I have some experience road biking and will attempt to answer your questions to the
best of my ability.
1. I am not a ‘bigger guy’ so I can’t speak for them but will say it is a great, low
impact exercise, especially for the bigger guys. If you are concerned about losing
muscle, just find a good balance between time and intensity. Do not let distance
be your guide. And get a good seat
2. for a 250lb bodybuilder, I think you would want a metal frame (I have one but do
not weigh 250lbs.) or a carbon fiber frame ($$). Aluminum frames, I have no clue.
I would Google bike frames.
3. again, let time and intensity be your guide. Am not trying to be evasive. This is
highly individual and depends upon your goals. ‘Fitness’ and weight loss are two
different things. As is muscle loss. As is ‘exercise’.
4. yes it is a good, low impact form of cardio, safe (well, sometimes street riding is
not so safe) on the knees provided your bike ‘geometry’ is set up correctly, suits your
body and proportions. Have a bike shop help you with this. It is very critical for
comfort and avoiding knee injury.
My story.
I was introduced to street bikes / riding when I was dating my wife 25 years ago.
In retrospect, an attempt to get in her good graces. (It worked.). I borrowed a friend’s
custom road bike at first (not the right geometry for me) then I traded a bunch of
used climbing gear for a like new Specialized road bike. Like most things in my life,
I am all in or I am out. So I was all in. And riding with my wife (see another post
about her), well, I had a lot of ground to make up, pardon the pun.
I started by riding all the highest, hardest hills / climbs in the county where I live,
which is also where professional cycling teams come to train in the off season because
of the great variety of roads. You can make your rides extremely hard and short, or
hard and long. Or short and hard which was my preference. I achieved my goal there.
Then repeated them. Then did some distance cycling. 100 mile rides were my longest.
40 mile to 60 mile rides was my preference. (I am more fast twitch than slow twitch.).
Eventually I started doing very short as in distance and time, but very very hard climbs
on a hill in a private gated community near my house. Which was good because it had
very little traffic for what I was doing. And what I was doing was laps on the steepest,
most difficult hill section. I don’t know what the incline it was but it was steep, would
be difficult to walk up, and I don’t know the exact distance, perhaps somewhere around
half a mile, not long. So . . . I would ride to the top, have some water and half a candy
bar and then cost back down to bottom, not the bottom of the hill because you had to
climb a hill to get there, but back to my starting point. Then I would repeat the process
again and again. Bottom to top, drink, eat, cost to bottom, turn around and ride back up.
My goal was ten times. I made it to six. I just got bored. It was incredible boring . . .
and hard. Sometimes I would go so slow it was a miracle I did not fall over. But you just
keep standing and keep grinding and trying to see with the sweat falling in your eyes.
I did it once without standing, sitting in the seat the entire time (way harder). Sorry,
but once was enough for me.
I was hoping to gain some much needed size in my legs and get a bit leaner but that was
not in the cards. I measured my legs before and after my ‘project’ and I never gained or
lost any size in the quads or calves, and like I said, I could use some size in both depart-
ments. My endurance improved dramatically as one would expect and my body weight
remained unchanged. (Does the word ‘set point’ mean anything to you?)
My only ‘claim to fame’ was doing one of the hardest hill climbs in the world, the Mount
Evans Scenic Byway in Colorado (above 14,000 feet), the highest paved road in North
America. The thin air and the distance are the challenge. It was relatively easy for me,
probably due to its distance, I think 27 miles, and I had been training on steep hills for
some time.
Hope this helps and amused you.