We chat to the star whos wapped reality Tv for fitness fame

We chat to the star who swapped re ali ty tv for fitness fame

It’s been four years since she left The only way is Essex, but Lucy Mecklenburgh has had anything but free time. Now 25, along with running her dress shop Lucy’s Boutique, the entrepreneur has been busy building a fitness empire. Her online fitness platform, Results with Lucy( resultswithlucy.com), continues to provide us with awesome training plans, while her soon-to-be four-year collaboration with Ellesse now culminates in her very own line. What made the starlet swap Essex drama for the fit life? WF finds out.

Unlike other celebs well-known for undergoing a body makeover, Lucy’s transformation was subtle. The now fitness guru has always been into sport. ‘I absolutely loved sports at school,’ she says during our interview at the WF photoshoot, ‘I did a lot of dancing and I was in the netball team.’ But eventually, it wasn’t all just netball meets, and naturally, Lucy started to enjoy her youth outside of sports. ‘As we all do, I discovered a social life, college, my first job,’ she explains, ‘and I just didn’t do anything.’ While for most this might’ve ended up in a larger waistline or tighter jeans, for Lucy – who agrees she probably is, to an extent, naturally slim – time away from the gym manifested itself in cellulite and feeling ‘yuck’. Lucy’s renewed interest in exercise and diet didn’t go unnoticed. Three weeks into regular training sessions with local PT Cecilia (now Lucy’s best friend and business partner at Results With lucy), something had shifted. ‘I literally just fell in love,’ she says. ‘My body changed like that, my mind changed even more. She changed my diet around – I was never eating breakfast before – and I just had so much energy, my skin was glowing and I just woke up happy I guess.’

What were her secrets? The same training she swears by today, Lucy reckons it’s HIIT – like her full-body workout across the next few pages – that holds the key to a fitter, stronger and healthier you. She admits it’s a love/hate relationship. ‘It’s my favourite and least favourite because it’s horrendous but it’s amazing,’ she says. But, for someone as busy as Lucy, its effectiveness is hard to dismiss. ‘I love short bursts of effort as it gets the pain over quickly,’ she says. ‘If I’m busy, I can fit this circuit into my day easily, and I can do it at home or in my hotel if I’m away. There really is no excuse not to do it. What I would say about HIIT is, if you work hard enough you only need to do 15 minutes. I hate doing things like running, I just find it really dull.’

Her faithful following (of which there are now a cool 1.1 million on Instagram) were quick to demand her secrets, too, and so followed Results With lucy back in 2013 – one of the first of its kind in the online training arena. Growing from a humble 30 videos in the beginning, the service now offers seven programmes, 500 videos and 500 recipes. ‘I think the thing to do being in the public eye was the fitness DVD, which don’t get me wrong, is a fantastic kickstart,’ explains Lucy. ‘But for me, it’s about keeping people motivated, making it a lifestyle change, not just a quick January fix’. Did they expect it to be so successful? ‘No, I don’t think we knew what to expect at all

really,’ Lucy laughs. ‘We just thought we’ll do it, and see what happens. People had been asking me for help on social media. They had similar goals to me – not girls that wanted to lose five stone but girls that just felt a bit yuck. They were like “I’ve got cellulite” or “I’m really untoned”, “I feel really unhealthy” or “I don’t know where to start” – same as me. So I was like, how can I bring what I do to everyone? So I just filmed 30 of my favourite HIIT sessions – all different fitness levels – and I put them online and it sort of went from there.’ More recently, Resultswithlucy is addressing the mindset side of fitness, tapping into the disconnect between a happy body and a happy mind. ‘Someone can lose two stone and they can be drinking green juice every morning and feeling better, but they still look in the mirror and they see something else, they still don’t like themselves,’ Lucy says. ‘I think it’s then working on confidence, self-confidence, and mindset.’ What does it feel like to own such a worthwhile business empire? ‘It is the most rewarding thing in the world,’ she gushes.

Another firm cornerstone of Resultswithlucy is nutrition, with Lucy promoting a lifestyle that is as much about eating well as it is about exercising. ‘Most things can be cured through food,’ she says. ‘My friends moan to me about bad skin or not feeling great and I’m like well what are you eating? I think that’s where you’ve got to start and I think that people forget how important food is. Healthy food is so accessible now and there are so many amazing cookbooks for healthy food that it doesn’t have to be boring.’ What does her own diet look like? ‘Really, really balanced. I indulge at the weekends, but in the week I’m pretty good.’ Perhaps that’s what resonates the most about Lucy – she’s refreshingly normal. When she says indulge, she means a full, cheesy, garlic bread; a big bowl of pasta and a tiramisu (Lucy’s love of Italian food is no secret), not a cube of chocolate, like some celebs would claim. Of course, her week is typically healthy. ‘Most mornings it’s usually eggs with smoked salmon on rye, for lunch either a juice or a salad and then in the evening I like Thai green curry with quinoa,’ she says. But, like the rest of us, her weekends are still punctuated by drinks with friends and meals out. ‘I’m quite strict in the week, but then at the weekend I’ll relax a bit. Like tonight I’m going out with my friends so I’ll probably have a few glasses of wine and I’ll probably have some chips on the side [with dinner]. You’ve got to keep yourself sane!’.

These days, Lucy continues to train regularly. Her week is made up of two one-hour HIIT sessions (interval training with 45 seconds on, 20 seconds off using a mixture of weights and plyometrics), usually started with or finished off with skipping, a Pilates class and a barre class. ‘I like the way you feel after a workout, it just makes you feel good and puts you in a positive frame of mind for the day,’ she says. She also likes to keep things fresh. ‘I try out different things all the time,’ she explains. ‘I do a lot with the resistance band at the moment, it’s amazing and the cheapest piece of equipment you can buy!’ As for barre – another recent addition to Lucy’s fitness routine – it’s feeling the burn that has her hooked. ‘It’s the only thing you can genuinely feel,’ she says. ‘I tried it for the first time in Miami a few years ago and I was shaking so uncontrollably, the teacher was like “are you alright?” and I was like “I swear I’m fit really!”’

With such an enviable figure and relatable outlook, it’s not hard to see why Lucy Mecklenburgh is the #Womencrushwednesday for so many girls – she’s certainly ours this month! Want to work out like the star? Try her full-body HIIT workout.

I love short bursts of effort as it gets the pain over quickly. If I’m busy, I can fit this circuit into my day easily, and I can do it at home or in my hotel. There really is no excuse not to do it