Ditch The Treadmill

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkfQIgO41Qs)

Group training session @ Liberty Gym with the Nottingham MASS crew!  I’m used to my commercial gym but this gym was BADASS!! Proper old school weights and machines, boxing rings and punching bags.. and it wouldn't be complete without posters of bodybuilders all over the walls and some slightly intimidating signs... 

eg. “Do not drop the dumbbells, you will be asked to leave. YOU ARE ON CAMERA.”

SURVIVING IN CATERED HALLS

Got another early morning session in before breakfast today, fasted workout = fat burner! I thought I’d better fill you all in on uni life, since I’ve neglected my blog massively since moving to Nottingham, I promised I wouldn’t, I blame freshers! 😅

Freshers was insane, 4 nights out in a row, I had a rest on Thursday and we saw Duke Dumont on Friday. The only exercise I did involved getting down on the dance floor, the occasional slut drop and reaching for water the morning after the night before. I’ve eaten my body weight in croissants and I’m not ashamed. Freshers managed to lose me my bank card, get me escorted home by the reps (they are younger than me), I got puked on by a stranger in a taxi, one incredibly horrific story that graced all of my friends snapchat on Friday night/Saturday morning. You’re welcome. And I think I’ve actually met someone more crazy than I am. Ella, I can’t compete! The plague of freshers flu is still clinging onto me like soaking wet jeans. Ugh! Freshers has ruined my fancy dress costumes as well as my immune system!

I’m not sure what expectations I had before I came to Nottingham, but I’ve been blown away by the food, the people, facilities, the campus. I do feel very much like I’m in a Nottingham bubble and the outside world doesn’t really exist. I haven’t watched the news or listened to the radio for over 2 weeks?! I have no idea what’s going on outside of who got laid last night and who’s selling tickets for Crisis on Wednesday.

Being in catered halls was my biggest concern before coming to uni. I looked around the self catered halls and really didn’t like how they were set up. I felt that the catered halls offered way more opportunities to meet new people, you eat together twice a day and I felt like this was more important in my first year - to make friends, than being able to eat what I want. My hall is also next door to the gym which means I can roll out of bed and get a workout in before lectures. Massive bonus!!

Taking the gamble to stay in catered halls was totally worth it, I’ve made some great friends already and the food is great. At breakfast they serve EVERYTHING from croissants, yogurts, porridge, cereals, boiled eggs and fruit! The croissants wink at me every morning as I scoop the porridge into my bowl. And the pain au chocolat’s. Well. >.< I usually have a boiled egg or two aswel as porridge depending on how hungry I’m feeling! This is so good because I never have time to make eggs in the morning - I am rubbish for getting my protein macros in the morning!! For lunch we are given £5.30 on our cards which we can use anywhere on campus. So we have a Caribbean place, Chinese, chicken joes that sells chicken wraps (so good), Italian, Starbucks, and a couple of cafés. As tempting as it is to blow the whole £5 on Starbucks (easily done) my go to place is the Italian, they have a salad bar and you can fill a box for £3. I’m yet to try out the cafés, I’ve heard amazing things though! Dinner is tough. It can be pretty hit and miss, I usually fill half of my plate with salad and whatever veg side is on offer and hope that there’s some meat I like! Always dodging those fried potatoes. Soup is always on offer at dinner so that’s my go to if there’s nothing but fried chicken being served! (Only happened once so far). Also they serve great desserts here, I’m still allowing myself to eat whatever I want 2 days a week, this now solely depends on what 2 days are serving the best desserts!!!! My sweet tooth will be the death of me. The best one so far has been the chocolate bread and butter pudding. God that was incredible. I’m still thinking about that one. Making meal times hasn’t been a problem yet but as I start joining more sports/clubs I will struggle to make the 5:30-7:00pm dinner time. I’m going to have to rethink meal replacements that can accommodate a mini fridge!

I have officially run out of money now until I get myself a job up here. Student life is definitely harder than I thought financially! Most importantly, I am loving my course so far. I had my first labs on Wednesday and that was really cool. Getting to wear my lab coat was definitely my favourite part.

Promise to keep you guys updated at every chance I get! This is the first time I’ve sat down and actually absorbed everything that’s happened over the last 2 weeks… Overwhelming amount of stuff to take in but I’ve loved every minute of it! It was really nice to go home at the weekend for a little break from the Nottingham bubble, I ventured off to the O2 to see Michael McIntyre, you all should go see him, what a hero. He has massive calf muscles… Who knew? I’m training with my PT Rich on 30th October so I will be posting a new video after that!! Exciting times! 😄 Tonight is our first formal dinner. I CAN’T WAIT to get dressed up and wear something other than gym clothes!

| HOW TO MAKE THE BEST PROTEIN SHAKE & TRAINING WITH SINEAD @SCMFIT| 💪😅

Hey guys! Sorry for not posting in a while, I had my last day at work on Friday and have spent the last week preparing for my big move to Nottingham. For those of you that don’t know, I’m starting university on Sunday!!!! Not quite sure how I feel about being a fresher yet. 😳

So yesterday I trained with the incredible Sinead, an old friend who I used to ride with! She is a PT and fitness fanatic too. After seeing my blog, she invited me over to The Park Club, Milton for a session together! We mainly focussed on legs in our session with a bit of conditioning in there aswel. We did exercises that were functional and that means they are going to help us perform the big heavy lifts better. Improving technique and flexibility is key! I really like the way Sinead trains, it’s not all about lifting heavy, it’s about doing it properly and maximising your performance.

Sinead really works you hard and those one-legged lunge jumps were absolutely brutal! And I’m definitely not the most graceful at doing them as you can see! Sinead is way better at them than me. I loved getting a bit of conditioning in at the end with the battling ropes. I love to hate them!!! I also managed to walk into a pole whilst filming yesterday, quite typical of me! DERP! Woke up with a real cute bump on my head this morning. Wish we'd got that on video!

It’s so awesome when you find other like minded people to train with, it’s so encouraging and motivating! It’s great to have had such good feedback from my friends and family about my blog but to have a personal trainer like Sinead tell me that she loves what I’m doing, it’s really motivating!

Luckily everyone in the fitness community I'v come across so far have been really positive and inspiring people and that’s what I’d like to continue to surround myself with. No bad vibes!

I am definitely going to continue training and blogging whilst I’m up in Nottingham! I am now having PT sessions with Rich once a month so I’ll be home for those. Also hoping to get some training sessions in with Sinead when I’m home too after having such a blast yesterday!!

Today I made some really yummy protein pancakes! I thought I’d try out some of the new protein powder I’ve been sent from Juice Plus+. I thought the chocolate flavour would go perfectly with my easy & guilt-free banana pancake recipe!! They turned out to be even more delicious and a great way to increase your protein macros 💪

338 cals C 36 F 12 P 23 

RECIPE:


Whisk 2 large eggs in a bowl 

Sieve ½ scoop chocolate protein powder (saves it being lumpy!)


Mash up one banana 


Add the banana to the beaten egg mixture and whisk


Fry in a pan on a VERY LOW HEAT (it will take a little while for the pancake to cook through in the centre before you can flip it over) 

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjZ2a9OoHtg)

LEGS & GLUTE WORKOUT

I hope you all have had a glorious bank holiday weekend! 

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xj6tBPavYVY)

ARMS & ABS WORKOUT 

Signing up for a 3 month training package at the Results, Health and Performance studio in May 2015 is the best decision I have made in a long time. Rich (the owner of RHP) has completely changed my life in a matter of just 12 weeks. My cardio gym sessions (horrific) and bad eating habits (borderline eating disorder) that began in October 2014 ended when I began training with Rich. So, I have a personal training session every week and my progress is tracked every 4 weeks: we take measurements of weight, body fat percentage (using callipers), lean muscle mass and most importantly we take progress photos. All the numbers and stats are great to measure your progression but I think it's paramount that you're getting the visual results that you want. Here are my progress photos and stats after 12 weeks training!

Questionable face-pulling going on, soz.

To be honest I'm not really fussed about my weight changing, my weight fluctuates week on week and my body is very sensitive to hormonal change, I get more bloated when I'm stressed and I get breakouts! The improvement in my body fat % is what I'm most pleased about, even though I looked much much "skinnier" when I started training, I'm actually looking more muscular and toned now 12 weeks on.

I think the most noticeable improvement is in my back:

My shoulders have always been very rounded (like a hunchback!) so my training has been very much focussed around improving my posture by using corrective exercises such as band pull aparts to try and open out my shoulders and strengthen my lats. In almost every exercise I do, I am always focussing on keeping my shoulders tight!

Let me know what you guys think, any feedback or suggestions would be hugely appreciated! Drop me a private message or comment on this post with any questions. :)

So here it is! After being written, deleted and rewritten about 96 times, here goes my first ever post. I am a complete and utter science geek, numbers are definitely more familiar than words. (true story) My friends will know how hard it is for me to articulate a sentence at times so writing this blog is definitely a new challenge for me! I’m making it my mission to get more girls lifting! I want to banish gym fear, share workouts, meal ideas and answer any questions you may have about women’s fitness! Note: I’m not an expert trainer, qualified coach or nutritionist. I’m a fitness fanatic who loves to eat healthily and train hard. Why? Because I love seeing the results. I am here to not only share my results with you but also to give tips and advice based on what I’ve learned throughout my training. I have recently been sent some free samples to try and test so I’m hoping to write up some product reviews for you guys in the very near future!!

I’m really excited to share my journey with you guys and I want to get as many of you ladies on board as I can!

Keep your eyes peeled for my next post which is going to include my 12 week progress photos and stats.