AUGUSTA — At a time of year when many are making resolutions to lose weight, Gov. Paul LePage may be an inspiration.

The once somewhat-pudgy governor, who often expresses frustration at his inability to slice more fat from government, has somehow found the trick to trimming down at least himself.

Though LePage won’t talk to the media about his weight loss, it’s become pretty noticeable.

“He looks fantastic,” said House Speaker Sara Gideon, a Freeport Democrat whose party generally doesn’t have much use for the two-term Republican governor.

In public, though, LePage barely acknowledges his slimmer self.

“People say I lost a lot of weight,” the governor said on the air recently, not quite confirming that it was even true.

But touching on his diet to a supporter in an Auburn hotel hallway before the election, LePage mentioned he’d lost more than 30 pounds and felt pretty good about it.

How he pulled it off remains a mystery, except that part of it is obviously more restraint at the table.

During Donald Trump Jr.’s campaign foray to Simones’ Hot Dog Stand in October, LePage joined the president-elect’s eldest son at the Lewiston eatery where the governor’s been going for more than 60 years.

While Trump gobbled down a hot dog — giving it a thumbs-up — LePage skipped the meal. He said he was determined to keep to his diet.

So there’s one concrete clue to LePage’s secret: No hot dogs.

During a recent radio interview, the governor discussed the difficulties he’s facing with the upcoming budget. Worrying about it, LePage said, has the weight “melting right off of me.”

Fretting about the impact of state spending plans might contribute to the loss of a few pounds, but it’s pretty clear the governor’s doing more than just wringing his hands.

Gideon said something during a radio interview last week that might offer more insight.

She said she was going to give LePage a pair of New Balance running sneakers for Christmas and “invite him to work out with me” and go out for a run or a walk where they could talk about the issues.

Maybe LePage is on the move more than people realize, pounding the pavement to shed the pounds. Then again, he said Thursday he didn’t know how he could accept her gift, given their political differences.

Mainers as a whole could stand to lose weight.

Nearly a third of them are obese, according to The State of Obesity: Better Policies for a Healthier America, a report released in September. That places the state almost exactly in the middle of the pack, between health-conscious Colorado and bottom-dwelling Louisiana, where temptation at the table is beyond reckoning.

The Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention, which LePage ultimately oversees, urges Mainers to eat healthy and keep moving. It said doing both will reduce the chance someone will develop such chronic conditions as diabetes, cancer or cardiovascular disease.

So there’s not much argument that a thinned-down LePage is likely healthier.

The Mayo Clinic advises that losing weight comes down to a pretty simple equation: “burning more calories than you take in.”

That means either eating and drinking less or burning more calories through physical activity.

The bottom line, according to the Minnesota-based hospital: “The key to successful weight loss is a commitment to making changes in your diet and exercise habits.”

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