Those who know me personally, know I’ve let myself go. It doesn’t help that I quit smoking, all nicotine actually, and I discovered I love food. Couple that with my wife telling me I was getting too skinny (about seven years ago, now) because I was riding so much, and I had a fast food ticket to unlimited yumminess… that I promptly took way too far.
Then I discovered real food, and through a set of life circumstances, dialed back my mileage… to a point I started putting on some serious weight. I haven’t ridden my Venge in the drops in two years. Of course, in all fairness, the setup is slammed.
That’s a lot of drop right there.
Now, this all must be taken in context. I’m not obese. I’m not close. But I can’t be called skinny anymore, by a long shot. The point is, I found it time to do something about it. I started eating more intelligently. Half-meals when we eat out, cutting out the fast food almost entirely. And I’ve started to drop some weight, especially now that the weather has turned lovely for cycling (to an extent, we’re still getting a lot of rain). I’ve had my struggles, but I feel some positive things happening.
So, yesterday I had the occasion to take the Venge out for a quick spin. It was a glorious, warm, mildly breezy afternoon. I was two-thirds of the way done when I realized I was cruising pretty low with my hands on the hoods and arms bent at the elbow… so I dropped my hands down to the drops. And rode. I got two miles in when I allowed myself to be satisfied that, indeed, I can reach the drops again.
It was a good day.
Fit Recovery 
I’d have back aches for a month with that setup. Well done!
I attribute that setup to FIXING my back pain. My back was so bad, I needed Aleve three to six days a week. After picking up cycling, I’m down to less than once a week. I get the sense the setup built up some muscles that needed the work.