A new year is upon us, and with it a return to our monthly challenges at Tiny Fitness! This challenge is open to all Tiny Fitness clients (folks who have purchased or do purchase a 10 class pass or a personal training package between December 15 and January 15).
Our goal this month: to reduce the amount of refined sugar that we are consuming! Refined sugar is inflammatory and weakens your immune system. It can also lead to an increased risk for type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and being overweight. Need I say more?
To participate in the challenge, complete the 3 tasks described below. Participants who complete all 3 tasks on schedule, track their food accurately for all 27 days of the challenge in MyFitnessPal, and have TinyFitnessES (that’s me!) as their friend who can see their diary on MFP will be entered in a drawing for 2 free personal training sessions, free zumba fitness classes, and more cool prizes. (I will be verifying your challenge participation via MFP, so the daily tracking step isn’t optional 🙂 )
Week 1 (January 5-10): Don’t be a sucker for sucrose
This first week, your task is to stop adding sugar to what you eat. If you normally add sugar to your coffee, tea, or oatmeal, try adding stevia or cinnamon to enjoy some natural sweetness! If you’re cooking, replace at least half of the sugar in your recipes with stevia (or just omit it altogether).
Week 2 (January 11-17): Sugar sleuthing
This week,you will need to take a good hard look at the ingredients in your groceries. Where does sugar fall in the ingredient list? Check your bread, yogurt, cereal, and other grocery items for any of the following ingredients; if it’s within the first 5 on the list, find an alternative product that has less sugar! Here are some of the alternative names that sugar might go by on your labels: barley malt, cane-juice crystals, caramel, corn syrup, dextrose, fructose, fruit juice concentrate, honey, molasses, sucrose, and turbinado…just to name a few.
Weeks 3 and 4 (January 18 – 31): Skip the sweets
Can you give up your sweet treats for two weeks? You know the ones – pastries, ice cream, sweetened yogurt, jam on your toast…can you replace them with fruit and whole grains for just 14 days? I bet you can! For bonus points, skip any juice that isn’t freshly squeezed (or better yet, drink a smoothie that contains the whole fruit!).
That’s it! A pretty simple task that could win you $130 worth of personal training! Make sure I know you’re participating if you choose to join in so that I can verify that our MFP accounts are linked. Happy un-sweetening!
