Rachel Recommends

Hi guys and girls,

It was a few months back, when I was on holiday in Prague when my bestie took a picture of me in the spa and I thought damnnnn I need to get back on it in the gym – my bum looks like an actual pancake. And as much as I love pancakes, I don’t wish to look like one. Spurred on with visions of buns of steel (just like the Gym Shark-clad Instagrammers I follow) I decided to embark on the 30 day squat challenge.

After a quick google I found a plan to follow which started at 50 squats on day 1 and went right through to a whopping 250 squats on day 30. I’m a pretty determined person once I get something in my mind, so I stuck to the plan each and every day. Even if it meant whacking out 150 squats before bed because I had forgotten to do them earlier. Here’s how I got on:

The first few days were a novelty and it felt good to get my glutes fired up, as I don’t tend to work them that much in the gym or my classes. It also felt good to a little bit of exercise every day – having 5 or 10 minutes away from my phone to do something for myself.

But as the number of squats increased, I actually began to get rather bored of the whole thing. Even with the TV or music to try and distract me, just standing there on your own squatting is pretty boring, but the thought that I was doing something good kept me going.

WHAT IT’S REALLY LIKE TO DO HOT YOGA

As I got half way through, I was noticing that my actual bum muscles weren’t really aching that much, in fact, it was my legs that felt the burn – and even my poor knees that were taking the strain. But the ‘no pain, no gain’ mentality pushed me on.

By the later half of the challenge I was expecting to see a bit of an improvement in the size and tone of my derrière, but looking in the mirror I really couldn’t see a difference. But I thought to myself, the J Lo transformation must be pending, surely?! Maybe one day I’ll just wake up and bam there it is?

I honestly couldn’t wait for the 30 days to be up – doing 250 squats in a day was A LOT and what was even less motivating was the fact it made hardly no difference. Check out the before and after pics below for yourself (before on the left and after on the right)!

I originally debated sacking off this whole blog post, due to the fact the squat challenge results were so underwhelming – and not exactly living up to my ‘Rachel Recommends’ ethos. However, my pal Grace reminded me that my blog is there to share my experiences and if that’s to recommend NOT doing the squat challenge, then so be it.

WHAT HAPPENED WHEN I DID YOGA EVERY DAY FOR A MONTH

So, what have I learnt? Well, it’s that squats alone will not give you great results. Instead of focusing my time and attention on squats, I’m going to mix it up with hip thrusts and kickbacks – utilising my resistance bands to make the moves a little harder. So there’s still chance of me having a peachy bum in time to rival Kylie’s at Glasto… watch this space!

R x