Mel C showed off her Sporty Spice physique as she performed on stage during a concert at Union Chapel in London on Thursday. The Spice Girl, 52, flashed her toned midriff in a colourful cropped bra top which featured cut-out detail. Maintaining her signature look, she teamed it with a pair of wide leg Adidas tracksuit bottoms and Nike trainers.
Mel put on an energetic display while belting out a series of her hit tracks ahead of the release of her new album Sweat, which drops on Friday May 1. Her ninth studio album is said to honour the 'heady and formative days' of the 1990s.
Mel recently shared the secrets behind her incredibly chiselled and muscular physique and declared that 'fitness is a huge part of who I am'. Sporty Spice has more than lived up to the nickname, maintaining her taut and gym-honed figure for decades even into her fifties.
Mel recently wowed fans when she flaunted her incredibly toned physique on the cover of her upcoming new album Sweat, looking more like a gladiator than a pop star as she posed in a plunging red and navy leotard. In a new interview with The Sunday Times, the singer laid out the dedicated strength training routine she follows, which has made her 'finally proud of my body'.
Revealing just how she achieved her incredibly taut and muscular figure, she explained that she does three weightlifting sessions per week and cardio in the form of spin classes or using her Peloton. Mel said that she also tries to go on a run weekly too, but has to be careful of long distances because her age has affected her joints.
The dedicated hitmaker doesn't even allow her busy and jet-setting lifestyle to interfere with her fitness routine, revealing that when she goes on tour she brings along resistance bands and a skipping rope so she can keep training anywhere. While she also lauded the benefits of doing a workout before going on stage, saying it's become part of her pre-gig 'ritual' and usually consists of a quick stretch and weight-lifting in the gym.
But in response to the awed reaction to her incredible Sweat album cover and music video, Mel was quick to assure fans that in the lead-up to the shoot she'd done way more intensive preparation than usual. She said she'd spent a fortnight focusing on her macros and doing two training sessions daily - one cardio and one strength - and insisted it wasn't a realistic routine for anyone to keep up, adding: 'I don't look like that 24/7.'
Though she's more of a fitness fanatic than ever, she said that it was always a big part of her life and revealed former bandmate Geri Horner had been her gym partner during the Spice Girls heyday. But Mel let slip that not all the Spice Girls were as gym-obsessed as she was, admitting there were others in the group who only came to like working out in their later years.
'When we were young, some people would roll over and go back to sleep when Geri and I were off to the gym,' she said. 'There were definitely Spice Girls who disliked exercise but have embraced it as they've gotten older.' But Mel acknowledged that at the time there had been a lot of pressure on the girls to look 'very slim' rather than be muscly, admitting: 'I think we were all nervous about getting bulky back then, the aesthetic we were going for was very slim.'
The DJ has been candid about her struggles with body image while in the band due to the relentless scrutiny of being in the public eye and cruelly branded 'the plain one at the back'. In her 2022 autobiography, she revealed how she began restrictive eating and developed issues around food and 'an obsession with exercise' as a means of control. By the turn of the millennium, she'd reached breaking point, previously confessing: 'I'd started having a binge-eating disorder, but I didn't understand it.'
Mel eventually sought professional help and was diagnosed with clinical depression and disordered eating - a turning point that marked the beginning of her recovery. But now that she's in her fifties, the star says she's never felt prouder of her body and is empowered by her chiselled physique and bulging biceps because she 'always wanted to be strong'.
