Many brides and grooms want to look and feel their best on their wedding day. And that often means slimming down and toning up. Whatever your style of dress or groom’s outfit yo have planned, Here’s 10 wedding weight loss and fitness tips to help you, based around some common questions we get asked here at Muddy Plimsolls.

When should I start an exercise programme ?

As early as you can. Most brides and grooms would benefit from starting between 3 and 6 months before the wedding date or at least 12 weeks before the day of the first dress fitting. This length of time allows you time to try out a training regime and see if it works for you. Crucially, it also allows the bride to realise if the results are not forthcoming and revamp her training.

Ideally, if you have a significant period of time before the wedding (a year say) try a training ‘dry run’. Choose a training plan that appeals to you and try it out for a month. If you find that training plan doesn’t work for you then you’ll have plenty of time to find another and another. If your wedding is coming up fast (in 6 weeks, say) and you haven’t started a fitness regime it’s not too late. But you leave less time to adapt or tweak what you’re doing to suit your particular goals.

Our done-for-you 3-month Personal Training Plan

Should I buy a smaller dress and try to fit into it with diet and training?

This is a high risk strategy. Unless you know your body and you know that a certain exercise regime/diet will yield a certain result, I would say buy a dress close to your current size. Besides, when it comes to bridal wear, the amount of allowance in the seams for taking a dress in (or letting it out) varies from dress to dress. Use your fittings dates as a structure to organise your fitness training. And liaise with your seamstress.

What kind of training plan is best for a bride?

There really isn’t a specific bridal training plan which features secret exercises. Generally our bridal clients have fallen into two camps: ones who want to use between 1 or 2 stone, and those who are already the size they want to be (give or take a few pounds) but lack definition or toning. Both types respond well to a combination of cardiovascular conditioning with some strength building to achieve a toned, athletic look.

We also recommend that brides and grooms work on improving their posture, their balance and their physical confidence. These elements will contribute positively not only to how they look but also how they feel about themselves.

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Should I increase my training the closer I get to my wedding ?

This depends on how your results are coming along. Overdoing it is something we coach against because you don’t want to overreach your weight loss and end up looking gaunt. Neither do you want to push yourself too much in a workout, get an injury and end up hobbling up the aisle in unfamiliar wedding shoes. By the time of your first dress fitting you ought to have achieved the majority of your fitness goals. Why? Because the dressmaker/seamstress is going to have their work cut out for them if you keep shrinking or bulking up between fittings. Another factor to take into account is stress. Under stress, some people eat more, and some eat less. You may get less sleep, leading to less energy, less training intensity in your workouts and less results. All with the clock ticking. By the time you are on to your 2nd or 3rd dress fitting, your training may already have entered a maintenance programme. Not an achievement programme.

I go to a class at the gym but have stopped seeing results – why ?

The class content has not progressed enough for your body to continue to adapt to it. You may still feel tired after a class, but you may be no more tired than last time so your body has had no reason to burn any more calories or develop more strength. You need to change it up.

How can I encourage my future spouse to also start a training programme ?

More and more men are training to lose weight for their wedding and to look good on the beach on their honeymoon. You could, initially, suggest you train together, which will also split the cost. If you’re both competitive, you could set some challenges to complete!

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What type of diet should I be on before my wedding?

If you have experience of a diet that worked for you in the past – even if it’s not the most rapid results – stick with that one. Alternatively, start with small changes that you can make to your current, normal diet as you go along.

What’s the best type of exercise I could do to burn fat ?

We recommend full body, compound bodyweight exercises, with short rest periods and moderate-to-high aerobic levels. Resistance training using weights, resistance bands or bodyweight are very effective.

I have poor posture – can I improve it ?

Yes you can. Although this post is about wedding weight loss and fitness tips, the fact is that improving your posture will help you look and feel better without losing a pound in weight. You can work on your posture through improving flexibility but also through strengthening opposing muscle groups so that your body is pulled back into a natural and relaxed pose.

Will I get too many muscles if I train with weight ?

How your body responds to resistance exercises can only be found out through performing resistance exercises. Which is another excellent reason to start your bridal fitness plan early. You’ll want to tone specific parts of the body – such as your back if you’re wearing a backless wedding dress, or your legs if you’ve chosen a short wedding dress. However, we’ve found that getting too bulky can be avoided by easing off on the isolation exercises (such as bicep curls or tricep dips) and keeping bodyweight exercises full-body, fluid and natural.

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Getting married? Would like to look and feel your best on the day? We offer a range of wedding fitness training across London and beyond for brides, grooms and all members of the wedding party.

Wedding Fitness Training Plans