A few weeks ago, Kyle Lowry showed up in a Kyle O’Quinn Instagram post looking much svelter and leaner than NBA fans have been accustomed to. It wasn’t just fans that were surprised by it however, as JJ Redick also had a hilarious reaction to Lowry’s weight loss.
https://instagram.com/p/6AskPFmAhC/
Now, the Toronto Raptors All-Star is sharing his reasoning behind the big offseason change to Stack.com.
It started during [last] season, and even before that. I was talking to my wife, and she said “You were always your best at your college weight.” The saying is, the older you get, the lighter you’ve got to be. I thought Ray Allen did a great job of that, and Chauncey Billups too. I’m getting to the point where I’m a little bit older. I’m still young, but I’m a little bit older, and I can pick and choose how I want my body to look and feel. It’s good to understand your body. I want to be special. At the end of the day it’s all about me and how I feel and what I can provide for my team and my family.
As for how he did it, Lowry said lots of cardio, extreme bike riding and palates are the exercises to thank for dropping the pounds.
Lowry’s game is built upon using his body to get to the rim, and his small-but-wide stature helped him bully his way through traffic. It will be interesting to see how the change affects Lowry’s game this upcoming season. If nothing else, it should help Lowry’s conditioning and he should be able to increased his minutes from the 32.3 he averaged a season ago, and perhaps stay healthier, since it was obvious in Toronto’s first-round sweep at the hands of the Wizards that Lowry wasn’t the same player who made his first all-star game in the 2014-15 season. He looked tired from the regular season and might have been more banged up than he let on.
If the Raptors want to contend in the East, they will need Lowry to be able to duplicate — if not surpass — his excellent season a year ago. While his new build may force him to make some changes to his playing style, it should help both him and the Raptors in the long run.
