Do Fruitbars Count As Fruit?

So... I have been thinking about my eating habits lately and decided it was time for an intervention. Even since I started training (January), I have been eating and eating, and when not eating, been hungry... I guess going from 4 hours to 10-14 hours of exercise does that to a person. Before starting, I was at a scrawny-yet-flabby 62 kg, and I ate pretty badly but not too bad (think loads of carbs, little protein, and very little fresh fruit and veggies, but also very little processed food).

After I started training, I started eating a lot more, yet instead of adding healthy foods to my diet, I just kept on doing the carb thing. I initially put on about 3.5 kg (well, actually, I put on 2 kg over Christmas break when I went home to visit the folks and failed to lose those, before putting on another 1.5 kg when I started training) and have remained pretty stable at 65 to 66 kg since. So nothing dramatic weight wise, most of the extra weight is muscle (but the initial flab remains) and I still have good energy levels. However, I just can't imagine that eating so little protein, and so few fruits and veggies is good for me. And how will I feel if my food intake was a bit more nutritious?

So... cue challenge #1. My goal for this week is to
1) eat 5 servings of fruit and veggies every day (I usually manage 2 oranges a day and that's it)
2) at most 2 of those servings will be the same thing (aka no 5 oranges in one day)
3) eat one serving of protein at each meal
4) lay off the carby snacks unless I am hungry for them.

So how did I do on day #1 of challenge #1... No too shabby. Breakfast was 1 orange, 1 glass of milk, and one croissant with nutella, lunch was a huge avocado, egg, and romaine salad with 2 slices of whole wheat bread (1 with cheese, 1 with chocolate sprinkles), dinner was pasta with tomato sauce and a huge bag of cookies. When I got home I had two oranges and a fruit bar (can you spot it behind the oranges?). So, even though I only succeeded in part 1) of the challenge, I consider this good progress, but now I need to crank it up a notch...

Do fruit bars count as fruit?

Speaking of cranks, I took my awesome bike for a spin today. 55 miles of hills, hills and more hills that I tried to fly over. I went out really hard and kept the hard effort for the entire 55 miles. 3:40 minutes and 1,800 calories later I got home, drenched in sweat, but ecstatic that my bike skills are improving so dramatically, so Wiesbaden 70.3 sounds a bit less scary.... The weather was also just awesome, doesn't hurt right?

How Geeky can I Look?

At least the glasses were hiding this...

This afternoon I went for a short swim, and then spent the evening battling a statistics software for my dissertation data analysis... Hubby is out of town, so I can work late... Heck, I am supposed to work late.

I hope y'all are having fun!!!