When Waide (60), a Dunedin taxi driver, started with the Jenny Craig weight loss programme two years ago, he weighed 149.7kg. This was reduced to 98kg and it now fluctuates between that mark and 104kg.
Waide lost his weight through a combination of diet and exercise. He started walking two years ago and has been riding a bike for the last 18 months.
"At first I was too heavy to get on my bike," Waide said. "I walked and used a rowing machine at home."
Waide then used a mountain bike and now rides a road bike most days.
His bike is now an important part of his fitness and weight loss programme and he has notched up a number of long distance rides.
Last week he rode from Dunedin to Waimate in 7hr 6min 22sec and finished with a half-flat back tyre in heavy rain.
Waide has also completed the journey from Dunedin to Cromwell (10hr 26min 9sec) and from Dunedin to Invercargill (8hr 36min 50sec). He has done other long distance rides.
The Jenny Craig influence changed Waide's diet. He now has a more balanced diet, consumes less red meat and potatoes, and eats more greens and salads.
Waide was active in his youth and kept himself fit by running with the Anglican Harrier Club.
He has always had a love of sport and coached swimming for 20 years. He was assistant coach for Duncan Laing at Moana Pool for four years.
But his occupation as a driver of trucks, buses and now taxis did not help his fitness and he did not notice the increasing weight he was carrying.
"It was my downfall," he said. "I just sat around and ate too much and got bigger and bigger.
"I was working long hours a day and seven days a week. I didn't have time for exercise."
Waide was always surrounded by fit and active people and this had an influence on his decision to lose weight. His three sons, Rob (34) and twins Pete and Dave (31), who now live on the Queensland Gold Coast, are talented swimmers.
Dave won five gold medals and broke three records at the Pan Pacific Masters Games at Brisbane last week. Rob won a gold, two silver and one bronze medal.
Waide was shocked into reducing his weight when Rob was married three years ago.
The trousers of his old suit were too small and he could not fit into any clothes off the shop rack.
"I had them specially made to my size," Waide said. "They look like an empty wool bale for me today."
He wore a size 52 shirt then. He can now fit inside it with his wife, Lynn.
