We bet you’ve dreamed of that Angel-body too, but after reading this article you might change your mind. Poppy Cross, a 29-year old fitness blogger wanted to give it a try. She followed a strict regime for 4 months including lifting more than you weigh, impossible diets, no liquids 12 hours before show time and a 15K bill.
Lately feelings are mixed about the bodies of the VS Angels, some just love them some have health concerns. When the company launched its Perfect Body underwear range last year, many women weren’t happy with the unhealthy ideal these models represented. More than 16,000 of them sing a petition claiming the market was sending out damaging messages.
Even though some of us think that the body image VS provides us with is just not realistic, a lot of us love the shows, models and underwear. Victoria’s Secrets is still a huge success and last year the US company turned over a astronomical £3.92 billion. Half a billion viewers watched its televised runway show in London in December.
The requirement for VS Angels is to be at least 1.75 m (5ft 9in) tall and to have a 61 cm (24 inch) waist. But that’s just the start of it. VS creative director Sophia Neophitou-Apostolou claimed: ‘It’s like being an Olympian – they have to be in peak condition.’ One of her Angels, Alessandra Ambrosio, admitted: ‘You work out as an athlete. All your mind, all your everything goes into it.’
When Poppy Cross, a 29-year old fitness blogger heard about the body requirements she started wondering whether VS was selling a dream or if this body image could be achieved by the average woman too? To find out Poppy gave the VS Angels four-month strict body regime a try.
Poppy Gross Before Her VS-Regime Photo: Dailymail
While being advised by personal trainer Dan Roberts and New York nutritionist Dr Charles Passler, she started the exact same diet and exercise plan the models do saying: ‘Being a fitness blogger, I’m no slouch. But nothing could have prepared me for the mental and physical challenge I had in store…’
Body Fat
The first step Poppy had to take was lowering her fat percentage (the percentage of our body that’s made up of fat tissue, rather than muscle, bones, hair, water and other stuff). Poppy tells Daily Mail: ‘I was in good shape to start with: at 1.75m (5ft 9in) I’d always been a dress size eight, with a 66 cm (26in) waist. But my body fat was 22 per cent – and this wouldn’t cut it in the VS world.’
The fat percentage of a VS model must be below 18 per cent, a healthy, fit woman will have between 21 and 24 percent of body fat. Athletes will have between 14 and 20 per cent. Below 13 per cent and you start to experience severe health problems such as confusion, fatigue, hormonal imbalances, organ failure and eventually death.
Poppy tells: ‘Dan explains that I need to make my glutes ‘as solid as concrete’, my obliques ‘sharply defined for a lithe look’, build muscle in my ‘skinny’ arms to get the ‘Gisele-esque lines’ and, finally, sculpt my thighs to get ‘more definition’. But I will also need to reduce my body fat – by four whole per cent. And this will mean serious training.
The Body Plan
To get a VS angels body weight training is key. Poppy says: ‘I am to be ‘eased’ into the programme, with one weight session with Dan each week supplemented by three to four other ‘homework’ sessions – sprint interval training for 20 minutes one day, weight training on my own for an hour the next, and classes including Pilates, boxing and ‘Ballet Beautiful’ (Angel favourites, I’m told). After a month, my sessions with Dan are to increase to four a week but I will keep doing homework. So I should exercise six or sometimes seven days a week, and on some days do two sessions.’
Photo: L&R
Pain
Poppy says that the first month was physically and mentally exhausting and required more hour’s of sleep than usual, she even catched three colds. About her personal trainer she says: ‘Dan is always there spurring me on, whether it’s in a session, with a text (‘Have you done your 50 press-ups?’) or an email with some more homework. As the second month progresses I’m able to work out for longer without feeling tired. By month three, I’m dead-lifting 72kg – more than I weigh.’
No Food
In 2012 Adriana Lima revealed she’d been on a liquid-only diet for nine days pre-show to help shed her baby weight. There was, justifiably, a mini-uproar that led to Lima having to issue a warning to girls not to follow her example. Poppy says: “Although he refuses to discuss her case, Dr Passler does tell me: ‘If you’re properly supervised, 1,000 calories per day on a liquid-only diet is sufficient, provided you have enough amino acids, protein, fat and minerals.’”
According to Poppy the diet is kinda insane: ‘My eyes pop at the powders, pills and protein supplements Dr Passler sends me, all costing a small fortune. I’m put on a high-fat, high-protein, low-carb diet. That means chicken, fish or beef with almost every meal. If I can’t face meat, I have the equivalent amount of protein in eggs (three equals about a portion of chicken). Anything with sugar in it is out, including fruit.’
‘For the first month I can eat vegetables. Mostly those ‘that grow above ground’, such as courgettes, leaves, sprouts and broccoli. But then I graduate to the ‘pre-catwalk’ diet, where it is just proteins and fats. To keep my energy up, I have two tablespoons of oil or butter with every meal. Eating out becomes near impossible and celebratory dinners, birthdays and weddings difficult. I end up constantly leaving food on my plate.’
Her post-workout meal enhances a protein shake made with coconut water and unsweetened almond milk, plus a protein bar as a snack. ‘I’m to train on an empty stomach, apart from black coffee and water mixed with the vitamin and mineral powder. Some research shows this forces the body to burn fat for fuel and spikes hormones that will encourage muscle growth.’
‘My last meal of the day is at 6pm – to prevent laying down calories as fat – and there’s no alcohol. So long social life. I never feel starved, just unfulfilled before bed. I also find I’m not quite so, er, regular due to the lack of fibre in my diet.’
Photo: L&R
Results
Poppy tells: ‘At the start and end of my programme I have my vital statistics measured by experts at the University of Westminster.’
‘My weight hasn’t changed but I’ve dropped at least a dress size and my waist has shrunk. My bust has also shrunk, by a whole cup size. My cholesterol levels dropped too, despite all that meat and oil – apparently the result of a very low-carb diet. The hours and dedication required to be VS catwalk-ready require a military mind and athlete’s performance – impossible to maintain if you have a job and family or want a social life. The VS girls admit they don’t live like that all the time. If they did, it would be called an eating disorder.’
Doctor Passler warns: ‘No-carb diets are not for long-term use. The potential long-term negative effects are nutrient deficiencies and an imbalance of normal gut bacteria.’
So, on paper, I did what I set out to do – I achieved the Victoria’s Secret body and I’m proud I managed it.
Poppy concludes with wise words: ‘Health matters to me more than appearance and I’m happy with the way I look. I’ll probably keep doing weights but I’ll give heavy dead-lifts a miss. And despite the fame and fortune they enjoy, I’m happy to be back in my old routine – and not having to worry about how I look in my underwear.’
The Cut
As well as her post-baby liquid diet, Adriana Lima revealed to a newspaper in 2012, that for 12 hours before a show there’s ‘no liquids at all so you dry out; sometimes you can lose up to eight pounds just from that’. It’s an old body-builder trick: dehydration contracts the skin, making muscle definition more prominent for a leaner, more sculpted and ‘cut out’ look.
