Kacey Musgraves in Bathing Suit Top Says Hi From “Hotlanta”

Kacey Musgraves is one of the boldest performers in country music, and that goes for the stylings, too. (It’s not every CMT staple that gets invited to the Met Gala, like she did.) This weekend, the 33-year-old posted images of herself performing in Atlanta, wearing a bathing suit top, raisint her finger in the air, her abs on full and impressive display. How does she stay so fit? Read on to see 7 ways Kacey Musgraves stays in shape and the photos that prove they work—and to get beach-ready yourself, don't miss these essential 30 Best-Ever Celebrity Bathing Suit Photos!

1. She Does Tabata-Based Workouts

Tabata training, developed by Dr. Izumi Tabata, has you doing high intensity exercises for four minutes each, during which you do 20 seconds as intense as you can, and then rest for 10 seconds. (Some people vary these numbers.) “Some of the research focusing on high-intensity exercise shows the advantages,” writes Strauss Zelnick in his book Becoming Ageless, which features tabata workouts. “For example, one of the early studies about this kind of training was done by researchers at Laval University in Canada and published in the journal Metabolism. The small study compared high intensity intermittent exercise and endurance training. Researchers found that the high-intensity group lost more ‘subcutaneous fat, as measured by skin folds, compared to a steady state exercise group when exercise volume was taken into account.’ Despite the fact that the endurance training group expelled twice as much energy overall, weight loss was still greater among the high-intensity group.”

2. She Has Tried the 4X4 Nutrition Plan

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Kacey is apparently a fan of celebrity trainer and former marine Erin Oprea’s 4×4 nutrition plan. “It's all about learning to live a healthy, balanced lifestyle forever. Not a quick fix,” Oprea has said. There are four things you should minimize, she believes. “First thing we wanna cut back on: starches at night,” she has said. “You eat your starchy foods early in the day—the healthy starches, the quinoa, the brown rice, the sweet potatoes, eat 'em early in the day. And then in the evening, go to, like, zucchini noodles and a lean protein.” What else?

• “We wanna cut back on sugar, cut out the processed sugar, but I still allow you to have a cheap meal because that's what keeps people living.
• Cutting back on alcohol.
• The last one is sodium. People never think about how much sodium is in the foods they are eating. So start looking at the food label…Salad dressings, breads, everything has salt. And so we eat an abundance. It leaves you a layer of puff on your body. Like I do all this hard work and I just have this puff and I don't understand. It could be as simple as just cutting back the sodium.”

3. She Does Barre

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Kacey packs Pure Barre DVDs when she’s on tour; the workout is a little bit yoga, a little bit Pilates, and, as you may have guessed, given its name, a little bit ballet. “Barre classes will tone, lengthen, and sculpt your whole body and improve your balance, all while having fun working out,” says the Cleveland Clinic.

4. She Limits Her Drinking

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Musgraves is known to enjoy a shot before a show but , on Oprea’s plan, you “don't say no alcohol because that's not realistic in most people's life. We have events. We have things we wanna celebrate. We wanna have fun. I want you to do it,” says the dietitian. “If you cut everything out, would you lose weight? You would, but you might crash and burn. So I'm trying to teach you ways that is real and you can still love life. I'm all about loving life.”

5. She Moderates Her Meals

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“It is torture sometimes trying to eat healthy on the road, but I try my best,” she said back in 2014. “It’s all about balance and still letting my tastebuds enjoy themselves. If there’s a reason to celebrate or I’m somewhere that has some kind of food that I know I won’t be able to resist, then I try to eat lighter all around that. Also, I try to eliminate carbs and most processed foods.”

6. She Had to Power Through the Rough Years of the Pandemic

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During the worst of the pandemic, “Some days I feel really productive and I do things around the house and I have fun actually, and some days I’m a … mess and I’m a total” jerk “and I’m really irritable and I’m not in a good mood and I don’t exercise and I eat like crazy,” she said once during a live-streamed concert. “It’s all normal. So don’t feel crazy, don’t feel alone.”