- Antonia Hoyle made it back into her normal clothes in 12 months
- She used HIIT – high-intensity interval training to get fit again
By
Antonia Hoyle
17:00 EST, 4 January 2014
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17:58 EST, 4 January 2014
Before I had my two children I ate healthily and made every effort to keep in shape: I went to the gym five times a week; I did Body Pump classes before breakfast and spinning sessions after work.
Saturday mornings were spent on leisurely 10k runs, and my fitness obsession even saw me finish a marathon. I was a size 10, weighed 9st and exercised for the buzz as much as for the health benefits.
That all changed after my daughter Rosie was born in November 2010. I put on 3st during the pregnancy, finding myself too exhausted to keep fit at all.
Back in her jeans: A year after giving birth to her son Felix, Antonia Hoyle is back in her pre-baby clothes thanks to less than 40 minutes of high-intensity interval training a week
Long after she started sleeping through the night, my old clothes were still so tight that the zips broke. No sooner had I started to lose weight and regain pride in my appearance than I was pregnant for a second time – and put it all back on again.
After my son, Felix, was born in December 2012, the familiar cycle of standing on the scales in despair and avoiding full-length mirrors started afresh.
My need for exercise had never been greater. But with two small children and a demanding job, finding the time to do it was more difficult than ever. I was finding that for all the joy motherhood was bringing me, it had shattered my confidence in my body.
As Felix approached his first birthday last December, I was still 10?lb over my pre-pregnancy weight, but looked worse thanks to lack of tone. When I tried on my favourite size 10 jeans, only to discover they barely pulled up over my hips, I burst into tears. I ate more to keep up my energy; toast and butter for breakfast and chocolate after dinner. I finished off the children’s tea and drank wine most evenings to switch off.
The ‘before’ body: Antonia’s post-baby shape
At 9st 11?lb, I wasn’t obese. I tried to tell myself it didn’t matter that I felt unattractive. But at the back of my mind I knew that the weight signified more than a change in body shape.
By the summer I’d begun to think that perhaps being a mother wasn’t enough; I wanted to feel like myself again too.
But was it futile and frivolous to even try to do something about it? I was a 35-year-old mother, after all, not an aspiring model.
COULD I HANDLE ‘INSANITY’?
I was already vaguely aware of high-intensity interval training (HIIT) – probably the biggest emerging fitness trend of the past few years.
The theory is that as little as a few minutes of intense exercise a week burns more fat and is more beneficial to health than the Government-recommended 150 minutes (30 minutes five times a week) of moderate intensity exercise.
Intense bursts of exercise have been proven to rapidly improve strength, endurance, muscle tone and fitness.
Also, the stress on the body triggers hormones believed to help reduce blood sugar levels and offset type 2 diabetes, and increase the metabolic rate – the rate at which the body burns fat – for between 24 and 36 hours after exercise.
Studies have shown similar benefits from cardio-type exercise, including sprinting and cycling, and resistance workouts, using weights.
Classes have mushroomed, with scary names such as Insanity, which claims to combine exercises that burn 1,000 calories in an hour, and there are DVD-based versions including TurboFire, which features kick-boxing moves, and P90X which involves some serious-looking gym equipment.
But HIIT also courts controversy. BBC presenter Andrew Marr, 54, believes the life-threatening stroke he suffered last January was prompted by intense interval training on a rowing machine. And I was sceptical – I couldn’t believe such a regime could have the same benefits as my former hour-long sessions. But, as a busy working mother, the chance to get my pre-baby body back without any significant time sacrifice was beguiling, to say the least.
A SIX-WEEK TARGET
Hours of poring over web pages led me to The Library (thelibrarygym.com), a gym in West London that specialises in HIIT-style training. As mentioned, there are various home versions but I decided that, if I was going to do such a demanding workout, I wanted to consult an expert first.
Trainer Zana Morris, owner of The Library, assured me that all I needed to do to tone up and slim down was 15 minutes of exercise, three times a week. In just six weeks she could help me shed my post-pregnancy weight for good. ‘Most people over-train,’ she says.
The session would involve no running or spinning – I would either be lifting weights or doing press-ups or pull-ups. Zana said: ‘The benefit of doing resistance training as opposed to aerobic work is that not only does it sculpt the body, but the resultant muscle burns more calories.’
EVERY MINUTE HURTS
Before
I started – on October 28 last year – I had a health and fitness test.
At 5ft 6in, I was 9st 11?lb. My body fat percentage was 28.7 per cent
–slightly outside the ideal range of 19 to 28 per cent. My cholesterol
was a healthy 4.75. I could do 20 press-ups and 60 stomach crunches
without stopping for a break.
Zana
gave me three different workouts – for chest and back, for legs, and
for arms and shoulders. The chest and back workout takes 15 minutes,
legs ten minutes and arms and shoulders 13 minutes. Three minutes of
abdominal work is included in every session. So I was doing only 38
minutes of exercise a week. But every minute was exhausting. Most
exercises were divided into three sets of six repetitions, starting at
the heaviest weight you can manage and getting progressively (if only
slightly) lighter.
I found the leg work – squats, thigh curls, thigh extensions and calf raises – the easiest to master, albeit agonising. The work on arms, shoulders, chest and back targeted muscle groups I hadn’t realised existed. But the often-neglected back muscles are especially important as they improve posture, thus lending the impression of a leaner figure.
The abdominal work – eight sets of 20
crunches that target upper and lower stomach muscles as well as the
obliques – was similarly challenging. By the end of each session I was
breathless.
EXHAUSTED .?.?. AND ELATED
Within
a week, I felt stomach muscles emerging that I thought I’d lost for
ever. For the first three weeks my upper body ached constantly. But I
derived a certain sense of satisfaction from the fact it meant it was
working.
And although weight- lifting didn’t give me the same endorphin
rush as running, I still left the gym feeling elated that I’d pushed my
body to exhaustion. Crucially, I could fit in the exercise between my
working day and nursery run, and still spend time with husband Chris,
35, an analyst, in the evening.
It was the eating plan that proved the biggest challenge. Zana believes in a high-protein diet, and although a lot of research has shown eating mega-doses of protein does the body few favours, I decided to give it a go. ‘Protein builds the structure of your body and helps your muscles recover,’ she explained.
She also suggested I cut back on my starchy carbohydrate and fat intake. So, an average day’s diet was lashings of fat-free yogurt (500g – the equivalent of four regular-size pots) with sour fruit such as blueberries for breakfast; a can of tuna with green salad for lunch; and chicken or steak with vegetables for dinner.
The amount of meat I was encouraged to eat for my evening meal was, again, enormous – 400g, which is equivalent to four chicken breasts.
Our food bill shot up, but Chris was overjoyed with the abundance of steak in our fridge and our new jumbo-size portions.
Still, it wasn’t easy. Despite all the protein, I still often felt hungry and I didn’t follow the diet rigidly. I gave in to my cravings for wine (apparently filled with sugar, which I was told to avoid), cereal (likewise) and brie (only cottage cheese is allowed) at least twice a week, and ate a hefty slice of cake on Felix’s first birthday.
But Zana said that was OK, as long as I stuck loosely to the plan the rest of the time. I managed to avoid bread and potatoes completely, finding the longer I went without, the less I missed them.
NOW FOR THOSE JEANS?.?.?.
The scales kept me motivated. Within a week I’d lost 3?lb, with my upper body fast gaining muscle definition I hadn’t enjoyed since my 20s.
When the six weeks were up, on December 12, I was thrilled to discover I’d lost 10?lb and weighed 9st 1?lb. My body fat had decreased to 23.8 per cent. My overall fitness had improved dramatically – I could now do 30 press-ups and 200 stomach crunches without stopping.
I’d lost 3in off my waist – it was now 26½?in – and 1in off my hips and thighs. Worryingly, my cholesterol level had risen from 4.75 to 5.86, but my blood pressure had decreased.
Physiologist Professor Michael Rennie said this was probably due to the high-protein intake, adding: ‘Eating excess protein provides more building blocks for fat and cholesterol, which can be dangerous.’
I quickly learned to adapt the exercise routine to my local gym. Even with the demands of my children and career, I feel I can justify taking 38 minutes out of my week to do it. I still love running, and will try to fit it into my exercise regime, but have found HIIT a more efficient and realistic way to exercise.
Zana says I will maintain my physique by remembering to eat when I’m hungry and limiting starchy carbohydrates to three servings a week. A week on and – save for one blissful pizza and four roast potatoes – I’ve found it surprisingly easy.
Perhaps it’s because I’m the same weight as I was in my 20s. My size 10 skinny jeans slip on effortlessly. My husband, for all his insistence that I didn’t need to change, says I look wonderful.
But far better than my weight loss or other’s perceptions of me has been the improvement to my self-esteem.
My body is no longer defined by motherhood. It belongs to me again.
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Safiya,
London,
2 hours ago
Eat fresh home cooked meals, give up alcohol. Don’t eat meat more then 3 times a week and exercise. Jillian micheals 30 day shred should do the trick… Now watch the pounds drop!
JELST,
South West,
1 day ago
I put on 3.5 stone with twins and back in my pre-pregnancy jeans within 6 weeks – apart from walking the babies def no time for any other exercise LOL
maryanne,
Horsham uk,
1 day ago
I was back in my jeans within a few days with all my three. 26 years later still the same size although been through cancer treatment and on tamoxifen. I just don’t sit there over eating and I take the dog for a 45 min power walk very day rain or shine.
buddc99,
Devon, United Kingdom,
1 day ago
I got back in my skinny jeans a week after given birth to my daughter. I had a good diet during my pregnancy and done zumba until I was 30 weeks pregnant. DON’T EAT FOR TWO !
SouthernSub,
Manchester, UK,
1 day ago
I just LOVE it when men comment telling us about losing baby weight. When you’ve grown a person and squeezed something the size of a melon out of a hole the size of a lemon please let us know your thoughts. Otherwise? Shush.
lisa3,
london,
1 day ago
glad she has the time to employ a nanny, with aname like Antonia and flex , she must be a toff with a lot of money, banker no doubt
EnglishRose,
London, United Kingdom,
1 day ago
HIIT is the way to go as it is paleo/primal. Also if you just life heavy boxes at home as part of normal life or work and run for buses until you are out of breath you get similar effects which is why many women who never go near a gym are also as fit.
betsypaige,
Seattle, Washington,
1 day ago
I got back Into mine in 4 months with no exercise. Just good genes (and good jeans, hehe)!
Leia,
Dallas TX USA,
1 day ago
Thank you for sharing the details of your success, and workout routine! It’s so much more straight forward, and something I can “do†compared to the typical HIIT workouts.
Genetic Genius,
London, United Kingdom,
1 day ago
My wife got back into shape within a few months without doing any exercising. How? We cook our own food. Simple. Eating processed foods cause almost all health issues.
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