While I’m not exactly a slacker all year long or anything, it’s time to join the resolutioners and emerge from the long winter’s nap I’ve been taking and really hit it hard.  I have some extra in my middle to take care of and some marathon training to catch up on.

Last week I started training again – not with any speed or flair, but I got 3 solid, albeit SLOW runs done, even a double digit on Saturday.  This week, I go whole hog – back to complete and total healthiness, and training as much back to normal as I can while I cleanse my poor, junk food addled body.

The January Plan:

-No sugar.  No sweet treats, no deserts, etc, unless it’s fuel during a run.  Again, not going crazy trying to eliminate every source of hidden sugar from my diet but I’m trying to cut out the easy stuff.  Also, it’s easier to say no when I’m completely abstaining.  Exception is, of course, fruit, proteins, smoothies, and protein bars (which are very low sugar anyway) in a pinch.  If I’m freaking out, I will allow myself some homemade frozen yogurt w/stevia.

-1600 calories per day, minus long run day.  Long run day is 1600 + allowance for a reasonable amount of booze (~2000 total).  If I want to drink any other day, it has to come out of the 1600.  I’m treating this like a bank – once my calories are gone, they are gone.

-Continuing with nutritionist recommended 1 grain per day, 1 potato/corn/carrot per day, 1 dairy per day, 3-4 proteins, 1-2 legumes, and 1 nut.  Calories are king here, but attempting to stay with these ratios as closely as possible.

-Also continuing with the organic/grass fed/no hormones/no antibiotics thing, and trying to get back to the “less than 9 ingredients” thing whenever possible and it makes sense.

This week specifically:

-3 runs – speedwork (1k, 2k, 1k, 1k w/400m rest in between), tempo – 10 mile at planned marathon pace, and 15 miles.

-2 other sessions – DDR and either a bike or a swim.

-stretch after each session

-do my little plio7 strength routine each morning

I’ve got my groceries planned and we’re precooking chicken for lunches this week.  I’ll also be batch cooking *something* each weekend so we have some EZ lunches and dinners ready.  I’ve also conceded that keeping some decent frozen dinners around (like kashi, amy’s, etc) might be the lesser of two evils rather than getting takeout or going for other easy and less healthy options.  And I’m pretty sick of soup, I need more variety.

So yeah, the goal for January is trying to be boring for the most part, get some good healthy eating and training under my belt, consistency and some solid progress.  The only plans we have are the gorilla run (possibly) and Zliten’s first half marathon – 3M – at the end of the month.  I know I can’t be boring until I’m at my goal weight, but it will give me a good start.

Being that I’ve just eaten crap-tastically (for me) for a good chunk of December, and the fact that it’s TOM, I think I’ll skip the weigh in for this moment, and take it later in the week once I’m back into the swing of things.

Today: so far, so good.  One day, one week, one lb, and one mile at a time.  Let’s do this!