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#105: Catriona Kirwan: Training for confidence, endurance and a balanced lifestyle
679 Plays2 months ago
Struggling to balance fat loss, muscle building, and endurance training?
In this episode of The Kate Hamilton Health Podcast, I sit down with Catriona Kirwan, online fitness coach and owner of Recreate Coaching. We chat about what it truly means to achieve body composition goals while maintaining performance, confidence, and a sustainable lifestyle.
Catriona shares her journey from yo-yo dieting to coaching, breaking down common misconceptions around training, nutrition, and mindset. We tackle the challenges of losing fat while training for a marathon, the realities of photo shoot prep, and why lifting weights is essential for long-term health.
If you're looking for real, practical strategies to build strength, fuel performance, and create a balanced approach to fitness, this episode is for you.
Episode Highlights:
[00:00] – Welcome to The Kate Hamilton Health Podcast
[01:36] – Meet Catriona Kirwan: Online Coach & Fitness Enthusiast
[02:21] – From Yo-Yo Dieting to Coaching: Catriona’s Transformation
[04:44] – Balancing Sports Performance & Nutrition
[07:11] – Fat Loss vs. Endurance Training: Can You Do Both?
[11:09] – Why Enjoying the Process is Key
[18:18] – Behind the Scenes of Body Composition Coaching & Photo Shoots
[27:21] – Setting Realistic & Fulfilling Fitness Goals
[36:47] – Client Weight, Body Composition & the Bigger Picture
[37:43] – Building Confidence Through Small, Consistent Habits
[38:47] – Time Constraints & the Pressure to See Results
[39:04] – The Long-Term Approach to Sustainable Fitness
[43:07] – How Stress Affects Body Recomposition
[43:43] – Biggest Myths About Body Composition & Fat Loss
[44:16] – Why Lifting Weights is a Non-Negotiable for Women
[45:58] – The Role of Diet Breaks & Maintenance Phases
[47:49] – Muscle Building Benefits You Didn’t Know About
[51:25] – Reversing Out of a Diet & The Power of Food Quality
[55:20] – Improvement Phases & Why They Matter
[01:01:49] – Balancing Flexibility & Nutrition for Long-Term Success
[01:07:50] – Defining Health & Finding True Balance
Links & Resources:
- Connect with Catriona on Instagram here
If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with friends who might benefit. For more health and fitness tips, follow me on Instagram and TikTok @katehamiltonhealth.
Music b LiQWYD Free download: hypeddit.com/link/xxtopb [http://hypeddit.com/link/xxtopb] Promoted by FreeMusicPromo [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCbycji-eySnM3WD8mbxPUSQ] / @freemusicpromo
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Transcript
Introduction and Guest Overview
00:00:09
Speaker
Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode of the Kate Hamilton health podcast. So in today's episode, I interview Katrina Kerwin. Katrina is an online coach and she is also my coach bestie. She is owner of recreate coaching where herself and her coaches work with women towards their body composition goals and building confidence along the way. She is very much about a balanced approach to body composition
Balanced Body Composition Coaching
00:00:35
Speaker
coaching.
00:00:35
Speaker
So in the conversation, we chat about a wide range of topics. We talk a good bit about sports performance, endurance, and how to fuel properly with these goals in mind. We talk about body composition goals, photo shoots. We talk about dieting, the do's and don'ts on the dark side of dieting. We talk about building muscle and how important this is and why building muscle is so important and how to go about this. We talk about balance. We talk about mindset. It's just such an empowering conversation where you will leave feeling, I've got this. I know I can make myself stronger. I can do it in but in a balanced way. And I'm going to come out of this whole experience feeling so much more empowered.
00:01:23
Speaker
so much more in control with so much more of a better relationship with food and just in general feeling so much more empowered. So enjoy the episode.
Katrina's Personal Journey
00:01:37
Speaker
Katrina, welcome to the podcast. I actually cannot believe that it's been this long and we haven't actually done this. I know, we've actually been speaking about it for so long. For anyone who doesn't know, Katrina is my coach bestie. We've known each other over a year now, which is mad. Become really, really close friends. So this, this episode, I feel will like you have a different feel to it. It's going to be very kind of friendly chat, talking all things fitness.
00:02:01
Speaker
and health and I'm really excited. Yeah, so am I. We've been literally being like, oh, we're going to, I mean, most of us had it probably about eight months ago. Oh, we'll go in that podcast, go in that podcast. And then we're like, no, let's just actually organize it. So anyway, look, before we fire away into talking about like different topics, do you want to just introduce yourself, explain to everyone kind of what you do and maybe a bit about your background as well?
00:02:21
Speaker
So my name is Katrina Kerwin, some people would know me as Kat and I've been an online coach for just over three years. So I started online coaching at the age of 23 and I'm 26 now. Now I have literally been into fitness sports since probably the womb. Genuinely, like I obviously was play GA. I did athletics and I competitively did kickboxing. And from that, that's kind of where my love for fitness came was actually specifically more so from GA and kickboxing. Cause I felt I was basically given no support and towards nutrition, which is nothing wrong with the coaches themselves. They're they're an obviously not
00:03:01
Speaker
talk to do that and then I kind of went through a cycle of yo-yo dieting not having the best relationship with my body probably not having the best relationship with my food not because of the food itself but actually just because of the understanding and awareness I just never really understood and then I decided I came home from Canada I had obviously went through that yo-yo cycle of Going through extremely restrictive diet just before a fight and before a holiday. I put it back on I put like 23 pounds on in like 10 weeks and that was my big like okay something needs to change and then I started to document it on social media did that for a couple of years and And then I became coach and here I am. I didn't know that story. I didn't know that you were so sporty. This is so lovely to learn. My background is like the opposite. I would have been such an unsporty kid would have really lacked confidence and really kind of found fitness in my like late twenties, early, early thirties kind of, it was like a game changer for me to like changed my whole life.
00:04:02
Speaker
So it's really refreshing to hear kind of it and like, you know, cause you do hear lots of stories like mine. It's really refreshing to hear a story of someone that's, you know, literally from as a kid yeah being really, really
Sports vs. Health and Nutrition Challenges
00:04:13
Speaker
sporty. and Always And like one hundred like, that's why like training has always come natural to me, but like food has was always my biggest issue. And that's like what I like kind of deal with it with a lot of my clients is a case of like a lot of them now do play sport or have like competitions or races or half marathons going up. And it's a case of. being able to navigate the food side of things rather than the training as well as I obviously of course do that too. But I do find that you can be really, really good at training and obviously come naturally to you within a food side can affect it so much kind of thing. Yeah. Let's talk about sport for a minute because I think there's a really, really good topic to talk about. I think people confuse sometimes sport with health and fitness.
00:04:55
Speaker
And it it can can be two very different things. Obviously if sport and health and fitness are merged properly, like you're unstoppable, like that that's what we want. But a lot of times sport can be quite unhealthy because it's so competitive, because you're pushing yourself to the limits. And then when we throw the whole females in sport, body image, dieting into it, diet culture into it, it can actually be a pretty dangerous recipe, I would imagine. 100% and like even coming from my own experience. Now this could have been like more so symptoms because I'm quite tall and basically kind of what happened to me when I was younger is I was doing so much sport, but I had no understanding of nutrition. So I was completely under fueling myself and I actually went through a period like my cycle was completely irregular for probably the goal of like three years. I got it really late and stuff like that. And that was due to me Obviously being underweight without even me even realizing just because I was so sporty, I obviously got so tall so quickly. And like I would be coming up to, for example, competitions, like this would be like a kickboxing competition and I'd end up like I'd have to lose a little bit of a weight. It wouldn't be really strict. It was obviously amateur, but I would still be going to like trying to lose to get under a slight weight category. But then with that, I had known I like, I was never told that like, Oh yeah, you've lost a bit of weight now, but you need to carve into a fight.
00:06:11
Speaker
So like I would go into a fight like with like minimal carbs in me. Genuinely, clearly, my energy was on the floor. I had no it i ah didn't even like i had no awareness of this. like It just wasn't taught to me. That's why it's so important now when clients come to me who do GA or do athletics or do running, that they have that awareness that it's like, okay, theyre like I always try to keep like performance goals and physical goals separate. now i can't like Sometimes someone will want to go into a flat loss goal.
00:06:40
Speaker
while having a performance goal. But it's so important that they have education around that so they don't affect their performance and also don't affect their relationship with food doing it because there has to be that balance. But yeah, that's what kind of really, that's why I'm probably so, I care so much with my clients and I'm so passionate about it when anyone does play sport that they have that understanding that if They are in a slight bit of a deficit that they understand that they need to be able to carb load coming into a match. So, so it doesn't actually affect their energy, their sleep. If it's a female, their cycle, most importantly, their performance. Yeah. And I think it needs to be really clear.
Navigating Weight Loss in Sports
00:07:15
Speaker
that if you want to lose weight and you're playing sports, whether you're playing, you know, GAA or, you know, on a regular basis or, you know, playing sports at a high level or you're training for a marathon or whatever, you know, if you're doing something where you're doing a lot of cardio in particular, you really do need to work with a coach to know what that deficit is because it's going to be a hell of a lot higher calories than what you think.
00:07:33
Speaker
It is 100%. And also it can actually be more difficult. Like I do say to people, if they want to do a half marathon and also diet, now I don't, like, I don't have any of my girls diet close to their half marathon when their mileage gets high. It's just not worth it. But let's say it's the first couple of weeks and stuff. Like I will always say that I won't sugar coat it. And I will very much be like, you're actually picking a slightly more difficult route in my opinion, trying to have a performance goal while trying to drop body fat.
00:08:02
Speaker
can be more difficult, especially when you're training for a half marathon, because like, for example, I'm trying for a half marathon right now. And like genuinely when I do a long run, like I could eat the house down. So the thoughts of trying to be on 17, 1800 calories while doing that, it's going to affect your sleep. I, like I tried to say to some of my clients that I'm like, it's probably actually affecting your, like your times and your performance without even having that, ah like without even knowing, but I do think it's so important.
00:08:27
Speaker
when someone is looking at doing both that they should have a coach because it is a case that they won't have awareness of being like, Oh, I do need to have more carbs coming up to it. Or for example, when it comes to training, like you do have to train slightly differently to someone that's just like trying to grow the glutes. You know, you need to put unilateral movements and you need to plug plyometrics in. Like there is the different type of training and it is obviously some people can train just regularly through a marathon, but some people need to focus on different types of training to obviously help with performance and to reduce like injury prevention.
00:09:01
Speaker
Yeah. And it's two opposite goals. And I think that's what you need to realize that, you know, obviously if you're training for a marathon or a half marathon, you're going to end up in incredible shape. You are like if your focus needs to not be on the fat loss. Like you probably will lose some body fat anyway, as part of the process. And it really needs to be focused on fueling and yeah, sports performance. And and that needs to be your focus and just let the other things be a by-product.
00:09:27
Speaker
exactly the byproduct. That's literally you what I try to say to clients so much ah so many times because I feel people will come and they'll have a goal of a marathon and then I'm like, Oh my God, it's brilliant or a half marathon or whatever it is, or high rocks, for example, instantly straight away, they think, Oh my God, I've never trained like this. So I'm going to be training so much more. so I'm going to lose loads of body fat. And like some people, I like, some people do go onto a marathon and they put on weight because even though you're doing so much output, you're so hungry. I'm so hungry. Like you can't stop being like, my YouTube is talking to so a client of mine the other day. I was already like yesterday who done a marathon before and she was like, yeah, I put on weight. And I was like, that's completely normal. And I was like, you have like your craving so much more. And a lot of the time it's like your nutrition probably isn't fully correct.
00:10:10
Speaker
So you're not actually having the quality of nutrition to support the performance, your hunger, your energy. So therefore, so what happens is people start having like lower quality foods and then
Prioritizing Performance Over Fat Loss
00:10:20
Speaker
it's affecting their energy. Then it's affecting the performance. And that's what can lead to weight gain as well. But with that, it is so important. I just find when people ah apply for coaching and they're like, Oh, I want to do a half marathon. Just go back to my point. It's.
00:10:33
Speaker
straight away, it's like the goal is phallus and then it's like phallus becomes more important than the actual goal that they originally planned to do. And I'm like, no, no, no, you wanted to do a marathon. They're like, yeah, but like, but straight away they're like, Oh, but I can't lose body fat. I'm like, you can't, but I don't think it should be something that like, when we're checking in, I don't need completely and utterly focusing on the scales when I'm trying to get you to perform better, you know. And it's going to be a hell of a lot more rewarding when you're like, I love what I just did. And what do I weigh on the scales or how does this size 10 clothes look on me? Like it's it's not the same kind of reward. No, it isn't. Like even for example, I had like a little PB in a run yesterday and did my, like I'm not ready for reference.
00:11:14
Speaker
I'm not naturally a runner. So like, obviously I was Atlantic when I was younger, then I went into bodybuilding and kind of neglected all that parts now kind of getting back into it. But yesterday I did my 10 K and 46 minutes. And when I say the feeling of that is just incomparable to seeing like a number on the scales drop. Like it's so different. Like it's just so different. That's why I would hate when someone has a performance goal. That like, let's say like I'll actually do this in check-ins where someone will do a really, really, really good run. They'll get a really good time.
00:11:44
Speaker
But then let's say the first few weeks it is about fat loss and then they'll be like, Oh, but they still not be like, yeah, but like you're getting faster, you're getting fitter, you're getting stronger. I was like, these are the things that you need to focus on when the actual goal is like a competition or a race at the end.
Kate's Running Journey and Mindset
00:12:00
Speaker
It's scary how conditioned we are, like, you know, not valuing those goals is more important. And it doesn't have to be that extreme. I'm laughing at your, sorry, 46 minutes for 10k. That's amazing. Congratulations. i quite sure now sure I know I did my little 5k yesterday and I did it in about the same time. I think it was like 37 minutes or something. week No, I know I'm post flu. But I mean, when I say I actually had to lie down after it, I didn't feel okay. I was like, I don't think I should have done this. I'm not well enough yet. But I was still like, Jesus, you did like it did twice the time. My God. what she never I literally was only saying to my friends of the day, like, I was struggling to do a 10k, obviously.
00:12:40
Speaker
in sub 50 which is still brilliant but yeah I really surprised myself yesterday really surprised myself but I have now for example example I have a hi half marathon and a high rocks booked and the idea of fat loss is not it doesn't even entertain me because I don't even want to take the risk of affecting my speed my performance obviously like I look and I'm like I want to get a decent time on my half marathon I want to do pretty well and I want to feel strong in my high rocks And if I do go into a fat loss phase, like I'll always make clients aware that there is a small chance that it could affect it. You're like your time. If you are really serious about it. Now, obviously nutrition can be supported and you can still do really, really well, but we've, when you do really come to understand both.
00:13:24
Speaker
I always do will say it's better to keep them separate. It's better to keep performance and physical goals separate. And having those performance goals, like what I've learned about running as well, which I know you have taught me because we talk about this a lot is like the ups and downs. It's not like strength training where it's like, Oh, I've had a, I've had a great run. And then the next day you're like, I'm going to do even better. It's not like you're not going to beat your time every time. Sometimes it feels like you're like dragging yourself around. Other times it feels easy. But I think having a mindset of, of knowing that like when you.
00:13:52
Speaker
are you know You have goals, whether it is a little like couch to 5k, whether it is a half marathon or a marathon, that you're going to have ups and downs. like you know i i was I was doing a really good 5k time before Christmas and Christmas happened, didn't run a whole lot over Christmas. I was busy with the kids. It was very difficult to manage everything.
00:14:11
Speaker
And then I got sick. And now ah and know I feel like I'm back to square one. ne That could be like, oh, fuck this. Like, why? Why? ah Why am I going to bother anymore? I give up running. But I'm like, I want to do it because not because I want to look a certain way. It's like, I want to do it because I want to be proud of myself, but I also want to be healthy. I'm like, I know this is good for me. I don't have any huge goals. Like, you know, my goals, like I've got the women's mini marathon with my Kate Hamilton health ladies that we're doing in June. So which is a 10K. So, you know, I'm working towards that.
00:14:40
Speaker
nice but I like I don't think like sometimes I talk to people I'm like you don't need big goals like if someone was to be like oh I did 5k today I'm like that's like brilliant that's brilliant and like with you say with the ups and downs of running by God have I dealt with that the last couple of weeks like and I would have never consistently ran before like I would have done the odd 5k maybe 10k once every couple of months like let's say for example that run yesterday went deadly and I don't know what way my run would go on Saturday you could go brilliant. You know absolute shit shows but you just you go with the flow and I've come to realise you just accept it as it is even though it can be difficult but running is very hit or miss. Yeah and I think when you get blips like getting sick
00:15:21
Speaker
I feel very back to square one, but I know, I'm like, do you know what? This is a nice little starting point now for my goal. I'm like, okay, hopefully I won't hit my time that I hit again. Like hopefully I'll be beating that time and as I start to feel better. And I do think that yes, there's ups and downs, but it is cool that if you actually just, you know, ran twice a week yeah over the space for a few weeks, it's amazing. It's really, really rewarding how quickly you notice how fitter you get.
00:15:47
Speaker
Yeah, like endurance is everything. It's just like literally building it up over time. And it's just, it's not always when people for anyone that is getting into running, it's a case of like your easy runs are so important. Like one thing that I've really learned to my running is I didn't take my easy runs easy enough.
00:16:02
Speaker
And when I started taking my easy runs, actually, you see, like really slowing down my pace. That's when I got faster. That's genuinely when I started to go faster. That's also, i've I've discovered this is all of my, then you enjoy it more. I was like panicking going for my runs, but probably because I'm running with Dave and he's like ridiculously fast.
00:16:18
Speaker
And so I was kind of accidentally going fast. I was like, I hate this. But once I slowed it down to my, my little trotter, I actually enjoy this now. And actually I was speaking with running coach Rachel Conway a few weeks ago on the podcast. And she was like, if you just go out, no matter how long your run is and you give yourself permission to walk a bit of it, if you need to.
00:16:37
Speaker
yeah It takes the pressure off. It's like, it's threatened so much about times. I know, you know, if you're working towards, Kate, that literally happened to me over a few, let's say ah my time has gotten so much better over the last, let's say three weeks. And that's because I just let go over time. I just was like, you know what, this is actually great. Like I was nearly creating anxiety for myself because I obviously, you know me, like I always have such a high standard for myself.
00:16:59
Speaker
And I was like, this is your first proper half marathon. I was like, let go of the time and just enjoy it. And when I started doing that, when I started just being like, don't focus on the time, just focus on enjoying it, pick up your pace, and naturally my pace just got better. but Just because day I enjoy focus on enjoying it more and just like not stressing out out over the goal. Even though it's nice to have a goal, but if you find that it's actually causing you a little bit of anxiety and stress, then you need to drop it.
Sustainable Body Composition Strategies
00:17:25
Speaker
You know, and that comes for anything that can come for like, for example, some of my girls that do photo shoots, like when they start to stress over it, I'm like, let's just like focus on the by-product of your habits day to day, focus on the basics and and like the rest will come, you know, kind of thing. That's such good advice.
00:17:41
Speaker
and it's amazing just the stress that we put on ourselves that we take the fun out of it and I think that's as well why I want to keep my golds nice and and small at the minute in relation to it because I don't know like I don't want to put myself off and like you I said really high standards for myself like I should be faster I should be just doing more I should be have bigger gold and then it's like I actually just want to be able to go out the door and enjoy it and just feel amazing afterwards. For me, the goal at running really is just to feel amazing. Even the mini marathon goal, you know, I'm going to be with my ladies. If I walk a bit of it, I walk a bit of it, like whatever. i'm like't For me, it's just to go on the day, have fun and feel good and use it as ah as a target for my running. But I wanted to talk to you a little bit about photo shoots as well. yeah and You actually are more well known as the body comp queen, am I correct?
00:18:25
Speaker
Yeah, that's genuinely, that is ah what I'm like, obviously only recently more of my clients have become more endurance. I've become more endurance and stuff, but my like bread and butter is body composition. So like it really is comes down to like, and that actually really stemmed.
00:18:41
Speaker
from me doing my first ever photo shoot. That's really where I kind of came from. Like obviously before my first ever photo shoot, I was actually more so about like, I'm still of course about it, about being being more confident and stuff. But that is like, I was very, in the past, I was confident with, I was Cacher when coaching. And that was like very much like when people came to me was more so confidence. I actually I actually for a while at the start of my coaching didn't post progress photos. Isn't that mad? Like, I feel like I've done a 360, a complete like change. But that's why I used to never do, never post them and stuff. Cause I had a completely different, and then I kind of obviously grew as a person and I did my first over photo shoot. And obviously that was, in my opinion, quite, I was happy with it, quite successful. And then from that, I just became so in delved into like physique development, obviously really successful fat loss phases or really successful improvement phases.
00:19:32
Speaker
And I think that the biggest thing with me is always having my girls go through like, whether it is like a maintenance phase where they're just obviously focusing know on bringing their categories up ever so slightly, building muscle or actually going into an improvement phase itself. And that's obviously where you go into a bit of a surplus and build muscle. But I think the difference with me is because I don't like my clients are obviously lifestyle and like they made you a photo shoot or they want it.
00:19:57
Speaker
take it a little bit more serious for the physique, but I obviously don't coach about bodybuilders or anything like that. It's like the improvement phase. I don't want to say it's a bit more relaxed, but it makes the girls a lot more comfortable. So we're not pushing body weight to a point where they feel really uncomfortable or they start to put on body fat and they're like,
00:20:15
Speaker
I don't feel good in myself. They actually get to understand that their body can take a lot more food than they realize. They start to break the fear of food and of weight gain and and of actually building more muscle and getting a complete different outlook of weightlifting and food and fuel itself, if that makes sense.
00:20:33
Speaker
I think that makes so much sense because I think body composition coaching can get quite a bad rep in a lot of ways, particularly around photo shoots. And, you know, and i I have some of my own opinions around not as much around photo shoots, but more around bodybuilding, but you know, that a lot of people will have a lot of opinions on, on this, you know, that like developing bad relationship with food, eating disorders that are associated with bodybuilding and extreme dieting and you know just restrictions and rules around it all can be quite damaging for some people. But what I find amazing that you're talking about and what I love about your approach is you're getting people results where they get to book a photo shoot, feel really proud of themselves, look strong, look healthy but within their boundaries like you're guiding them
00:21:21
Speaker
Yeah, always. My clients always have their own authority. Like for example, my own coach Amy, she was a part of the team now. Like we, I remember when she was doing her photo shoot, like we would talk and like, we actually set a calorie guideline at the start of the shoot that we wouldn't go below that she was like, I was like, no matter what her outcome was, because I was like.
00:21:39
Speaker
I don't want you to disrupt your relationship with food or I don't want to disrupt kind of like a relationship with exercise. And it's so important with any of my clients when they've done a photo shoot, they will know that i've I'll always communicate it. And that's, I, I coach people the the exact same way I coach someone in a lives lifestyle phase.
00:21:55
Speaker
I'll coach them through a photo shoot. Like I'll be like, are you happy with this? Like we don't need to push any further. Like, and then if they're like, okay, like I, like one of the girls is in a photo shoot at the minute and she has a holiday and I was like, look, we'll just work and I will obviously dive right through it. And if you, she's had more events and stuff and it's taking that approach where it's.
00:22:11
Speaker
not drastic. And I know like the people do go for drastic approaches and you can push harder and absolutely. And some of my girls do push harder, but never to the extent that it's the case that you're going to get a couple of photos and it's going to disrupt your relationship with food for the next five years. I just don't believe in that. Like I just don't think it's worth it. And I think it's because that's the way I did my own photo shoot is I spoke to my own coach and I was like, I'm not going below, I think mine was like 1,700, 1,800 calories. I was like, I'm not going to that. like whatever, what people do is 11, 1200 calories and they're doing two hours of cardio a day and stuff like that. And I'm like, it's just so unsustainable. And I was like, well, I want to be able to have meals out or get understanding and stuff like that. And of course there's going to be times when someone is doing a photo shoot, they have to mainly need to be more tedious. Absolutely.
00:22:57
Speaker
But it is a case that I would never want them to be like, okay, this has gone so far that my food focus is so high that I'm going to go and put the weight all back on within the first like few weeks. And I know that because if not all my clients that have done a photo shoot have very much relatively reversed well because of that balance as such.
00:23:18
Speaker
that relationship with food is just the most important part. And the relation what I like as well about your coaching is not only is like the relationship with food really important, and you know having the the correct amount of macronutrients, getting enough fuel for your runs or for your your training or whatever it is that you're doing alongside it, but it's also your relationship with understanding the importance of having a social life. So working with me, like that you understand that it's important to me that I can go out with my kids and have an ice cream and them not see me restrict like that. you know or that you know if there's something coming on it's like yeah okay if a holiday coming up i want it i want to feel good on my holiday so it's like yeah we gotta go but at the same time you know it's also not that strict to go literally like that is the way i coach my clients and the way i like my coaches to coach our clients is the way i like i like would coach myself if that makes sense like i've never went through a dining phase
00:24:10
Speaker
where i've completely removed my social life or completely removed like the foods that i love and stuff for a physique so i would never expect my clients to do that either and i firmly believe like i very much believe if you remove all the foods that you're having currently now just to get a physique, you're going to put it back on quicker. Like you're just not gonna sustain it. And it's all about, if you want to lose, whether it's five pounds, 10 pounds, 15 pounds, whatever it may be, it's important that you learn to lose that while stop still keeping in the things that come up in your life.
00:24:42
Speaker
all the time. So it's like, like you say, if you go out for, I don't know if you were to like to me this week, oh, I'm going out for a meal out with the kids and stuff and I have the grand semi of the menu. We'll have a look at it. We'll just learn. I will always want my clients to actually just have a better understanding of nutrition. And that comes from my own experience. I found the biggest downfall of me maintaining my results are The reason I kept doing it so drastically was because I had no understanding of food. So like, if I went out for a meal, I'd be like, well, I can't go out for a meal. Cause I had no understanding of how to look at a menu. Or like, for example, if I wanted, like, I don't know if it came up, like when I was in college and I was doing a fat loss phase and this is when I like actually got a coach and became to understand it. It's like, I wasn't afraid to have a muffin cause I was like, okay, I can fit that into my calories. And when you come to realize that there is like that 80 20 diet or some people is going to have a 70 30 where
00:25:32
Speaker
They have 80% good quality, 20% of the foods they love. I find the chance of going into that all or nothing approach or going into that self-sabotage minimizes so much. And that is what like maintains the results. And also it stops people being put off diets. I feel like people look at diets and they're like, they just look at it like as it as if it's miserable. And I'm like, no, you're just creating it, like creating it so drastically and making it so difficult for yourself. that that's why it's becoming miserable, but it shouldn't. It should just, you naturally just make better choices. I want you to like, for example, like your current foods, like I want you to keep the foods that you love, Kateen, but it's like, if you were to be like, okay, how can I make this better? I'd be like, okay, this is what you can do with this to make it naturally more calorie friendly or fit within your calories and stuff like that. But I always think if that's what it is, rather than completely
00:26:22
Speaker
following a meal plan that you're naturally never going to stick to. I just think like, even though we give example meal plans out, the one thing I say in all my calls and all my clients know, I'm like, please don't stick to it. I like use it as reference. Like, for example, I'll give an example meal plan. I'm like, that's how it's going to help with your hunger. How it's going to help with your performance, your energy and stuff like that. But I was like, please don't stick to that. Because if I feel like when people stick to a meal plan for like 10 weeks, 12 weeks, and then they come off it,
00:26:48
Speaker
They don't know how to eat like an adult. Because it's not real life, exactly. Meal plans are not real life. I don't do i don't do meal plans at all because I'm very much about building healthy habits like and a healthy lifestyle.
Sustainability and Personal Satisfaction in Leanness
00:27:00
Speaker
Something else I talk about a lot around kind of around what you were talking about there is the cost of getting lean and the cost of being lean. And I talk about this a lot because I think a lot of people don't really understand this trade-off. And I think when you understand the trade-off of what of what your goals are, it makes you question your goals. That's really important. Like for example, if we take me as for an example, yeah, you know, was considering a photo shoot. I had been working with Emma curve and their last year and we were going to do a photo shoot. You know, I was working towards it and she's been on the podcast and then I decided not to because it didn't align with my goals at the time. I had a lot of business stuff going on and it was too much. And I was like, no.
00:27:41
Speaker
And then it was something that me and you talked about when we started working together, but more as a business photo shoot. But even so, it's not something that lights me up inside the way it does. Like some people get really empowered at the thoughts of having a photo shoot and getting photos of themselves. And you know, and and and that's amazing. Like, you know, just like someone who trains for a half marathon and you know, it's for them and you know, and I think We need to look at our goals and be like, first of all, does it actually light me up inside? Or is it just something I think I should do? yeah So whether it's ah your goal as a photo shoot or you just, you see people on the internet and you're like, Oh, I want to look like her. I want to look lean. It's like not um it's sustainable. I say that to people. I'm like, like what I achieved for my own photo shoot. I remember people were like,
00:28:24
Speaker
my friends are like, Oh, you're going to have these apps forever. I was like, Oh my God, no, I'm not, I'd be miserable. That's what people need to realize, especially with the amount of online coaches out there now. And I have spoken about this in the podcast before, not, and I feel like not in a while, I get really heated about this, but I'm like, what the photos you're seeing people sharing, they have traded quite a lot to get that physique, to get those photos, to share with you, to make you think that that's what fitness is.
00:28:48
Speaker
I will never lie and say there's more sacrifices in a photo shoot than there is a lifestyle and it's a case that if you're just crying to like create more of a healthier lifestyle and just feel more confident. There's no need for photo shoot. Like even though I put some of the girls through photo shoots, I'll always ask them like, but like, do you really need to do it? Like, and I put them through them and like, obviously like not pushed to a extent where like I said, disrupts the relationship with food, but I'll always be like, are you doing this for yourself because it lights you up? Or are you doing this because of social media?
00:29:20
Speaker
Does that make sense? Like sometimes I'll really ask and like, even like I remember I asked you, I was like, do you want to do this for you? Or does it align with your goals and stuff like that? Or like what you're looking to achieve? And even I was like, oh, maybe I'll do another one. And then I was like, why? Why do I need to do another one? I don't need to do another one. I just need to do a bit of a fat loss phase if I want to feel more comfortable. And that's like enough, you know, kind of thing. Like I said, it it sounds awful, but like majority of the time when people do photo shoots, like they only actually look like that for a day.
00:29:48
Speaker
You know, like obviously a lot of my clients have come out and they've reversed very, very, very well. It's a case that like they do reverse and we bring calories back up and it kind of is a goal to be able to get back to a place that they can.
00:30:00
Speaker
maintain, you know? So it's like, why don't you just do a diet that you can maintain for the rest of your life rather than having to go that extra mile? Now you can do a photo shoot where you just do a photo shoot, lose a couple of pounds. And I sometimes say that to good with the girls. I'm like, why don't we just go through a fat loss phase? And if you want to do a photo shoot at the end, it just be a photo shoot that you feel good about, not that you have to like put yourself under pressure to work towards, if that makes
Confidence Beyond Weight and Appearance
00:30:23
Speaker
sense.
00:30:23
Speaker
I think the key around all of this, when we're setting goals, is feeling. How do you want to feel? What is this goal going to make you feel like? It it can't be about a better number. If anyone listening, if your goal is, I want to be nine stone 12, or I want to be 10 stone two, or whatever, it like that number, you're going to feel the exact same when you hit that number. Or even even a close size, if you're like, oh, my goal is I want to be a size 10.
00:30:51
Speaker
If you just restrict your way down to a size 10, you're going to feel like the same person that you are now when you reach that size 10. It's not an enough. like its And even if it is a photo shoot, if you're doing it just to look a certain way, to like to have these photos, be like, oh, look at me. i i like you know And be proud of yourself or whatever. If it's for the look.
00:31:10
Speaker
It's not, it for it like for me, it's not enough to get me through. First of all, I know some people are probably a little bit stricter on themselves than I am and can push through and and go for goals that really don't fulfill them. But what you need to, anyone listening, if you like if you're setting goals, what do you want? Like, what do you actually want? How's it going to make you feel?
00:31:31
Speaker
And why is it important to you? And it's so important to spend some time on that. And that can be confusing as well. Like because we're so like exposed to so much, like we take my goals, for example, at the minute is very much health. Like I mean, you've spoken a lot about this. yeah People will see that I don't, I'm not sharing a whole lot about my goals or my journey at the minute on my social media because I'm a little bit undecided myself. I like to have something to work towards because. It's just the way I'm wired. I like, I like a little goal. It's just nice to be focused. For me, it's very much health, but I also want to feel confident and feel good. And although I'm at a healthy weight and you know, well, I'm just recovering from being, from having the flu, probably not wasn't as healthy as I thought it was for me. Yeah. It's very much about food quality, what like eating a fruit and vegetables, just tidying up my diet a little bit, eating a little bit better, but also let's lose a little body fat at the same time, get fitter with my running and keep strong at my training.
00:32:22
Speaker
even if I look back on my photo shoot that definitely like a son asked me this actually ages ago and they're like would you have said that was your most confident? I was like oh god no. I was like no. I was like you're so endowed of like of being leaner that like you actually your confidence is from within and like that's really what I've worked on over the last probably like since then probably last two years and stuff is just like focusing on confidence through how you feel like I'm My confidence now is coming from my running, like from getting PB's from looking like my quality of food is so much better. Like I was even speaking to you about it, like focusing on my sleep, focusing on it like your downtime. Like it's not just the number on the scale. So like you can lose a stone and be like, I actually don't feel any better. Like you said, and I'm like, well, what way did you lose that stone? Did you lose that stone by restriction? Has your sleep been in bits? Have you not been able to socialize? Have you been like doing so much cardio that your body is so exhausted? I was like all of these things are actual health and I was like that's what's also going to lead most importantly to be honest to confidence rather than what you see on the scales. Like what you also need to realise is you don't have to wait till you reach the goal to feel that way. Like I'm such a believer in fake it till you make it. Like you should be living, you should be in like, okay this it sounds so cliche as well, you know the joy is in the journey but it is, it's like if you can actually enjoy being like yes
00:33:43
Speaker
I drank my two liters of water today. I did that run. I walked a little bit of, but I don't care. I still got out the door and I got it done. Got my gym session done. And you're like, do you know what? I'm the absolute boss here. Like I'm just taking all my boxes and I'm feeling amazing about it. I'm really smug. That's where the joy is. Oh, it is. Cause whenever, whenever I look at when I do a fat ass phase or when I did a photo shoot or when I do like the phase I'm currently in now with my hierarchy performance phase.
00:34:09
Speaker
or I do an improvement phase, I actually never look at the end result. Like when I look at my photo shoot, I actually think about the journey because with my photo shoot, I didn't have a goal weight. I hadn't a clue what i what way I was gonna look like. I was nearly naive about it, but in ah in actually the best way possible.
00:34:25
Speaker
because it made me enjoy the journey and so whenever I look at certain points I'm like no I liked the journey of it and I think if anything if you can look at it that way it's going to improve your relationship with the scales it's going to improve your relationship with your body it's going to improve your relationship with food because I feel like what happens is we subconsciously punish ourselves if the scales isn't going the right way, or if you feel like your physique isn't going the right way. And like when I go back and check and check in, I'm like, well, your clothes are feeling better. You have more energy. I'm like, you're making better choices. You're not going in that to that all or nothing approach. I'm like, like people get so fixated on the number. I'm like, you need to look at the habits.
00:35:02
Speaker
because ah for example I actually say this all the time in fact when you're thinking about a certain person so you know the way some people are like oh I want to get back to this weight and I'm like okay well let's just not even think about the weight Isaac though you're actually not even thinking about the weight I mean you're thinking about the person most of the time when someone thinks about, oh, I really want to get back to 13 stone two years ago. I'm like, that stone 13 stone or 10 stone, nine stone is irrelevant. I was like, you're actually thinking about the person who you were. I was like, you're thinking how you felt? Yes. The confidence, the energy, you looked like that. we like Nobody, you don't remember like the actual weight. I'm like, you remember how you felt, but people just put a number straight on it and think that's the answer. And I'm like,
00:35:45
Speaker
No, no, no. And as I was like, especially like, depending on where you are with life, if you've lost muscle, gain muscle, where you're currently at, like that number is going to look so different. So I'm like, let's just focus on how you felt back then. And let's visualize that and let's work towards that. And then I always say as well, I'm like, when you look back at a certain person and you're like, Oh, I really want to get back to her. I'm like, or him, I'm like, okay, well, what did they represent? Like, what did they do on a daily basis? And they'd be like, Oh, they're really good getting their steps in. they're really good at making better choices and I'm like okay well that's what we need to do. I'm like that's what made you feel better so let's work back to getting back to the person that created those habits rather than the person that was the number on the scales.
00:36:24
Speaker
Yeah, and it's the doing the habits that'll make you feel like the person sooner than you think rather than when you hit the 13 stone. Usually I'm always just like, please just focus on the habits. I'm like just sometimes like with clients, I'm like just literally remove the scales. I'm like, let's just focus on you literally. Yeah, we do that at a lot as well. yeah I have clients that literally have no idea what they weigh anymore.
00:36:43
Speaker
If I ever have a client that's like, I am just like, actually, no, I'm the same. I actually have probably four clients that halfway themselves I'd say in about six
Adapting Goals to Life Changes
00:36:51
Speaker
months. And I'm like, it doesn't make a difference. Like, so obviously people would be like, as a body composition coach, is that all important? But I do have clients that may not want to be as body composition focused. And that is absolutely no problem. But even as a body composition, there's a huge difference between weight loss and fat loss. percent I was literally about to go into that next. So I was like, if even as a body composition someone was like, I don't really want to weigh myself, I'd be like, okay, once I like can get visuals, I was like, at the end of the day, body composition is visual and how you're feeling. So I'm like, that's the most important kind of thing.
00:37:22
Speaker
you know But it is, if someone if people can start to focus more on how they want to feel rather than what a number says on the scales, I feel like people will be a lot more confident, a lot more fulfilled with their life, and a lot more just happier within themselves.
00:37:38
Speaker
That's literally exactly what I was going to say. I was going literally going to be like, I wrote this down while you were talking. There was like confidence, evidence. Those habits, that's where confidence, that's the secret to where confidence, that feeling is. It's building the evidence that you can do it and being proud of yourself for but for repeatedly doing it. And if you struggle to get those habits down initially, don't beat yourself up. the Your biggest enemy is going to be guilt and shame. It's like most of us aren't lazy.
00:38:06
Speaker
Most of us are just too fucking and busy, too busy, too overworked, too overwhelmed, and or we might just have some emotional work we need to work through. And once we do that, I think once we don't give up on ourselves and we're like, okay, shit, my habits all fell apart this week. wow Like, you know, that sure, like me and you are only talking about this, this happens to me all the time. like and you yourself back ah it just I just take a really long time to reach goals, but I think that makes me good coverage. That's okay. Like, I feel like people have this thing, like,
00:38:34
Speaker
especially like when people reply to my like, let's say when I'm putting up like a physique photo, people always reply. How long does that take? Why does it matter? They achieved it. They're going to maintain it. It doesn't matter whether they took four months or nine months. I'm like, it doesn't matter. I was like, we are so fixated on time schedules. And that's why like,
00:38:52
Speaker
When people put up, I'm not dizzying eight week challenges. I think they're brilliant, but also I do have ah an opinion in a sense that it puts people under pressure to achieve a certain goal in such a short space of time. And then it leaves them disappointed. So like whenever I talk to friends, I'm like, let's just focus on the next six months. So it completely removes this timeline of like, I need to do this or I need to achieve this.
00:39:12
Speaker
So then they become more like, like you say, enjoying the process rather than being like, Oh, I need to lose 10 kilos in three months. And I'm like, well, you're actually going to run yourself into the ground trying to do that. Especially if it's like, for example, I still, I work with busy moms as well. And one of them, I came up on it in a call and I was like, I'm being honest. I was like, can we just not focus on that? I was like, that's not to say that we won't achieve it, but putting yourself under so much pressure. to achieve that in what I would consider a short space of time especially if someone's training at home and stuff, it'll just take away from actually the whole goal of like we said, wanting to feel better, better, because it's, they could still lose a couple of kilos and wait aside and they could feel absolutely so much better for it but
00:39:53
Speaker
because they haven't achieved that goal in that short space of time, it's then people start to compare and be like, oh, like that's not good enough. And I'm like, no, no, no, like it's, we should stop comparing as well to other people because everyone has different lifestyles. Everyone has, some people have more time than other people. And so like, for example, if like whether someone is 25 or someone's 50 or someone's 30, someone could be really, really busy with work and comparing to someone that doesn't, isn't as busy with work, so has more time to put into their physique or into their habits and stuff like that. And I always say like, you should just focus on as well. Like when you have certain goals, like I'm spoke to you about this, like we'll have certain goals. And sometimes we have to readjust those goals based on your circumstances with life, because that can change. You know, you could all of a sudden have loads of time and
00:40:40
Speaker
you have this big goal and you're like brilliant. And then life happens and you don't have the same amount of time. And then we what's really important is readjusting those goals and expectations. Because if you don't, I think that's what leads to people being disappointed. But it's like, no, you've still achieved so much.
00:40:57
Speaker
with your current circumstances. And I think that's what people completely neglect. They just don't even think like, everyone's life is different. So that is one of the reasons why makete people may achieve different things is because some people have more time or less time, and different issues with food or different relationships with exercise or different, like we say, mindsets that sometimes someone will come to me they'll have this goal and I'm like no we really need to work on your mindset before we work work on the goal. I make because your mindset is going to be the driving factor of that physique also it's like your mind your habits kind of thing.
00:41:30
Speaker
ah I take back what I said earlier about the enemy you know is the enemy ah towards your goals being guilt and shame. It is guilt, it is shame, but it's also time restraint. Attaching guilt when things don't go according to plan, feeling shameful, and but in giving yourself time limits. why why like i to you back to people like so Why do we have to achieve so much weight loss in such a short time?
00:41:53
Speaker
They're like, I don't know. And I'm like, do we have something coming up? No. I'm like, why are we? But even if we do, even if we do, let's just take that. I think just you take that away and it just, it's it's just, it's like a weight off your shoulders. It's a freedom. It's like, I have goals and I'll keep looking at my goals and I'll keep asking myself why. And you know, if they change slightly, that's okay. But I'm focused on what's important to me and I'll get there.
00:42:18
Speaker
It's a lifetime. Like it's your life. It's forever. Obviously, you know, you're, you're looking to get fit. You're looking to get healthy and you want to be able to keep it forever. So what is the rush? Like you said, if they do achieve it in that timeframe, brilliant, grand, that's fine. But I always say, I firmly believe the people that stop focusing on the toilets, you say this to people all the time.
00:42:39
Speaker
is like the people that stop focusing on the timeframe and just actually focus on doing tend to be a lot happier and achieve the results they're looking for rather than the people that are so fixated on the end goal and timeline on it.
00:42:53
Speaker
I'm like, so you end up stressing yourself over it so much that I'm like, you actually forget what you're meant to do in order to get there. So I'm like, let's just focus on being present and focus on today, focusing on sticking to our calories today, getting our training in today, then worrying about two months time or a
Muscle Building and Diet Breaks
00:43:07
Speaker
holiday. and Like stress is such a big factor to body composition. Like it's so important. So like.
00:43:12
Speaker
Whenever my girls are, for example, in a father's face and they're getting so stressed out, like they'd be like, Oh, do you think I'm going to lose this amount of weight by this holiday? Do you think I'm like, stop, stop. I'm like, you're, yeah I sometimes I'll be harsh than I'll be like, if you can, if you carry on like that, now you probably won't because you'll stress yourself out so much that your body will stop responding. So I was like, let's just focus on today, focus on winning this week.
00:43:34
Speaker
and everything else will follow. And the less you stop focusing on the future, the more you just be present and actually just enjoy life a bit better, to be honest. Yeah. In relation to body composition goals, right? I think another that misconception that people have, but as well apart from the ah the cost of being lean, you know, what, like the trade-offs that are actually needed and the consistency and the habits and the, you know, all of that. It's also, I don't think most people realize that most of those photos they see online or whatever,
00:44:03
Speaker
Most of the year is spent in either at maintenance or in a calorie surplus with short dieting phases. So this is where we need to learn how to eat more, fuel our bodies and train hard. Now I have plenty of ladies who are like, do I really need to lift weights?
00:44:20
Speaker
Yes, you need to lift weights. We all need to lift weights. It's so, so, so important. And it doesn't have to be in a gym. It can be at home. We need to lift weights and we need to fuel our bodies and eat well most of the time, get into a slight deficit when we want to do lose body fat. But if we can just try and be as efficient as possible with it, let's say not efficient, as consistent as possible with our fat loss, get out of it, get back to maintenance.
00:44:46
Speaker
see where we're at and regroup. I always say to people I'm like your dream physique is in the gym with more food. I always say I'm like genuinely like there's not a hope like when I was like I hate the word skinny fat but when I was like had less muscle and had a little bit of body fat and stuff like that I wasn't confident not because of like the word skinny fat or because I had body fat because I whenever people are like I want to be toned I'm like you do realize that requires muscle I'm like, you don't diet yourself to a toned physique. So it is like when I look back over the last couple of years, I spent more time in a surplus or at maintenance, focusing on lifting more weights, lifting heavier, focusing on eating more than I did dieting. And the thing is, and then, cause a lot of people are like, Oh, did you just diet loads to get to those physiques? I'm like, no, like I probably only spent like 20, 30% of a dieting and the rest of it was in an improvement phase.
00:45:42
Speaker
And like you, like I said, with some of my girls, I said, you don't have to go through a really big circles or posture calories to a big screen where then you start to feel extremely uncomfortable. I'm like, you don't need to do that. And it doesn't matter what age you are. It isn't so important that you take diet breaks.
00:45:59
Speaker
you cannot diet. Like for a lot of my clients, if they have a bigger diet, like a bigger fat hospital to go towards, I'm like, it is so important that we structure our diet breaks, whether it's like they have a holiday or if they don't have a holiday, I'd be like, right, we're going to come out of a diet break or diet, our diet now. And sometimes they'll be like, well, I don't need to. And I've like, your body's not responding. It needs a bit of a break. And that's where people don't realize it's like, they're like, they're like, Oh,
00:46:22
Speaker
spen And this is what I find happens a lot as people will be on such low calories and then they're burning themselves out so much. Basically what happens is they end up just like coming into fatigue, put themselves off dieting, think then that they can't get any further. But I'm like, no, if you actually just gave yourself two to three, some people need four months of actually taking a diet break, you're speeding up your results to the requirements. to the desired physique. So for example, I actually use actually my brother's now wife, right? We died it for her wedding and she lost 18 to 19 kilos. Okay. Now that was, ace yeah, she did really, really well. And that was over the space of like not about over a year, right? But I remember it was probably like
00:47:08
Speaker
six months to the wedding, I was like, okay, you're not responding anymore. We need to take a dive break for about three months. And she goes, what? And where we're like, I never forget her face. And she's like, what? And I was like, no, we need to bring our calories back up. You need to get back into the gym. We need to bring her, but like like ideally I would have liked longer, but obviously we had a timeframe. So I was like, right, we need three months. And she was like, no, it's so close to my wedding cap. Like I can't do that. Like I'm like, I'm going to slow down my results. And I was like, every decision, this is what people need to realize. Every decision a coach makes when it comes to your results,
00:47:36
Speaker
They are only trying to make it better. So if anything, they're trying to speed up your results, not in an unhealthy way, but so you don't need yourself to burnout or leaving yourself with such low calories that you end up putting it back on. And people don't realize the more muscle you have, the easier it is to stay.
00:47:54
Speaker
leaner or have less body fat. That's literally the reason why I train. I'm literally like, you know, I'm 38, I'll be 39 this year. So, you know, pushing on a little bit, getting towards more. but I'm like, you know, obviously all the important health reasons as well. But if I'm being completely honest, I've spoken about this before. I'm like, I don't want to have to eat less and less and less the older I get.
00:48:15
Speaker
to keep, to maintain body weight. I was like, I am going to fight this middle age spread. And I'm like, I want to keep a decent amount of muscle on my body, maybe build a bit more so that I can eat like a normal person. That's my goal. It's not what it is. And that's literally what I say to people all the time. When I say to people, I'm like, right, if we go through a muscle building phase or take a diet break, where we focus on building a bit of muscle, we focus on bringing your calories back up, you will be able to then diet a little bit further, but also have the chances of maintaining that physique are so much higher because now you have muscle to support
Reverse Dieting and Maintenance
00:48:49
Speaker
it. And that's why like people don't realize as well why it's so important for improving phases. People don't understand why some people may have to diet lower than others. And it's the reason being is, for example, when I diet now and when I died a few years ago, I'm able to get diet with like, I can start in 2,500 calories and lose weight. But if I tried to die it but i tried to diet, it when I tried to do my first ever dieting phase, let's say four years ago,
00:49:14
Speaker
or whatever i now that's probably six years ago or something before I started putting on a good bit of muscle I would have to start straight on 1800 calories and that is because it's not because I'm any taller anything or any any different it's genuinely just because I now have muscle to support it therefore my body burns more body fat.
00:49:31
Speaker
but yeah well And that's why it's, I'm like, if you want to be able to maintain a lower body fat percentage in a healthy, like just not talking about shredded here, just, and just being a little bit leaner, have more muscle. Like, and yeah so like and just to give context to people. So Katrina is 26 and you're quite tall. What, what height are you?
00:49:50
Speaker
um let she sex vote like No, she's six foot. So that's why, you know, starting a diet at 2,500 calories, people would be like, oh my God, I gained so much weight. But myself then being 38 and I'm five foot six, I'm dieting currently at 2,100 calories. Yeah. Which is because I've got, and this is like another goal of like, you know, dieting down a little bit. I have a decent amount of muscle on my frame. I've been strength trainer for many years now. I'm not a great dieter, to be fair. I'll diet to a certain point. And then I'm like, now I'm comfortable here now. I'm done. I'll never, there's never any fear of me going to the extremes when it comes to dieting. Because I think because health is such an important value of mine. Like Kate Hampton, health. This is why, you know, the whole point of this podcast as well. But I think,
00:50:34
Speaker
You know, knowing dust that like there is a lot of, there's a lot of muscle in under there, which is great, which makes me be able to. So like my maintenance, like, I know we haven't, we haven't done main maintenance together really yet, but like. No way. If we did a property, we could get your maintenance up to 2,500 over a proper reverse. Like, yeah, no, I wreck. Yeah. and And there was a time, no, and not as I know I'm a little bit older now. There was a time I was maintaining on 2,800 calories. Yeah.
00:51:01
Speaker
It's easy. I'm probably, I think I maintain on about 2,600 now, as far as i I'm aware. But I think what's really important as well, when we're talking about these maintenance phases or improvement phases, as as you called, for anyone who might not know what an improvement phase is, it's a nicer way of putting a gaining phase where we're actively using in a bit of a surplus. A book! The one thing that people don't do in a fatless phase is they don't reverse. They'll diet to whatever. Let's say they finish on 1700 calories. And then I'm like, you do realize now you need to go through a couple of weeks of bringing your calories back up. And that's why I feel like that's where I feel like there's a huge, it's what's so important. I always see people I'm like, that's probably the biggest and the most important thing about having a coach is that reverse phase of like,
00:51:44
Speaker
Being able to understand that you can now, just because you've died in 1700, let's say we bring you back up to 2000 straight away or 1900, everyone is different. But it's like knowing that it's like, oh, you can actually spend a couple of weeks now bringing your calories back up ever so slowly or slightly. But the chances of you then maintaining your physique again are so much higher because now you've given you, you're now maintaining your weight at like 2,200 rather than have basically when people come out of a dining phase, They stick at 1700 for so long but that now their maintenance is like 1800. And then it's like, you need to be able to bring it back up so then you can actually live more, be more healthy, have more energy, and also maintain the weight that you've currently lost.
00:52:28
Speaker
Would you recommend people coming up like, so just say they finish a diet on 1700 calories. Should their calories be brought up like a hundred at a time per week? It depends on someone who has cardio. So if someone doesn't have cardio and they just did it through calories, I would just be like, go back straight to maintenance. I'd be like- If you'll up them by three or 400 calories straight away. No cardio straight away. Like they'll maintain its grant. But if someone has 1700 calories and they're doing a good bit of cardio after the workout,
00:52:57
Speaker
then what I'll do is usually I'll bring them from 17 to 19 or something depending on the client yeah but and I'll reduce their clo their their cardio slightly as well because remember when you're bringing your calories up but then you're also decreasing your cardio that's still food that you're essentially not food but like calories and energy yeah energy that you're reducing. So it's like you want to be able to match that kind of thing like that. If you go from, and that's where some people don't reverse, probably as they finish their diet, they're like, Grant, I've been doing so and so meant to cardio. I've been on 1700 calories. I'm finished now next week. They go back to 2000.
00:53:33
Speaker
calories and let's say they've been doing a good bit of cardio and then they're like, right, we're not going to do that anymore. Sometimes some people's bodies respond fine like that, but not to say everyone's does. So I always say it's important to give yourself around a leeway of two weeks of slowly, gently reducing your cardio and increasing your food at the same time. Again, if someone comes out of a fat loss phase and their food focus is quite high, then I will usually bring again, every person, if someone's fatigue is high, I'll bring their calorie, their cardio down first more than their food.
00:54:03
Speaker
or if someone's food focus is a little bit higher, which I try not to get clients to that point, then I'll increase their food first. Again, that's why it's important to have a coach because it's it's it's different for every person. Yeah. And I think as well, it's important to kind of, when you come out of it as well, kind of find, to not being afraid to find the tipping point as well. Being like, you know, that little jump increase a little bit for ah each week, for a few weeks, see where, see where you end up like, you know, notice when you start to put a pound or two or three on and then be like, okay, maybe we need to just take it back a hundred there. And this is where we need to sit for now. So then when you find that tipping point and you want to bring someone into an improvement phase, what do you do then?
00:54:41
Speaker
So usually obviously I get to a point also just for reference for anyone that's coming out of a reverse and let's say they're like, whatever, let's say they're 70 kilos when they finished, right? And they come to bring their calories back up. Don't be worried if you go back up a kilo or two, like that's just carbohydrates. Like it's like holding a bit more water more food volume, more water and their food volume, water, everything like that. It's just genuinely like, I'm like, it's that's completely normal. I feel like when people come out of fat loss phase, they're like, Oh God, I put on a kilo. I'm like, it's literally just food in your stomach. I'm like, I'm the extra bit of water that's attached to the more car by water egg and the carbohydrates that you're having. I was like, you're fine. But to go back to what you're saying there. Yeah. So we get, basically what I do is I get them obviously a couple of weeks where they reverse. So we get to a point that they're, some of them will want to keep a little bit of cardio in for cardiovascular health and that's obviously fine. And then we'll get to a point. So usually again, it depends on, it really depends on the the relationship with the food for the client. so
00:55:36
Speaker
So like I have some girls that will go into this phase with that will be very nervous. They've never done it before. So I like ever do whatever so slightly. So I might bring it up by like. 15 grams of carbs, like 20, 30 calories or 50 calories, sorry. Or I might be kind of like a case of like bringing them up by 25 grams of carbs where it's a hundred calories or a case of like could be 150, but usually it ranges between 50 to a whole hundred calories, maybe for the first week or two weeks, three weeks. If even some people like, for example, I have a client that probably took about eight weeks to get up like an extra.
00:56:11
Speaker
300 calories, you know, some person, another person can go up 300 calories in three weeks because their body responds, but 50 to 50 calories. If you want to kind of.
00:56:21
Speaker
take it slowly, watch your body respond. And if you feel like that the weight is kind of staying the same with its fluctuations, bring it up, try a hundred, you know, kind of thing like that, and then leave it there for a little while. It's not a case that like when you went to improvement phase, you don't bring up the calories every single week. Like if someone's in an improvement phase, like some of my girls are going on to like week 20, but they've been on 2,500 calories for like the last like let's say six weeks because that's what's working for them. Sometimes they can get to a point it's not always about pushing and then you get to a point it's like okay 2500 is enough of a surplus for them. They're responding well and now it's actually about like body recomping a little bit where their physique actually starts to look better while building muscle because we're not pushing food as much anymore.
Food Quality in Improvement Phases
00:57:07
Speaker
if that Does that make sense?
00:57:08
Speaker
And that's it. And you're, exactly you're monitoring exactly what their body looks like. Maybe not focusing as much on weight at this stage. You're looking at measurements, you're looking at photos, really. The thing is literally how a person's physique, like when someone's in an improved phase, he like sometimes is proper like Jim bros, but they'd be like, Oh, I have to get to like a hundred kilos. And I'm like, why? Like, like, what does that a hundred kilos mean? Like when they're like, Oh, like you hear of people like trying to push their body weight in an improved phase. And I'm like,
00:57:38
Speaker
No, at the end of the day, you're just actually trying to grow. So I'm like, you bring your calories up ever so slightly. And then to be honest, personally, the weight actually becomes slightly irrelevant unless it starts to drastically increase. Yeah. Yeah. You're monitoring it more just for health reasons. When we're pushing calories up.
00:57:56
Speaker
that food quality stays good. So it's not a case that, you know, it's a free-for-all that you're stuffing your face full of like brownies and crisps and eating whatever you want. Like, woohoo, I'm in a gaining phase. It's like, you're, you're looking to build muscle. You're not looking to build body fat. Obviously their but body fat will be a little bit of a by-product, but you want to really like, and I think it's really important to not be afraid that, you know, with good quality food, you know, decent proteins, good fiber rich foods, healthy fats, you're, you're to look strong. You're going to look fit.
00:58:25
Speaker
You're probably still going to look quite lean, maybe not as lean as you were when you when you finished your diet. or you're In a lot of ways, like what you said there, you're going to look better and you're going to feel better. I very much, ill exactly, but ah yeah that hey the big one is feel better. A lot of the time people start to feel sluggish.
00:58:42
Speaker
and unconfident in improvement phases obviously maybe because they push a little bit too hard with calories of course but also it comes down to the food quality i was literally speaking to someone about this the other day and i was like i did a my first ever improvement phase i being honest felt shocking after him and first of all i pushed a little bit too hard but also the quality of my food just was not great like i was probably taking like a little bit of the piss a bit more and i put in like that it was much much younger than i am right now but i was kind of like just like having more sugary stuff because i just thought of like the dirty bulk that's what everyone did to be able to put on muscle and stuff
00:59:19
Speaker
And then it's like, no, but like that's at the end of the day, when you actually focus on food quality, like when you have proper food before your work, like your workout, you have proper food after your workout, like proper carbs, like not just like, I'm going to have like, well, it's nothing wrong with having a cookie, but like,
00:59:35
Speaker
have like, you know, like something that's going to be better is like rice, oats, potatoes, like whatever it is, a bagel, stuff like that. It's not having a bag of jellies before you go and train kind of thing like that. This is literally like what I did this time last year with Emma. It was like we started an improvement phase. I was, you know, I was trekking away, but I was like, oh, the weekends, so we'll go and have coffee on. I might just get that brownie or that cookie or whatever. It's like gained a little bit too much body fat too quick, but it was my first experience of it. but And, you know, and still I would have very much had that balance, those balanced meals. Like, you know, what so I was i knew health wise, I was getting the food, but I was also having the extra little bits as well. And I didn't feel healthy for it. I did start to feel sluggish and I was like, and it put me off. I was like, this is not what I'm about. This doesn't feel healthy to me. Yeah. And it affects your performance. Like I say to people all the time, like I'm like,
01:00:21
Speaker
your energy is not going to be the same so therefore your performance is not going to be same and the whole point of the food the driving factor of the food is for more energy for more performance so when you obviously are able to lift more in the gym because you now have more energy from quality of food therefore you're going to obviously drive more muscle to like grow more muscle from that so if you're obviously having jellies or you're having like I don't know, Dunkin' Donuts or whatever. Sorry, Krispy Kreme or something all the time. yeah we cat will Like even though I love them, that's not what's going to get you a PB in the gym to be able to grow more glutes or grow more like delts or whatever it is. I'm like, it's going to be your proper structured meal. So when I look at like
01:01:03
Speaker
people like doing improvement basis. I'm like, I want you to have, like when you're having 3000 calories or 2500 calories, I'm like, I want you to be having like five, six meals a day. And they're like, that's a lot cut. And I'm like, yeah, or four, three, or four. Once it's proper quality food, I don't want to see.
01:01:16
Speaker
a thousand calories worth of snacks. And that's even for someone that's in a deficit, like the habits are the exact same. It's like, you know, like I'm like, when someone comes into an improving place, they're like, what do I change? I was like, you literally just eat more of what you're currently eating what you were eating in a deficit. Obviously there's going to be certain digestion issues where you might not be able to have some people can't have as much pasta or like rice or whatever it is. Everyone is, every person is different based on their own kind of thing. But like the main thing is, is the case that you just start to eat more. I'm like, don't people just start thinking, oh, I'm proof of faith. I can just more eat more of.
01:01:48
Speaker
the sugary stuff and i'm like of course it it creates more flexibility but i do think the people that focus on food quality more tend to actually get that body compositional change a lot more than they're looking for yeah absolutely and it does it gives that more of a flexibility to be able to have a bit more you know if you're going out for dinner you have a more calories to play around with or if you end up over your calories for the week it's not the end of the world You know, if you have an occasion on or whatever, it makes that that, that flexibility a bit easier, but it's the day-to-day life. And this is i like, actually, let me just go going back to when I was working with Emma, because I just want to be really clear. It was nothing wrong with what she was literally like, Kate, your meals are supposed to be the same, just a little bit more. And she's like, think was go easy on the brownies. You know, that it is very much your. so
01:02:31
Speaker
You're so right. And you say the same thing. She says the same thing. Lindsay says the same thing in our coaching as well. And it's it's very true. Any clients that we do have that are, you know, coming up towards maintenance, looking to go into an improvement phase. It is very much about keeping so your breakfast, lunch, dinner, maybe adding in an extra little meal if you need to, but it's just more of it. Like, so, you know, Lindsay's a big believer in, you know, instead of having her 30 grams of oats, she'll have 60 grams of oats.
01:02:55
Speaker
So literally if I'm looking at, ah for example, if I look at the clients, my fitness part and now they're bringing up their food, I'm like, ah I literally say that I'm like, right. So I'm having 30 grams of oats, have 60 instead of having 70 grams of pasta. And they'll have 90 instead of having 150 grams of potatoes. Now have two 50, you know, kind of thing like that.
01:03:11
Speaker
Maybe throw in a squares bar now because you want something like a little bit yummy or pre-sack so like faster testing that's brand and you can have that in a deficit also. Do you know what I did actually? I introduced a bowl of Special K every day and I just thought it was so funny because I remember when I was like in my early 20s doing the Special K diet. yeah know i'm Now I'm eating Special K to you know gain muscle. It was so funny I really enjoyed it actually. I really enjoyed my Special K. I might have a bowl soon.
01:03:36
Speaker
but the not overthinking it and just slowly improving your food choices. And as well, if you focus on like the quality of your food, the chances as well, like your palate, like your cravings are going to be a lot less also. I find sometimes people go into improvement based and they're like, well, I'm actually craving more than I was in a deficit. I was like, that's because your deficit was, I don't want to say quote unquote cleaner, but I had a lot more whole foods in it. So therefore you weren't craving as much. Like the more sugar you think you have, the more you crave. Like I find that you say yesterday and crave more and go, you have more snacks. And she goes, yeah. And I go, it's as fast as I can.
01:04:10
Speaker
And like, that's it. And I think when we're in our diet phase, or I'm conscious of time, so we are going to finish up soon, but you know, in your diet phase, it's really important if you enjoy chocolate to have a little bit of it, like I will always have ah have a little bit of chocolate every day because I love chocolate.
Balanced Snacking and Routine Adjustments
01:04:24
Speaker
So I'll have my cup of tea with my little chocolate bar. Yeah. And I'll keep that the same, whether I was, you know, at maintenance, whether I was proof of phase, whether I was dieting, because it's part of my lifestyle and I like it.
01:04:35
Speaker
But I don't feel my whole day full of chocolate because then I'd crave it all the time. Like I don't, as much as I may want to have a chocolate with my 11 a.m. coffee, I tend not to because then I'll just want it all day. Whereas I look forward to it after I collect the kids from school, I come home and have another coffee. And I'll usually have my chocolate bar then. I used to have it at nighttime when my kids were small and they'd go to bed and I'd have my cup of tea and my chocolate bars and watch a bit of Netflix. And it was my habit for a long time and I look forward to it. But I find now that I'm getting old, what's happening is the sugar and the cat, that's the sugar. Sugar and the caffeine, no, you will understand in about 10 years' time. The sugar keeps me awake, wakes me up now, bedtime, and the caffeine and the tea. But what happens is I'll have it, and people who've listened to the podcast have heard this story because I talk about this a lot. And then I'll go to sleep, and then what will happen is an hour later, I'll wake because I need to eat. And I get really mad because it disturbs my sleep. So I've had to move my evening tea to post school afternoon school run. Coffee and chocolate is a nice time for me. That's your habits there. That's like the difference is like, like I always say, if someone is really, no, you don't even have to be really serious about your physique. But if you are quite serious about like you're building muscle or actually wanting to see change.
01:05:43
Speaker
the quality of your food is important and it's not just calories and lifting weight. I'm like it is food quality is so important. And like I say, it is the same when you're in a deficit. Like when I look at someone's my fitness pal, I don't look at it any different when someone's in a fast phase and when someone's in an improved phase.
01:05:59
Speaker
If someone, both of them have over a thousand calories worth of snacks. First of all, I'm going to say the person in the improvement phase, I'll make her energies through. They're going to be on the floor. Your skin's probably going to be in bits. I was like, that's why you're not pushing weight at the minute because your food quality is not there. And then the person that's in a deficit, I'm like, you're making your deficit harder now because the snacks are so calorie dense.
01:06:18
Speaker
that they're leaving you feel so unsatisfied because they're not actually filling you because they're empty. Like he was ever had eight or six rice cakes. That's 600 calories and fell full afters, you know, kind of thing. yeah so it' So true. And it doesn't matter your goals. Going back to the start, whether we're talking about half marathons, five Ks, the same as your goal on everything that we've literally you spoken about is yeah anything. Sometimes I always say that like it's even more important because it's so performance focused, but again,
01:06:46
Speaker
If you're serious about your goals, your food quality should be at the forefront of it. I think that's such a
Diet Breaks and Internal Wellness
01:06:52
Speaker
lovely place to finish it. It's like, just eat proper food, people, myself included, yourself included. And we all need, but it's important to remember, we're all human. So, you know, we're all going to blips and slips and you know, they and go, shit, what happened? I had a McDonald's and I was out and I and had a burger and chips and in the pub or, you know, It like, it happens to everyone. And then it's just like, I would never have a yeah to tidy it up a bit now, you know? exactly And it's the biggest reminders to everyone that you can not diet your way to your dream physique, that you have to take diet breaks and focus on building muscle in order to like, feel actually confident. I always found taking diet breaks and focusing on improvement phases, if anything, improve my relationship with my body because I stopped focusing on it being constantly smaller. When people are constantly dieting, they're constantly fixating. So it's important to have them rated, not only just for performance goals.
01:07:41
Speaker
All right, I'm going to put you on the spot. Last question. Oh God. I feel like I've literally rambled about everything on this podcast. No, it's been amazing. What does the word help mean to you? Take a minute. I'll ramble at you for a minute. What do you think? I ask everyone, most people this question I ask, I get really interesting answers. Like I'm such a plain Jane, but mine will be probably confidence, energy, happiness within self.
01:08:11
Speaker
And balance. Yes. If I feel like when I look at health, when I feel like I have the energy, I have confidence, balance, and I actually forget my other one now. That's, that's what I feel like as health is like feeling good within your body. It's not just, again, we can look at the leanest of people and look like they're so strong and doesn't actually mean that they're healthy. It's just an outside. So it's a lot of the health actually comes from within.
01:08:36
Speaker
And I think that's what makes you such a great coach is that you can get people to, to their goals with the balance that's needed. yeah So important. So, so important. We'll never, we'll never take away balance from our queens. know Katrina, thank you so much for sharing everything that you have shared with us on the podcast. It's been an amazing conversation. I could keep you longer. I won't because i know like, what time is it? yeah Thank you so much. No problem at all. It's been lovely being on it.
Conclusion and Listener Engagement
01:09:06
Speaker
I just want to say thank you so much for listening to the podcast. It really means so much to me that there are people out there actually listening to what I have to say and to the conversations that I'm having with others. So thank you so much. If you are enjoying the podcast, could you please make sure that you are subscribed? And if not, if you could hit that subscribe button, it really does make that much of a difference. Also, if you would like to leave a review on any of the episodes that you listen to that you particularly enjoy, I would love to hear what you have to say.
01:09:34
Speaker
And also, if there's an episode that you've enjoyed, please do share it on your social media, in your WhatsApp groups, with your friends. If you're sharing it on your stories, please tag myself in it and whoever I'm interviewing. And and this it would be greatly appreciated.
01:09:50
Speaker
Also, if you're interested in working with me and my wonderful team, please do you contact me about applying for coaching. So you can contact me at KateHamiltonHealth at gmail dot.com or on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, all KateHamiltonHealth and you will be able to apply for coaching. We can organise to have a chat and see if it's a good fit for you and get you moving towards your goals.