Quick post to just check in, I can’t believe it’s almost December, this month has flown by!

I’ve been trying to get back on the work-out wagon, which hasn’t been easy.  On top of that, my eating has been anything but clean over the past week, so I’m trying to get back on the healthy-wagon in that area too (Good grief, I don’t even want to discuss how much I ate on Thanksgiving, it was ridiculous!) I did manage to get a really good workout on the elliptical this weekend, so now that I’ve got that machine figured out, it will be a good substitute for running.

One thing that will force motivate me to get into a routine is a competition my triathlon club has over the winter, called the Icy Iron.  You choose 1 or 2 times an Ironman distance and have six weeks to complete that distance.  If you complete it, you get a gift card ($5-10?) to a local bike shop, and if you have the most miles in one of the disciplines, you also win another prize.  I chose to do 2x the distance, which sounded pretty manageable and would equate to swimming .8 miles, biking 37 miles and running 8.7 miles per week.  You are allowed to substitute the elliptical for running, which is what I will probably end up doing for most of the challenge.  So nothing too crazy workout-wise, but enough to ease me back into training which starts in January (yipes!).

So the goal for the rest of this month/December is to get back into the routine of working out almost every day and to lose a few pounds that I’ve put on since Redman and lose just a few more to get closer to my planned race weight.  You’d think someone would lose a lot of weight while training for Ironman but from what I’ve read and heard from other club members is that unless you are really careful with your diet, that usually isn’t the case (especially women)!  It’s going to be a challenge considering right now we’re in the middle of the holidays, which means tempting food is always around (especially cookies, which are my weakness), but I’m hoping to stay strong!

I did provide myself an incentive… a really huge one if I stick with it…. a triathlon bike!  I’ve been going back and forth between getting aero bars and a more aggressive fit for my road bike or just getting a triathlon bike instead, and have finally decided to go the triathlon bike route.  I got fitted this weekend and know which one I want (and it is soooo pretty), but will wait to order it until after xmas when I’ve hopefully met my fitness/health goal!

Back to work!