My winter training and weight loss program 2013

When my cycling season ended last year I had all these good ambitions about taking just one month off then resuming a healthy diet and exercising enough to keep myself ticking over ahead of the new year when I would only need to top up my fitness to where it ought to be before pushing on. But what is it they say about the best laid plans of mice and men?

It never happened. I visited the gym a few times in mid-November, got out on the bike once or twice and I got a few spins in when I was back in Northern Ireland over Christmas, but more often than not I didn't do much and ate plenty. I guess you have to indulge sometimes, but better to indulge when you're still training than when you're sitting in front of the television.

Anyway, I came out of last years cycling season weighing about 198 pounds. I had gone as low as 192 in mid-July, but never maintained that. This year, I aim to go further in an attempt to enjoy the mountain bike season even more so I don't suffer quite as much as I might otherwise if I spent the winter doing what I'd prefer to be spending the winter doing: Nothing.

With Christmas now behind I knew I had no more excuses about not getting back to getting fit again. I put together a gym training program for myself and weighed in to see where I was at. The weight was 205 lbs ... not great, but still seven pounds lighter than I had been the year before. My target was 182 lbs and I had given myself twelve weeks to hit it. Two pounds per week? Doable, surely. Well, worth a go anyway.

I penciled in Monday, January 14 as the day I'd hit the gym again though a few things came up early that week and I never did get going. I moved the date to Monday, January 21 and threw away any acceptance for excuses.

My plan is plenty of interval efforts that really get the body working on the fat and to cut back on junk food, booze (actually, I have drank but once since New Years Eve), and to limit my daily calorie intake. The following are five rules I'm trying to adhere to over the next twelve weeks from January 21 to April 14.

-- No beer. Or at least limiting myself to five days of drinking for the twelve weeks.

-- No refined sugars. That means chocolate bars etc. and anyone who knows me knows this might be the hardest task of all. I know I'll slip up occasionally but so long as I limit myself, I'll be happy. Last year I successfully gave these up for the forty days of lend and I'll be doing that one again at the very least.

-- A limit of 1,600 calories intake per day. Aside from the sugars and beer, I don't care so much what I eat, so long as it isn't going beyond this mark.

-- Six days of exercise per week. Rest days are penciled in for Friday though if and when something comes up that means I can't go to the gym, I'll switch that days activity to what would have been the rest day. I'm aware though that there will be times I can't go to the gym several days per week due to more commitments from the real world , and I'll just have to live with that.

-- Seven pints of water per day. An easy task but an important one. They say plenty of water intake not only helps hydrate for exercise but aids in weight loss.

-- Minimum of seven hours sleep per night. Harder than you'd think. I'm up most mornings at 5.30am and the TV at night is always good. Getting to sleep for 10.30am won't always be easy, but I'll try!

Over the next twelve weeks I'll be keeping a diary on my progress, with daily reports on what I'm doing at the gym -- or out on the bike when the weather allows for it -- and a weight-loss chart on the sidebar to the right that I'll update every couple of days, though no longer than each week, to see how things go.

Wish me luck.