After all that pushing a little bit more last week, I woke up with a sore knee on Friday. I could tell it was 100% because of a tight calf that I forgot to foam roll. I skipped my Friday run and then headed to CT with a bunch of friends. Saturday morning at 8:25am I was still snuggled all warm in bed when Jennie came in, already dressed saying “we’re going running.” I think my response was “Now?!?!”. But without thinking about it, I got right up, put on layer upon layer and met the runners at the front door. Andy took a selfie of us. But maybe that thing should never see the light of day. It was damn cold. But pretty.

Really pretty. And then the long run was done for the weekend and I could gorge myself on friends, babies, beer, and excellent meals. My favorite things.

Then I came home and shopped and cooked for 3 hours to start the Whole30 on Tuesday. I won’t go into the whole thing, and I don’t really want to turn this into a Whole30 blog except how it pertains to fitness and running. But I’ll get into a little bit. There were a lot of factors leading me to try this and one of them was better running. The other was co-workers doing it at the same time. And overall just a fresh approach to eating after the sugar fueled holiday season. I waited to start until after last weekend because I knew the food would be good (I was definitely right).

The Whole30 cuts out diary, grains, legumes (except things in pods like green beans and pea pods), and added sugar. Oh. And no processed stuff. It’s basically what Michael Pollan says “Eat food, not too much, mostly plants”. Something I dreamed about but had yet to have any success at achieving. At least with Whole30 there’s a little guidance.

So far I’ve eaten egg muffins for breakfast (eggs mixed with roasted vegetables and cooked chicken baked in a muffin tin).

I don’t have any actual pictures because I’m always too hungry at breakfast to take a second and snap a pic. Whatevs. MS Paint never dies. Dinner and lunch has been the best chili I’ve ever made (thanks Le Cruset!)

Look at that mess on the stove! That’s how you know it’s good. And last night I made turkey burgers with a tahini sauce

I’m not terribly hungry. A little here and there. Nothing drastic. I will say; it’s been freeing to not be counting calories or Weight Watchers points though it’s a lot more planning and cooking. A lot. And I would knock over an unsuspecting toddler if he was standing between mean and a cupcake right now. But overall? Not too bad. My workout last night, though? Dead legs all around. Dead, I tell you.

I didn’t run Tuesday because I tweaked the same knee that was bothering me on Friday and I wanted to give it a nice good long rest. It worked and yesterday it was back to normal. I took that happy knee and climbed onto the stationary bike. The same bike as last Wednesday. The same workout as last Wednesday. And yet? So so so hard. I’m told it will get better. After a couple of weeks. WEEKS! Oy. Let’s not even talk about power core. I mean, yeah. My v-ups continue to improve. And I’m wracking up 1 minute planks left right and center. But it took my 45 minutes to get through 3 sets of 3 exercises. So much dead.

Still. 2.5 days down. 27.5 to go. Let’s just see what happens.