Preppy Runner – Theodora Blanchfield

If you’ve been reading my blog the past few months, you know that I’ve been struggling to get my act in gear since starting my new job. You’re probably sick of reading about it, and I was getting sick of writing about it, too, but I try to write about the struggles in maintaining my weight and healthy habits as well as when it all comes together.

Well, it feels like it’s all coming back together, again, and thank god.

It turns out that all I needed was some new goals–and not goals that I arbitrarily picked and tried to convince myself that I wanted, but goals I wanted so badly I’d do anything in my power to achieve them.

Right now, my big goals are to be happier with how I look in a bathing suit by the end of the month and to not die at Reach the Beach. While I’m incredibly excited, I’m also incredibly nervous. Strangely enough, in my long and illustrious three-year history of running, I’ve never run three different legs adding up to almost 20 miles over the course of 24 hours. While sleeping in a van.

And as far as looking good in a bathing suit, well, I’ve just been kind of unhappy with how mushy I feel my core has gotten.

So with those two goals, over the past few weeks, I’ve found myself stepping my game back up without it feeling as difficult as it had been even a month ago.

Skipping (some) happy hours and wine before Junior League meetings. Skipping the glass of wine at home after work. I’m the first to admit I love unwinding with a glass of wine or a beer, but it’s not doing any favors for my waistline.

Cooking more for myself because even seemingly healthy food out has sneakily unhealthy ingredients.

Tonight’s dinner: Brussels sprouts with a little maple syrup and a turkey burger. (The Brussels sprouts were made from a bag of frozen Brussels sprouts and booked in a pan with some water before putting the syrup in; nowhere near as good as roasted ones.)

Last night’s: a makeshift egg and spinach wrap, but with mozzarella instead of feta. Meh. Not bad, but Starbucks still does it better.

I’ve also realized that I’m terrible at motivating myself for strength training on my own unless there’s a consequence more than flabby abs, so I signed up for Jaz’s boot camp for the month of May. It’s close to me, I love Jaz and her energy, and I know that it will help me become a stronger runner as well as tone up.

I did her Tabata class this morning, which included lots of burpees, running up and down the stairs, one-legged push-ups and plyo jumps, and then chased it with a 4-mile run that I was supposed to do yesterday but was too tired to do last night, so I doubled up this morning. It’s a good thing it was supposed to be an easy run, because my pace was certainly much slower than usual, because my legs were shot.

I’ve already lost two pounds, and Jaz told me this morning I looked like I’d lost weight, too since she last saw me in January. (I definitely can’t see a difference myself, but there are worse compliments to start my day with.)

Time to get to sleep so I can continue this trend…

What are the goals you want so badly you can taste right now?