Why ride a trike?

Lots of good reasons. In my case, it's for health benefits and weight loss.

The following series of photos shows my progress from a few days after receiving the trike on July 6, 2004 to the nearest month end. I'll try to update with monthly reports. The purpose of this series of progress photos is not for my own vanity, but to hopefully encourage and inspire others who may have been considering getting a trike or bike and beginning their own path back to better health.

	July 10, 2004: This is where it all started. This photo was taken just a few days after I received the Sun EZ3-USX trike. Look at that gut! 264 pounds of flab...
July 31, 2004: Just three weeks later the changes are beginning to be apparent.
	September 18, 2004: For some reason, I didn't get a photo in August. The visible progress has slowed, but the weight continues to drop and the feeling of well-being is increasing by leaps and bounds.
December 31, 2004: October & November here in Southeast Kansas brought lots of cold, miserable wet weather. I only found a few days dry enough and warm enough for riding. My weight began to slip back up a few pounds in spite of my strict adherence to the changes I'd made in my eating habits. My wife, who has also been following the same program of diet and exercise as myself, was also seeing her hard-earned progress beginning to slip. We decided to move indoors. On December 6, 2004 we joined our local YMCA and started a program of cardio exercise and weight training three days a week. The cardio part is done on stationary recumbent exercise cycles. This will help keep us in good shape until we can start riding the EZ3 again in the spring. The combination of cardio training and weight training has pushed both of us to greater gains than we had before bad weather took us off the EZ3 in October.
	January 29, 2005: It's been eight weeks since we joined the YMCA and started a program of weight training along with cardio exercise on stationary recumbent bikes. A few days before this photo was taken, the weather actually cooperated and I was able to take the EZ3-USX trike for a spin! It was a short lived break in the weather though. Note the wet street behind me. There was an inch of snow covering the ground here earlier in the day! My weight is hovering around the 214 pound mark, and has been there about a week and a half. The fitness experts at ExRx.net Online Fitness Forum have recommended I toss out the scales at this point and focus on body shape changes as I am now building some lean muscle mass as I lose fat.

March 5, 2005:
Visible fat loss is not as obvious after 12 weeks of weight training plus cardio on the stationary recumbent, but it is there. My weight has only dropped another two pounds to 212 lb, but my waist measurement has decreased a full inch. I'm beginning to see a "V" outline of the oblique muscles on the sides of my stomach. I'd love to see a six-pack of those abs but my body fat percentage is still way too high at 15-16%. My wife & I are measuring bodyfat levels with a bodyfat skin caliper. We bought the Accu-Measure brand. If you are serious about losing weight, I recommend one of these. They will tell you more when combined with a tape measure than weight scales alone.

Spring is not far away now, and there are more and more nice days. Soon we will be able to resume daily riding on the EZ3-USX and should be able to start rapidly knocking off some of that remaining bodyfat!

April 8, 2005:
No photo this month. We just purchased a new home in mid-March and are spending all our spare time cleaning, painting and doing some minor remodeling in preparation to moving in before the end of April. We haven't been to the gym or rode the trike in three weeks! Fortunately, we've stuck to our dietary plan and kept the weight off. All the work on the house is close to a good workout at the gym, and I've actually lost another two pounds! One good thing, the new place has room for us to build a home gym, plus parking for the trike and the second trike we plan to have. :-)

May 18, 2005: We're back in the Gym! After six weeks of moving, we are finally settled in our new home. Returning to the gym has demonstrated how fast one loses those hard-earned gains in the gym. Both my wife and I lost about 20% of our strength compared to the last workout we did on March 24. We are quickly regaining it though. After five workouts we have both nearly regained to the point where we left off. For example, on March 24 I completed 3 sets of 12 reps on the seated chest press machine with 130 pounds. I had completed 3 sets of 130 x 12 at that weight for the previous three sessions and was ready to increase weight. When I returned to the Gym on May 7, my chest press sets looked like this: 130 x 12, 130 x 9, 130 x 5. Yesterday (5/17) I did 130 x 12, 130 x 11, and 130 x 6. It's hard to get it back, so don't lose it in the first place! One great thing- I stepped on the scales this morning and weighed 203 pounds!

May 30, 2005: This is our new home gym. We just got it set up and are eager to use it. We'll be adding to it and making improvements in the coming months, but it's a good basic setup as is. We'll still be using the local YMCA, but the home gym gives us an alternative when the weather outside is foul or we just don't have time to drive to the gym.

June 11, 2005: My wife & I have both regained and surpassed the losses we incurred during our absence from the gym while we moved to the new house. A couple of weeks ago I started experimenting with the supplement Creatine Monohydrate. I'm beginning to notice a difference in my workout. In the last few trips to the gym I have made dramatic increases in the amount of weight lifted. I don't know if it is directly a result of the Creatine supplement or more psychological. I do know I am pushing myself harder. One known effect of taking Creatine is sudden weight gain. This is caused by water retention in muscle tissue. I've seen my weight go from a low of 203 lb to currently 209 lb. I have not seen a corresponding increase in waist size, so I know it's not fat gain. Besides, it's impossible to gain 6 lb of fat in two weeks. I'd have to consume an extra 21,000 calorie surplus to do that! Note the nice pink thighs...sunburn from riding the trike! :-) Extra photos: profile front1 back If you want to learn more about Creatine Monohydrate, may I suggest you start here: Creatine FAQ on DiscussFitness.com.

August 14, 2005: The current photo is from July 23, 05. I didn't get a chance to make a July progress report, so the July photo will have to suffice for August. We've split our workout routine into separate days for upper and lower body workouts. We now spend two days a week in the gym for upper body and two days for lower body. The advantages are shorter workout times in the gym, plus three days a week for each muscle group was beginning to show signs of overtraining. I'd let the trike riding slip a bit during the last couple of months, but have picked up the slack the last couple of weeks. I'm now riding 5 to 10 miles every day that I'm not in the gym, and a few miles on upper body days if time permits.

My wife, Wanda, has worked out along side me and followed the same diet plan from the beginning. She's not felt comfortable with her own progress to allow me to post photos--until now, that is! I thing she's doing a danged fine job!

If you would like to know more about the workout routine I've used to help lose the weight and tone up, click on the link: My workout routine.

Here's a couple of links to trike related technical articles I've done:

My EZ3-USX Recumbent Trike.
This is the one I ride several times a week. This page is just for information purposes on how the trike arrived in pieces and some of what was involved in getting it assembled.

Lights.
A construction project to add lights to the trike for safe night riding.

Thunderspeed Trike construction project.
I have started design & construction of a second trike. When completed, the USX will become the exclusive property of my wife. :-)
I've named this new trike the Thunderspeed. The Thunderspeed trike is referred to as a Recumbent Tadpole design because it is wide in front and narrow in back. Unlike the EZ3-USX, which is a Delta design, the Thunderspeed has two wheels in front which do the steering (like a car) and one wheel centered in back and connected to the drive system. (similar to a standard bicycle)

My email is jimball@yellowjacketsystems.com

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