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Rachael Anne Hill is a freelance health, fitness and nutrition writer. She is the fitness expert for Top Santé and Slimming and writes monthly columns for both magazines. She also contributes regularly to a number of other publications, including the Daily Mail, the Daily Mirror, the Express, Health & Fitness, Sunday Times Style Magazine, Now, Zest and Prima. Rachael has also written Real Food for Kids for Ryland Peters & Small.
Rachael broadcasts regularly on radio and television, most recently as the nutrition expert for ITV’s This Morning. She also presented ‘Body Spies’ the BBC’s Fighting Fit, Fighting Fat series, as well as a series of fitness-based programmes on UK Living, BBC Digital, Carlton and GMTV 2.
Before entering the world of journalism, she was the Curriculum Director for YMCA Fitness Industry Training, one of Britain’s largest fitness training organizations. She was responsible for developing, writing and directing their nutrition, exercise and health courses.
In addition to writing and presenting, Rachael runs talks, seminars, workshops and courses on fitness and healthy living throughout the UK.
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 When and how did you discover eating the low-GI way? Tell us a little about your background in the world of health and fitness.
I started out by training to become a fitness instructor and personal trainer. However, during the years I spent teaching fitness classes and working with individual clients I began to realise that when it comes to losing weight and improving health, exercise alone is never enough. If people were to be truly effective at achieving long-term weight loss and reducing their risk of major lifestyle diseases (such as heart disease, diabetes and cancer) they had to address the other half of the equation - their diet. I returned to University to study nutrition at degree and then Masters level before taking up the post of Curriculum Director for Britain's largest fitness training organisations, YMCA Fitness Industry Training. It was about this time that I began to research further into the idea of eating according to the Glycaemic Index. It was a concept that appealed to me as not only was it the first eating regime I had ever come across that was actually endorsed by the World Health Organisation but it was also incredibly well researched by some of the world's leading experts in the field of weight loss and nutrition. The idea that roller-coasting blood sugar levels could lead to weight gain and lethargy also made perfect sense to me. Afterall, we all know that when our blood sugar levels drop and we begin to feel tired we are far less inclined to exercise and much more inclined to reach for the nearest chocolate bar or glass of wine. Almost every client I had ever trained complained of those mid-morning or mid-afternoon lulls, cravings for sweet, starchy food and an inability to lose weight, especially from around their middle.
How easy did you find to introduce low-GI foods into your life?
Introducing low-GI foods into my diet couldn't have been easier because instead of cutting foods out, as is the case in most diets, I simply had to substitute a high-GI food for something lower on the GI scale. This meant that I simply swapped a bowl of cornflakes in the morning for a bowl of porridge, the baguette at lunchtime was substituted for a sandwich made from stoneground bread and for my evening meal I simply changed the ratios of my usual meals to include more of the low-GI foods such as vegetables, fish and lean meats, beans and pulses and a little less of the higher GI ingredients such as white rice and potatoes.
Why do you think it has proved so successful and popular as a way to lose weight
and become healthier?
It's so easy. It's filling - hunger on a low-GI diet is simply not an issue. It's delicious. It's liberating. It is a way of eating that can be fitted around any lifestyle and it doesn't ban any foods either so you can continue to eat just the sort of foods you enjoy, you simply play a little with the quantities in which you eat them. It works - and those feelings of tiredness and lethargy begin to disappear almost immediately.
Why is this a good eating plan for life rather than a quick-fix fad?
A low-GI diet is essentially the intelligent person's way of healthy eating.
Did eating the low-GI way make you shop in a different way?
Not really. I have simply substituted many of the high GI foods I used to buy for lower GI alternatives and instead of buying ready made meals and processed foods I buy a lot more fresh fruit and vegetables and lean meats and fish.
Do you and your family follow the low-GI diet - how does it work with young children?
Yes we do. Children can suffer from yo-yoing blood sugar levels much the same as adults the only difference is that a sudden surge in blood sugars will often manifest itself in excessive nervous energy, running around, shouting, crying, tantrums and general disruptive behaviour. A low-GI diet can help to ensure that blood sugar levels remain constant helping to enhance a child's ability to concentrate, learn, interact, play constructively and sleep and it is no more difficult to implement with children than it is with adults. It simply involves cutting back on over processed, fatty sugary foods and drinks and replacing them with fresh fruit and vegetables, beans, pulses, lower GI alternatives to the usual high-GI breads, rices and cereals and adding plenty of good quality lean meats and fish. (For more ideas on healthy eating for children try Rachael's book Real Food For Kid's).
You've written a best-selling book of low-GI recipes. What sort of response have you had from readers who've used the book?
The best part of writing the GI High-Energy Cookbook is the amazing e-mails I get every day from people all over the world who have bought the book and gone on to lose weight, gain energy and generally feel 100 per cent better about their lives and their bodies.
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