we’re all that stupid, how is it that we beat all of the established countries so easily? Now, the argument can be made that we’re going down the wrong path now, having China fund our debt, but that’s a topic for a different blog. Either way, the notion that most of us are complete dopes is very European – not that this matters, really… And the stuff with the choreography?
And why I think it’s an American commercial: I just get the feeling that this may be an American deal that’s playing on the European stereotype (that I just displayed, in the last paragraph), that Europeans believe that Americans are stupid – it’s just a little too easy. In any event, the company doesn’t need the smart people to buy the stuff… It’s got a lot of the same ingredients that an Energy Drink has as far as I could tell – and they charge $25 for a week’s supply ($25 for the first week, $25 every other week thereafter)… You get 10,000 idiots to try the stuff and that’s $250,000 in the first week and $500,000 a month thereafter… That ain’t so bad. Anyway, the chicks are obviously American as were the singers… so at the very least the commercial was shot here.
Either way, every time I see that commercial on TV I laugh my a$$ off – especially that part about being easy to swallow, not that’s entertainment!
Fit Recovery 