Saying Goodbye to Fast Food

"The time has come", the Sarah said, 

"To talk of many things: 

Of fries--and pies--and Happy Meals

Of Frosty's and Burger Kings..."

As I've been going through my pre-marathon training (yes, there is such a thing), I've been giving a lot of thought as to the kind of diet I'll need to follow to maximize my marathon training success and avoid dying.  I've been doing a lot of research about fitness nutrition, and running nutrition in particular, to devise some sort of eating plan.

Needless to say, I'd rather be the win penguin. 

I already have a fairly healthy diet, eating lots of vegetables and fruit, wholesome carbs, lean protein, low fat dairy - and I usually cook at home.  So I'm not looking at a drastic lifestyle or health change, just some tweaking that will help my athletic performance.  

I was sort of joking (but not really) when I said one of the reasons I signed up for the marathon was to eat more pasta.  Long distance runners should be eating a diet high in carbohydrates (anywhere from 50-70%!!!!!!!!) to keep stores of glycogen up.  This, I am excited about... VERY excited about... Because I love me some carbs.  But I have a feeling that when they say carbo loading, they mean whole wheat penne or steel cut oatmeal, not the 47 grams of carbs you're gonna get from a McDonald's Big Mac.  

This idea, along with general common sense about nutrition is leading me to *another* challenge and journey to embark on... A life without fast food.  Now, I don't even frequent fast food "restaurants" too often... definitely less than once a week.  But I'm going to follow the adage of "If you put junk in your body, you'll get junk out" and I simply can't afford that.  So for at least the 4 months that I'll be in training, I'm going to avoid the stuff.  THE ONLY EXCEPTION TO THIS RULE: McDonald's coffee. Because I'm pretty sure they put crack in it so that I'm hopelessly addicted, and it's one of the only easy and convenient coffee stops in Kirksville. (Plus a large coffee at our Mickey D's is only 1 dolla... ballinnnn)

A big reason why I'm writing a post about this is for accountability.  Usually, if you announce that you're going to do something, then you're going to follow through with it.  I'm not really sure how hard this will be at all... I don't think I'm addicted to fast food by any means, but *sigh*... Cheesy fiesta potatoes...

I'll let you know how it goes.....