I hope everyone had a great holiday season and that your 2017 is off to a rousing start complete with an exciting list of “New Year’s resolutions.”

For those dawdlers who have yet to start on your resolutions, worry not. This is really the first full week of 2017… Jan. 1 falling on a Sunday and the “official” holiday being on a Monday kinda made the whole week feel a tad wonky. So pick this week as your starting point.

As for me, my Los Angeles marathon training got a resolution-sized kick in the pants this past week courtesy of my running coach. We’re just past the halfway point in our 5-month training prep and James informed myself and the rest of the T2 gang that we are now entering “Phase 2.”

This is not to be confused with the aborted Star Trek TV series (Click here to learn more).

Nor is it related to South Park’s underpants gnomes and their grand plan to turn undies into loads of cash (kudos if you know the reference).

Phase 1: Collect Underpants!

Phase 2 is basically James’ polite way of saying things are about to get serious. Our long runs are getting even longer (we did 18 miles on Saturday… in the rain I might add), which is to be expected as race day is now less than three months away.

More apparent though, my weekly maintenance runs are getting significantly:

1. Longer
2. Paced faster
3. And with fewer walk breaks

That’s a trifecta of ouch.

James has told me from day one that his strategy has been to kick me outside my comfort zone in order to make me faster and increase my endurance. And now with Phase 2 he’s kicking it into high gear and kicking my ass along with it.

The results so far this season have been quite promising. I’ve cut my number of walk breaks in half and yet my race times this past fall were still noticeably faster than the same races in 2015.

So far so good.

Over the next two and a half months I’ll be getting up earlier during the week to accommodate my longer maintenance runs, coupled with more cross-training and also improving my diet (another 2017 resolution)… all in the hopes of PR’ing come marathon day on March 19th.

So whatever your resolution or goals are for the new year, be sure to find your own Phase 2 and push yourself harder than you thought possible. It might be challenging at first, but I think you’ll be pleased with your results.

After all, it worked for the underpants gnomes.

Live long and prosper… and Run on!