Ricki-Lee opens up about maintaining a healthy lifestyle following her 30kg weight loss

If there’s one body part Ricki-Lee Coulter loves to flaunt, it’s her booty — and now she’s revealed how she keeps it in shape.

If you haven’t seen Ricki-Lee Coulter’s Instagram feed of late, it’s filled with a string of swimsuit snaps showing off her fabulous curves, toned physique and her favourite asset — her booty.

In fact, you will never find the 33-year-old to skip ever skip “booty day”.

“Booty goals is always the goals. I never miss booty day,” she told news.com.au. “That’s always the thing I keep my focus on and the one thing I focus the most on.”

The Australia’s Got Talent host joked, saying she “naturally has a big ass”.

“It just runs in my family. We have got hips and ass. I love it.”

Ricki-Lee Coulter simply captioned this Instagram snap as ‘cheeky’. Picture: Instagram/therickilee

… and this one ‘suns out bums out’. Picture: Instagram/therickilee

After completely transforming her diet about nine years ago, Ricki-Lee went on to lose an impressive 30kg, dropping from a size 14 to an eight — and has maintained her weight ever since.

She said the secret behind maintaining her lifestyle wasn’t to focus on her weight, but rather on how she feels.

“For me it’s about feeling great and having energy,” she said in her role as Goodlife Health Clubs ambassador.

“Filming AGT and being on tour, I have to feel great. I have to be switched on all day and food and fitness is such an integral part of that.”

Ricki-Lee in 2008 — she described the following year as a ‘really ugly period’ in her life.

About nine years ago, the 33-year-old lost 30kg since and has maintained her weight ever since.

She goes to set with pre-prepared food and snacks from sandwiches, to salads and carrots and celery sticks with houmous.

“I really do try and be consistent with what I’m eating and my exercise,” she said.

“I know that now because I have been the other way,” she said, referencing to when she was 30kg heavier.

It was around 2009 when Ricki-Lee said she experienced a “really ugly period”.

“For me — 2009 was a big year of change and was a HUGE turning point in my life. It was the year that I finally found the strength to walk away from, and close the door on a really ugly period of my life and became the woman you see today,” she wrote on Instagram recently.

And it was in 2011 that she decided to take charge of her health and eliminate her “bad habits”.

“Everybody knows food has such a huge impact on the way you feel and the ups and downs,” she told news.com.au. “I never understood any of that. I just ate what I wanted because I liked it. I didn’t understand it could create ups and downs.

“I have changed my life and all of my bad habits 10 years ago now and it has always been about how I feel.”

She said she wasn’t as educated about food and nutrition as she is now.

“I also never exercised,” she added.

But once she met her husband and manager Richard Harrison, that all changed.

“I learned so much about food because of his healthy diet. He’s so into health and fitness and I was always so curious and intrigued about what he knew and why he eats the way he does.”

Ricki-Lee started to change the way she was eating and took particular notice to foods that weren’t making her feel good.

“I started putting two and two together and realised certain foods were starting to make me feel really bad, and if I drank milk, or ate yoghurt I’d feel sick and the same for eggs. It was a process of elimination,” she said.

“After a while I came to understand how food can affect you and started changing the way I was eating.”

She now turns to eating plenty of organic vegetables and red meat.

But her change in lifestyle doesn’t mean she can’t treat herself.

“I workout hard. I eat healthy but I also do have times I drink, go out with my friends and have pizza … balance is something I have been striving for this year.”

RICKI-LEE’S BOOTY EXERCISES

As much as she loves her booty, Ricki-Lee admits it takes work to keep it sculptured.

“To keep it tight, up and perky you have got to put the work in,” she said.

You will find the 33-year-old at the gym most days doing a combination of high intensity workouts, lifting weights and plenty of squats, squat jumps and lunges — all for those “booty gains”.

“One of my favourite’s is a step-up into a reverse lunge,” Ricki-Lee said.

“I really enjoy watching my body change as I work with weights or if I do more cardio. I find it fascinating.

“I love it when you’re in the car and you notice your biceps and you’re like ‘Oh there they are, hey girl’,” she joked. “Even when I put my outfits on for AGT, sometimes I’m like, ‘Oh look at that back and that booty, there’s nice tone there’,” she continued, laughing.

DAILY WORKOUT REGIMEN:

“I train everyday, well I try to anyway, some days are just not possible,” Ricki-Lee said.

As a morning trainer she likes to get her training done before dawn, starting off her day with a 30 minute to one hour run before hitting the gym.

She mixes her gym days circuits that focuses on different muscle groups (legs and booty or back and chest), high intensity workouts and weights (such as dead lifts and squats).

“For me it’s just about how I feel and when I go for a run or when I do an awesome workout, I feel strong, alive and awake,” she told news.com.au

“I feel like I can take on the whole world, that’s why I eat healthy and that’s why I workout — not for any other reason.”

Ricki-Lee was a contestant on the 2004 season of Australian Idol, making it to the top seven before she was eliminated.

She is currently on her Australia tour with a concert in Sydney on October 12, Brisbane on October 18 and Melbourne on December 13.