Melanie Chisholm has already taken over the music industry-now, she's on to fitness.
Five, sometimes six days a week, at the ungodly hour of 6 AM, Melanie hops in her Ford Explorer and speeds off from her scheduled Hollywood Hills home to the chic L.A. studio Holistic Fitness, where she begins a grueling, two-hour, take no-prisoners workout with trainer Gregory Joujon-Roche.
Melanie was not always sporty, but in the wake of spice fever, while working on her first solo album (Northern Star, out this month), she begun to live up to her name. Big time.
"Mel was always thin, but she'd never touched a weight," says Joujon-Rochem, "but she took to fitness like a duck to water. She's the most focused client I've ever had. We're doing pro-caliber sports, she's not only strong, but flexible and agile."
"I want to get stronger, put son some muscle," says Melanie, "getting in shape is easy here; the music business starts mid-day, and the weather's beautiful-unlike London."
There's nothing easy about her regimen; 10K runs along the Santa Monica beach or Lake Hollywood, track drills with a pro receiver from the Detroit Lions, Tai boxing, surfing, yoga, a brutal lifeguard workout . . . "We take one body part and just kill it-spending two hours at a time on the stomach, or the outside glute," says Joujon-Roche.
Why the sudden fitness obsession? "This is my chance to do something on my own," says Melanie, "I'm in L.A. to focus on my album; exercise keeps me sane, energized, destressed."
Exercising like a fiend isn't the only secret for a killer body, though; it also takes a serious diet, points out Melanie: "I used to be a vegetarian, but when we started strength training, I needed protein, so I went back to fish."
"Mel eats tons," adds Joujon-Roche. "She's hardcore."