A beautiful young fan yells encouragement to me during a cyclocross race. She repeatedly hollers the word, “focus!” The beneficial effects of cycling are seemingly infinite. There is the fitness, and the well known accompanying cardiovascular benefits. Blood pressure is lowered, arteries more elastic, waistlines shrink and as long as one can avoid moving trees, the […]
Category: Cycling Stuff
Cycling-related topics of the DrJohnM blog.
Categories
Cycling Wednesdays: #4…
Today’s installment of “Cycling Wednesdays,” is yet another guest post. (Heck, if this keeps up, I will not ever have to write another myself.) Sam Hartman is new to the Louisville cycling scene. I do not know him well, but I can say that his legs are distinctive. Moreover, I can also vouch for his power […]
As a cardiologist and advocate for healthy living through exercise, the bleak news of rising childhood obesity hits me hard. But as an endurance athlete well versed in the inflammatory effects of excessive exercise, and a coach of middle school children, recent news reports on the over-training of American youth is equally troublesome. The over-training of […]
Categories
Cycling Wednesdays: #3…
This third installment of “Cycling Wednesdays” comes as a guest post from Rachel Fagerburg. Rachel is a dear friend, mother of two young children, fellow cyclist, and wife of a teammate. She is famous in this area for her talent as a race announcer. I am grateful for her words… On May 19, my husband […]
The iphone chimes later in the night than usual. The text message, from a college-aged friend, reads, “thanks for playing with me on the ride today.†It is true that exercise comes wrapped in many different packages. There is gyrating on a AHA-endorsed Wii, and then there is the Tuesday Night World championships, as it is […]
Categories
An old girlfriend is back…
Having friends to ride with is good. I’ve missed riding with her. We rode last night, and it was nice. She is of bavarian heritage, a little over-engineered, possibly. Unfortunately, of late, she has spent a great deal of time either too sick to accompany me on rides, or even worse, she has been away […]
It is pretty cool that my town, Louisville, KY, was named the 21st best cycling city, by Bicycling magazine. Each city gets one picture in the feature, and Louisville’s snapshot features yours truly on the tandem with Will as stoker, my best-friend Bob Bobrow to our right, and one of the Mandrola’s favorite teenagers, Andrew […]
Spring in the Ohio valley has brought hours upon hours of gloomy rain. Â We are indoors, and reflection is on the docket. Â Seven months have passed since the blog journey began. Why do I have a blog, or some may call it a cocoon. I ask myself this question a lot. Â The EP lab and […]
Categories
Do I exercise too much?
They have the look. Their faces are chiseled; the cheekbones are easily visible because the body is devoid of fat. Their eyes speak fatigue. They are not refugees. Have they been stricken with a calorie-eating tapeworm? No. They are middle-aged physicians conversing in the doctors lounge. I see them pulling up their scrub bottoms to […]
Images taken via the iPhone on visiting the cardiac nurses lounge today. Indeed, it seems America is running to Dunkin. Now for the closer: KFC’s double down. Fried chicken as the bun, processed white flour, saturated fat, pork fat, dairy fat, special sauce and nearly an entire days worth of sodium masquerading as food. […]
It is true that chronically drilling oneself out on a bike may predispose to atrial fibrillation, or AC separation. But cycling is not all bad. Take this case from the most recent NEJM as a striking example of one of the many benefits of cycling. It is a 56 year old man with completely disabling […]