Something I’ve noticed since I started my journey to a better body 4 years ago is that everyone has an opinion about what you do.  I get comments at work telling me I’m weird for lifting heavy weights and that my dietary habits are “disgusting”. Most of the time I laugh it off. I actually enjoy being different to everyone else. I love that there are not many females in my circle that do what I do. I like being the only girl in the gym that lifts heavy. I like the fact that I can enjoy double cream, cheese & butter on a daily basis and still lose weight whilst others around me are eating weight watchers crap and not seeing results.

But as the saying goes – opinions are like arseholes. Everybody has one.

Yesterday, I posted a picture to my facebook page where I compared a picture of me from 2010 to a picture of me taken a couple of weeks ago.

It was taken to demonstrate the progress I’ve made in the last three years and to serve as a reminder that building muscle is hard work. It takes time and dedication and isn’t going to happen overnight, in 6 weeks or even 6 months.  I’m three years into my muscle building journey and I’m not where I want to be yet.

Later on in the day, I had the following comment on my photo:

“Oh I don’t like Ladies with Muscles – toned yes.”

I can’t lie, the comment actually made me really happy.  Someone thinks I have muscles – hurrah! *does a happy dance*

But at the same time, it also pissed me off. Royally.  Not because someone thinks “ewwwww, muscles on a woman – icky!” but because why would anyone think I give a damn about what they think about how I look?

Now listen carefully, because I want to make this crystal clear…

I don’t lift weights to make myself aesthetically pleasing for you

I can never understand why anyone would think they have the right to comment on the way other people look. I know I put myself out there and post these pictures and maybe it’s naive to not expect the occasional negative comment, but I actually wonder what goes through these people’s heads when they take to their keyboard to express their opinion to someone that never actually asked for it.

To anyone that feels the need to direct negative comments towards me or my pictures, I would like to say this to you:

I choose not to accept your negativity.  Therefore, it still belongs to you.

I do what I do because it’s part of me. It’s who I am.  I like the fact that my body is firm yet curvaceous.  I love the fact that I look awesome in clothes…

and awesome out of clothes too ;)

I love the fact that I am strong. Not just “strong for a chick” but STRONG. I know I can walk into the gym at any time of the day or night and pick at least 100kg from the ground.  How many other people can say they could do that?

So I’ll stick to what I’m doing, thanks.  Next time you think of voicing your opinion about my nasty muscles, remember…

Your approval is not needed!

©2013 JAG's Fitness Blog. All Rights Reserved.

Hola fierce friends, hope your week has been a good one – thank goodness it’s Friday!

It’s been a great week for me, training and diet has been spot on and at the start of the week, we had some stunning weather – warm enough for me to sit outside in the sunshine at lunch on two days. The temperature has dropped now but it’s still great to walk to work with the sun shining…

No matter what mood I wake up in or how bad a day I’ve had in work, walking through the marina always puts the biggest smile on my face. I absolutely adore my location here in Swansea, it’s such a beautiful place to live <3

Weigh in day yesterday and though I’m not too fussed about what number is on the scale, I’m actively trying to lose fat at the moment so keeping track is useful.  I’ve been weighing daily for months now and it’s interesting to see the daily fluctuations, such as the day after leg day or the morning after a big carb feed.  I only record my weight once a week though and I was pleased to see a 1lb loss yesterday.  That is a total of 7lb in the last 40 days whilst eating at only a moderate deficit – around 1900 on training days, 2200 on rest days.  I’m still eating high fat but since I have added in soaked white rice on training days, my carbs are slightly higher now – 100-130g on training days, 20-70g on rest days.  Over the course of a week, they look like this…

I’ve eaten some epic meals this week to contribute to those macros but the absolute best meal has to be the one I ate last weekend whilst visiting my beautiful mum. She took us all out for lunch and I ended up eating a 20oz megasaurus steak!

My plate was pretty much cleared…

I made sure to leave enough room for dessert too :-D

Thank you mum for a delicious meal, you’re amazing!

The epic meals have definitely fuelled some awesome workouts this week. I’m hitting 102.5kg for reps on deadlifts again – woohoo!  I’m starting to see some real definition in my upper body now…

Shame the second picture is so blurry as I think my arm and shoulder is looking great!

With my new found confidence due to leaning out, I also wore my old Nike running tights to the gym yesterday. Never before have I or would I have worn them to the gym as they show up every lump and bump but I think my lower half looks pretty strong and solid…

The next confidence test will be to train lower body in them – eek!

I’ll be spending my weekend mostly relaxing, reading, taking a walk along the beach and hitting the gym for squats and deadlifts.

What plans do you have?

©2013 JAG's Fitness Blog. All Rights Reserved.

I received a request via my facebook page today, asking if I would consider writing a blog post about my gym essentials – workout clothes, which shoes I wear, what my thoughts were on gloves, etc.

I thought this was a great idea for a post as when I first started going to the gym, I remember feeling so nervous about what I should or shouldn’t wear, would people think I was a weirdo for carrying a notebook, should I wear sleeves or no sleeves?

So here is my essential gym kit.

First things first, you need something to carry it all in.  Now as I walk to the gym most of the time (which is around 25 minutes each way) I need something practical.  I’ve tried many different bags, some sporty, some stylish but I always come back to the same kind – a rucksack.  When walking with a lot of gym kit, it’s important to distribute the weight evenly throughout the body so that you aren’t putting undue stress on one shoulder/arm.  Therefore, a rucksack is the perfect gym bag.

My favourite gym clothes are fitted but flexible.  I don’t spend money on specialist exercise clothes as I don’t feel the need. Back when I was running, I obviously invested in proper running shoes, breathable clothing that drew the sweat away from the body and compression socks.  However, as my exercise regime consists of just weight lifting and the occasional hill walk on the treadmill, I don’t need to make such an investment.

I have 4 pairs of gym trousers, 3 of which are identical.  They all came from TU clothing at Sainsbury and they are the only gym trousers I will consider buying now.  They are fantastic value for money, fit amazingly well, are comfortable and look really good.  The fabric is also quite thick, which is essential when in the gym as the last thing you want is guys visualising your butt crack as you squat! I always opt for bootcut trousers with a long leg…

For the top half, I absolutely LOVE halter tops. The single most important reason for this is because the bar sits better against my skin for squats rather than against the fabric of a t-shirt.  Not only do they seem to contain “the twins” well, they also make my upper body look hawt!  As my exercise regime includes no impact (and therefore no bouncing!) I don’t feel the need to wear a sports bra.  I’ve found a well supported halter bikini top, along with the hidden support in the halter top itself, is plenty enough to hold the girls in place.

Though not essential in the slightest, I love to wear a cute pair of character socks in the gym. Most of the time, nobody can even see them but when my trousers ride up when I’m on the leg press, they make me smile :D

The most important piece of gym wear is my shoes.  The wrong shoes can create real problems for you in the gym, especially if you squat and deadlift.  Foot wear is not so important on upper body days and as I often do some high incline walking after training upper body, I tend to wear my Nike Lunarglide running shoes (you can see them in the picture above) as they support my feet well.  However, on lower body training days, I couldn’t do it without my favourite workout shoes…

My Converse! When performing squats and deadlifts, it’s important to have a firm, sturdy footing which regular trainers or running shoes do not give. They have too much cushioning and support in the heel, which doesn’t allow a stable enough base when you have a lot of weight on your back.  Though I’ve never tried proper weight lifting shoes (these tend to have a raised heel), I wouldn’t be averse to doing so.  At the moment though, my Chuck Taylors do the job just fine.

As I take a selection of things into the gym with me, I like to carry a smaller, drawstring bag just to keep everything together.  Mine was a freebie from a previous race for life event and it’s perfect to carry around the gym…

Inside, I keep my other gym essentials. My old mobile phone (which has a wicked camera) for training pictures and videos.  I also chuck my locker key in here.  It also holds my holy grail – my gym notebook…

A notebook is such an important thing to have with you in the gym.  I write out my program before I hit the gym and the weights/reps I hope to achieve.  Sometimes, depending on how strong (or weak!) I feel, I might make an adjustment.  Once I’ve finished each exercise, I will add a (+) or (=) sign at the side to indicate whether the weight should increase or stay the same next time.

I also carry my liquid chalk…

Without my chalk, I couldn’t manage to do my deadlifts or chins.  In the past, I have experimented with gym gloves but in all honesty, I don’t feel they serve any benefit whatsoever.  They add unnecessary width to the bar, actually making it more difficult to grip and they don’t completely prevent callouses.  Chalk will give you amazing grip without adding that extra width to the bar.  Yes, you may get callouses but I embrace mine, they make me feel badass.  However, if you really don’t like or want them, then you should maybe think about working on your grip…

I don’t use lifting straps and I don’t use a lifting belt as, at this moment in time, I don’t feel the need to.  With straps, I prefer to work on my grip strength as I don’t want my grip to be the limiting factor in my lifts.  I don’t use a belt as I don’t think I’m lifting heavily enough to need one yet.  I’m sure the time will come when I do but right now, I’m managing fine without.

And that is my essential gym kit.  Share your own “gym essentials” in the comments section :-)

©2013 JAG's Fitness Blog. All Rights Reserved.

To love and be in love is the best feeling in the world. I’m the luckiest girl in the world to be able to share today with the most amazing boyfriend in the world.

Le Passion!

Happy love day everyone! <3

©2013 JAG's Fitness Blog. All Rights Reserved.

It’s a statement I see often, all over the internet, accompanied by pictures of oiled up fitness models with rippling abs and a come hither stare into the camera.  It’s misleading, but people want to believe it.  Raspberry ketones, slimming patches, revolting teas or shakes, slimming pills – they all promise the same thing yet none of them deliver.  Safe to say the only pounds you will lose will be from your purse/wallet.

I’ve been on my better body journey now since 2009.  That’s 4 long years.  I’ve gone from fat to skinny fat back to fat again and finally I’m arriving at fit. The final leg of my journey has been from 2011, when I switched to a much more basic diet (no grains – have since added back in soaked white rice, no legumes, no vegetable or seed oils, limited sugar – planned treats permitted) and commenced intermittent fasting.

These photos represent TWO YEARS of hard work – eating right, training hard and not giving up when things get tough…

THERE ARE NO QUICK FIXES. ONLY HARD WORK, CONSISTENCY AND PERSEVERANCE!

©2013 JAG's Fitness Blog. All Rights Reserved.

Rewind three years ago, to the start of 2010.

I had, through the course of 2009, dropped 50lbs and for the first time in many years, was slim.  I felt like a million dollars. I was loving my exercise, particularly running and body attack and I trained with weights in the gym, though as it was a leisure club, my workout consisted of mostly machines.

Excitedly (and stupidly) I entered into my first ever physique competition which would have taken place in May 2010.  However, just a couple of weeks into my preparation, my binge eating reared its ugly head and I was forced to pull out.  It’s only now I look back over the photos and I am so glad I did.

Here is a picture of me in 2010, at the start of my competition preparation, alongside a picture of me now, in 2013…

I had worked my butt off to get back down to 10 stone/140lbs. Why that magic number? I have no idea. I’m pretty sure the last time I weighed so little was when I was about 16 years old, doing 3 hours of cardio a night and eating like a rabbit.

And it leads me onto thinking why lots of us, men and women, get so hung up on the number on the scale.  It really is only a number and the pictures above prove that just because I might weigh less, doesn’t necessarily mean I will *look better*.

I used to be embarrassed about my weight, forever comparing myself to other women.  But now I really couldn’t care less.  I’m 5ft 8″ and have a naturally curvy, hourglass shape. I’m never going to be a petite, dainty size 8.  Only now I can accept that and actually not give a shit.

I’m tall, I’m strong, I’m curvy, I’m Amazonian. I have muscle mass, I have curves. I can pull 130kg deadlifts. I lift heavy shit for fun. What’s not to love about that?

©2013 JAG's Fitness Blog. All Rights Reserved.

However, last night, I was reading some comments on my facebook page about a picture I posted on Friday and I remembered a picture I had taken 12 months prior.  As it turns out, the pictures were exactly 12 months apart – what a coincidence! I stuck the pictures side by side to compare and, well, you can see – the progress is obvious…

Booty says KAPOW!

Had I not taken pictures, I’d still be convinced that I’d wasted a year of training and made no progress whatsoever!  But as you can see, there has been growth, an improvement in shape, lift – my entire lower body looks better!

So my tip for anyone working to change their physique – take pictures! Even if you don’t like what you see, take them anyway and file them away somewhere so that you have something to compare. You may be pleasantly surprised! I know I was :)

©2013 JAG's Fitness Blog. All Rights Reserved.

…to the new year and all is going extremely well!

It’s been a long time since I felt so motivated in the gym and it’s having a really positive effect on my lifting. My numbers are creeping back up to where they should be which pleases me greatly; I’m almost back to what I was lifting when I was only lifting for sets of 5 reps but am now lifting for sets of 8.

One of my aims this year is to get more video footage of me training in the gym. Not only will this serve to help me improve my form but it will hopefully be helpful to people who read the blog, if only to motivate.  I’m back in the gym tomorrow for lower body so will try and get an up to date squat or deadlift video.

As you know I’ve been following a relatively low carb, high fat diet for the previous 2 years but am currently experimenting with carb cycling to see if it has a positive effect in the gym.  Typically I was only eating a small amount of starch in the form of sweet potatoes on training days and no starch on rest days but since the start of the new year, I’ve been consuming starch every day with considerably more on training days and a modest amount on rest days.

At present, my macro split looks something like this:

Rest day macros

Training day macros

So far so good! I’ll keep you updated with any progress.

Food is still pretty basic – I break the fast at 3pm with a protein shake made with double cream & water.  This is the same every day whether it’s a training day or a rest day. I have a shake for the sake of convenience as I work in a busy outpatients department and our lunch break is at noon.  It’s far too early for me to break my fast and I’m not prepared to change my feeding window so a protein shake packs a good punch – a decent amount of protein and fat.

If it’s a training day, I’m in the gym for about 5.30pm so don’t get to eat until I get home so around 8pm.  Food is normally approximately 300g meat (usually beef), 250g sweet potato (100g or so on rest days)  basted in coconut oil and baked and about 400g veggies (broccoli, cauliflower, sprouts, carrots). Sometimes, if I don’t fancy veg, I add in 3 scrambled eggs cooked in butter and have some sauerkraut on the side.

On rest days, when I get home I will typically eat something small such as a little full fat Greek yoghurt, some brazils and a clementine but on training days this is eaten as dessert after dinner.  I also *love* a glass of Jersey milk in the evening – it’s full fat, unhomogenised and absolutely delicious!

This is just a typical day of eating (as I get asked this question a lot!) but doesn’t include everything I eat.  I also eat other types of meat (lamb, chicken, pork), aged cheddar, different varieties of vegetables, berries when in season, occasional bacon, gluten free black pudding (swoon!), etc.

I’m not going to make any promises about blog post frequency as I find that just puts pressure on me to write something of substance but if anyone out there misses my blog posts, you can also keep in touch with me via facebook, twitter or fitocracy as I post more frequently there…

Facebook

Twitter

Fitocracy

I’ll leave you with a few pictures from the past week or two.

I’m finally managing to master fishtail braids <3

I also mastered the smoky eye look!

And finally, I got to the gym the other week only to find I had forgotten to pack my gym trousers! In desperation, I borrowed a pair of shorts from a male PT but I think I *just* about managed to pull off the look…

Catch you soon folks!

©2013 JAG's Fitness Blog. All Rights Reserved.

There is never a right or wrong time to set personal goals. Unfortunately, most people choose the start of the year to set new goals/resolutions and often aim too high. By the time January is out, the goals are long forgotten.

I set myself several goals last year, mostly fitness related but a couple personal. For more reasons than I care to go into, I didn’t manage to hit those goals. Am I disappointed? Yes! Does it put me off goal setting? No!

However, rather than a long huge list, I have one simple goal that I hope to achieve this year…

CONSISTENCY

2012 was a very up and down year for me, taking two steps forward and one step backwards.  Consistency is what let me down.

I’d spend two months eating well, training hard and loving life.  Then at the drop of a hat, I’d eat foods that I know make me ill (yes gluten grains, I’m talking to you!!), take time off the gym to feel better, have to ease back into training which meant dropping weights,  work back up to where I was only to do it all again a couple of months later.

This is one big reason I didn’t meet my fitness goals of this year and I know, had I been consistent with my training, I’d be sitting on a 150kg deadlift right now.

So, no goals other than consistency in my diet and training.

And to put my plan into order, I had my first training session of 2013 today. Sadly I was training alone as my workout partner and gorgeous boyfriend has a back injury preventing him from training at the moment. Not to be deterred, I was up early, knocked back my pre-workout green tea and cup of espresso and headed for the gym.

Though I lowered my weights from my last session, I probably should have lowered them more than I did – the DOMS kicked in within an hour of getting back from the gym – yikes!

Today’s session was as follows:

20 minute walk to gym
10 minutes foam rolling – quads, piriformis, calves
Various mobility drills for the lower half
Shoulder dislocations
Third world squat stretch x5 minutes

Overhead Squats

20kg x5
20kg x5

Back Squats

20kg x5
30kg x5
40kg x8
40kg x8

Deadlifts

60kg x5
80kg x3
90kg x5
85kg x5

Leg Press

120kg x8
120kg x8

Lying Leg Curl

30kg x8
30kg x8

Standing Calf Raise

130kg x8
130kg x8

Seated Calf Raise

35kg x8
35kg x8

Looking at this workout makes me sad at the backwards progression I’ve made due to my lack of consistency. A few months ago I was pulling 120kg x5 deadlifts :(  I was also squatting considerably more.  But, I am the only person that can correct this and I’m certain I’ll be back to where I was in the coming months.

Do you set goals/resolutions? If so, what are they?

©2013 JAG's Fitness Blog. All Rights Reserved.

At this time of year I would normally be working on a big, long post covering everything that happened in 2012.  However, with the loss of my dad last month, I really don’t have it in me.

Instead, I’ll just leave you with a selection of my favourite pictures from the past year and I’ll be back in 2013 with a lot more blog content.

Happy New Year friends!

Wishing you all the best for 2013 :-)

©2013 JAG's Fitness Blog. All Rights Reserved.