Well hello there!  Remember me?!  It would be no surprise if you didn’t, seeing as it’s been months since I last posted.

Basically the rest of 2017 has not been worth blogging!  It’s all been about recovery and making sure my foot and blood were better in order that I can start 2018 off with a bang. I can’t believe how long it’s taken.  The good news is that all my clots have been reabsorbed into my body (uh bye-bye) and in record time – plus the doctors have decided that they were precipitated by the immobilisation of my leg which is great because it means that they shouldn’t recur as long as I don’t break my leg again.  So I’m off the meds and back in normal life wooooooooh!  Slightly less good news is that my foot is still not perfect, but it’s damn near and so that’s good enough for me – 2018 is the year of the fitness.

I’m sitting here cozied up on the sofa on 30 December planning out my new year, thinking about what I really want from 2018.  I normally hate saying goodbye to the old year, but frankly 2017 can buh-bye right on outta here and I am soooooo excited for 2018 which is 100% all about dat health and fitness life.   I have to say I’m not exactly feeling like a paragon of health and fitness right now!  I have definitely found all the weight I lost when I was on crutches, which is fine and to be expected seeing as my work-outs have been all focused on rehab rather than actual training.  However, it’d be nice to be back to where I was, so my focus from 1 January onwards is on regaining fitness and health.  I have a plan and goals and I’m ready to rumble!!

Races and Events

I am super-excited to say that I’m signed up to Race to the Stones again this year – a nice 100km ultra which goes from the Chilterns to Avebury.  It’s got amazing reviews and I’m super excited for it, since the route looks beautiful.  I was signed up last year as an interim training race but this year it’s going to be my main focus for now and then I’ll see how I’m going after that.  I would loooove to do the Wadi Rum Ultra in October but I’m going to wait and see how RttS goes and then go from there.  I’m going to do RttS over two days with 50km each day (same as I would have done last year) and my lovely friend Susan is going to come and do it too so I’ll have a buddy to play with in training and in the event yay!

So that’s my main race, but I’ve also got a bunch of other fun stuff just for giggles.  Susan and I are also signed up to this swim/run event in June – how fun does this look?! It’s basically a teeny tiny version of the Ötillö in Sweden (which is for mad people) – 10km alternating between swimming and running.  It’s in Bedford, which probably isn’t quite as picturesque as Sweden, but it’s a lot more convenient.  And we only have to go 10km instead of 80km so it seems like a better option right?!

Then I am yet again signed up for the Westminster Mile – I absolutely love this race.  It’s my favourite of all, partly because the run time: goody bag ratio is phenomenal.  Less than seven minutes running for an excellent good bag and a quality medal is ideal.  I’ve done it every year since the inaugural race in 2013 (it’s an Olympic legacy event) and it’s probably the best organised and most fun race I’ve ever done – lovely officials, a great atmosphere and good fun.  I’d definitely recommend it!

So onto the training plan …

Training

I haven’t really been able to do any weights work because it’s put too much strain through my foot, but I did my first squats workout in six months this week and I’ve had no flare up so I am BACK IN THE GAME!  Although having said that, my foot might not have flared up but, despite the super-light weights I used, my muscles were horrified about being asked to do anything resembling work and the resulting penguin walk for the next two days was epic pahaha.  Oh well.  Never mind eh.  Penguins are cute right?!  And next week it’ll be loads easier.  So from next week I’m going to be putting my weights workouts back in yasssss queeeeennn.  I won’t be able to run full time again just yet, so the cross-trainer’s got to keep playing a part in my training, but that’s cool – I don’t mind at all as long as I’m keeping my run fitness up and it’s been amazing for that so far.  I’ve got to get back into yoga too but luckily my gym has an excellent yoga programme which is handy – and it has proper yin yoga which means I can stretch and recover properly.

So therefore this is what I’m aiming for per week:

• Resistance/strength work: 5 sessions a week, to include weights work and circuits
• Cardio:  6 sessions a week, to include runs, cross-trainer sessions and swims
• Stretch 2 sessions a week, to include yoga and ull-body stretch sessions

It sounds like loads but it’s less than I was doing pre-broken foot so I think it’s going to work out just fine!  I’m really excited and motivated now that I’ve started this week (in pain, but excited and motivated ha).

Food and General Health

I’ve been paleo on and off for years now but I’ve been pretty committed to it lately by default – I’ve been eating my ten portions of fruit and vegetables a day and trust me, there’s not that much room for empty grains after that!  I don’t, however, eat paleo when I’m out for two reasons:  first, I don’t think it’s a good idea entirely to cut out gluten or dairy as I think it leads to intolerances; and secondly, who wants to be that person whose diet everyone has to work around on social occasions?!  That means I’m about 80/20 paleo, but I want to try and cut out the little loopholes I’ve been falling into lately, specifically, dark chocolate/raw vegan chocolate.  It’s just soooo goooooodddd!!!!

I do also watch my macros as well as eating paleo, but only to make sure that I don’t overdo the sweet stuff, and from doing that it’s pretty obvious to me that that’s my major achilles heel.  Soooo … I’m going to focus on cutting out the chocolate habit going forward.  Deep sigh.  But it’s got to be done!  It’s all about the health and wellness and what I’m putting into my body is key.

Fun Stuff

All this being good is obviously real good and all (and don’t get me wrong, I’m genuinely excited about it) but there has to be super-fun stuff to look forward to too right?!  Enter … THE HOLIDAYS!!!!!  Susan and I are off to Club La Santa at the end of January for a week-long swim camp and general fitness holiday which I am SUPER PUMPED ABOUT – I actually totally crashed her holiday; she’s done it before and as soon as I heard she was going back I was like ME TOO ME TOO.  I actually can’t stand swimming but I am keen for a new challenge, plus we’ve got the Mustard swim/run coming up and I want focus on something that will take the pressure away from my foot.

Then in March is something I’m even more excited about, albeit I literally came up with the plan at midnight last night (but now I’m super-invested).  Cape Verde in March anyone?!

(Totally nicked that picture from Google, obvs).  As I had to go out into the sleet and wind and sub-zero temperatures last night I got the worst beach cravings.  So I googled “Cheap hot beach March” and Cape Verde popped up.  A minimum of research and I’m doing it!  I’m thinking:

• sea swim before breakfast
• long run/hike in the mornings
• surfing/watersports in the afternoons

What is not to like about that?!  I’m going for two weeks too.  Because I can!  I can’t actually surf yet so I reckon two weeks and I’ll basically be Kelly Slater.  That’s how it works right?

Laters gators

So that’s the basic update and plan.  I’m going to be way better about blogging too as soon as I have something interesting to blog – which hopefully will be weekly.  Keep me posted about your plans for 2018 toooooo! It’s nice to be back.