On today`s show Mario tackled the topic of weight loss and his own personal journey.  We got a big response from listeners who were eager for Mario to share his secret on how he shed the last few sticky pounds.  Below is Mario`s recipe for success, he has shed the 14 pounds and is here to tell us the tale!

This isn’t scientific. I`m not a doctor or a nutritionist but this plan is working for me and might work for you. The food is delicious and plentiful and I think shows how your body best processes natural clean foods like fruit and veg -so much so that weight begins to fall off almost immediately .

 

MARIO PLAN!

Breakfast -Big bowl of fruit -any combo of fruit -some natural yogurt/black coffee

Lunch-Large salad/with nuts , beans , veg -olive oil & balsamic vinegar with 2 or 3 egg omelette with ham /tomato onion

water

Snack: 3/3.30 - apple or any piece of fruit

Dinner : Normal healthy home cooked dinner.

EXAMPLE DINNER:

Roast chick (with skin)

baked potato (with skin) and a little full fat butter

veg -(as much as possible )

Water

Snack 8pm : flapjack (homemade )

with peppermint tea

EXERCISE : walk 1 hr 3-4 times a week (6.5k) listen to podcasts/radio /audible books

I play tennis  2-3 times a week 1.5 hrs

Mario tells us the object is to eat a lot of good food -fruit & veg and "CROWD OUT" bad foods like bread , soft drinks ,processed foods chocolate and biscuits .

The morning fruit bowl means it’s many hours between the body taking in ‘big ‘ meals ie, your body is digesting food more easily .You are ‘fasting ‘ in a sense but eating plenty of fruit to keep you ticking over

TIPS FOR SUSTAINING 

Write everything down in a diary ( And I mean everything!)

 

 

Try And sleep for 8 hours a night if you can.

 

 

Exercise - do not count it as calories burned -just do it because it’s good for you -don’t think “I just played 2 hours of tennis i can have all the cake "! stick to the good food -this is NB . you will never out train a bad diet .

 

 

Don’t give up any of the bold foods completely,eat pizza or cake or big pasta or steak -once or twice a week . If you have 21 meals  a week make 19 of them nutritious and healthy .

 

 

Same with alcohol.If you like to drink -drink but try and make it only once a week AND keep to the food plan THE NEXT DAY !

 

 

If this worked for Mario maybe it might help somebody else! Let us know if you try this out and it helps you too!!

Joining Mario this morning for this weeks profile interview was comedian and actor Jon Kenny.  Of course memories of D`Unbelievable sketches were first on the agenda as Mario remembered his favourite one!

Jon shared with us his favourite comedy and movie choices and also about his time working on Father Ted, playing the cinema owner in "The Passion Of St. Tibulus" and who could forgot his  classic performance as Eurovision presenter  Fred Rickwood in "Song For Europe".

Jon is back on stage this September in a new play "Crowman" written by Katie Holly. It won rave reviews earlier in the year and John is looking forward to getting back to the performance. The main character of Crowman is Dan Lonergan.  The play is an account of the hilarious characters that inhabit his life on a daily basis and a love story that never was.

It is about lost love and the sense of belonging and not belonging in a small community. Most of all it is about the humanity and decency of the local characters found in every rural village and town in Ireland.

Crowman is at the Olympia Theatre, Dublin on September 4th, 5th and 7th, tickets are on sale now from Olympia Box Office and Ticketmaster.

Press the play button on the image on the top of the screen to hear the full chat. 

 

 

Joining Mario today for The Story Behind The Song was singer songwriter Alice Kiernan.

Alice started out at the age of 16 gigging and performing in venues around Dublin supporting acts such as Ham SandwicH and Paddy Casey.  She released her debut single earlier this year "Running Now"which you can listen to right here!

Alice joined us to talk about the huge success of teen pop star Billie Eilish who has stolen the show at Electric Picnic this year and managed to knock Lil Nas X of the top of the billboard hot 100 chart after he had dominated for 19 weeks!

The song "Bad Guy" has some dark tones as it talks about a girl in what would appear to be an abusive relationship but she is the one that`s in control and describes the reasons why shes the "Bad Guy".

Vanity Fair described the song as dance music through a fun house mirror and Alice notes we can see this in the music video as Billie has really clown like movements in her moves .

While it appears that Billie has come from nowhere, she has spent years recording and writing with her brother, home schooled and recording also from her home, she is the real alternative pop star for today`s music industry.

Press the play button on the image on the top of the screen to hear the full chat. 

 

 

 

Its the first All Ireland Final Michael Lyster has had free for a very long time, so we thought we`d ask him to come in for a chat!

Michael is looking forward to today`s game - but is also looking forward to the Belgian Grand Prix which he will be watching before the game. What are today` predictions from the man who has witnessed so many All Ireland Finals?

Press the play button on the image on the top of the screen to hear the full chat.

Joining Mario this week was author and host of "The Cringe Binge" podcast Jules Coll and environmental journalist and campaigner John Gibbons.  Nudity on TV was first into the roast as Jules wonders do we now have to use sex to sell pretty much everything! She watched the latest period drama "Sandition" last Sunday night and she says it can only be described as "Love Island with britches!" Now do we want to watch it more now or not?!

John went on an epic 3,000km EV touring holiday with his family around France which included battling through 40C plus temperatures in the last June heatwave in central France.  2019 is one for the record books for temperature increase, and says as was feared the climate system is far more responsive to forcings than many of the more conservative climate projections have been suggesting.

Mario is up next and is not happy with the way the teen climate activist Greta Thunberg is being treated on twitter with some nasty comments and criticisms coming her way.

She is a 16 year old doing something amazing for a highly important cause, how sad that people like this are trolling her?

Press the play button on the image on the top of the screen to hear the full chat.

Larry Bass has brought some of the biggest TV shows to our screens in the past 20 years with his production company "Screentime ShiAwiL".

Some of the names include Popstars, You’re A Star, Charity You’re A Star, Dragons Den, MasterChef Ireland, The Voice of Ireland and MasterChef Ireland and of course "Dancing With The Stars", which Larry insists that Mario should do! i think we all know where this is going!

 

So apart from convincing Mario that his next move needs to be in the world of dancing, Larry had some interesting things to say about the TV license fee in Ireland and what it means for TV content.

I`m passionate about Irish television and Irish content for Irish people but we cannot to sustain Irish output if we don`t pay for it , whether we pay for it through a license fee, advertising or somebody just wants to write a cheque, we haven't had a license fee increase in this country in 15 years, we are expected to make television for an even lower cost that we did last year and the year before."

Larry went on to give us his favourite comedy and film scene choice and names his personal hero.

Press the play button on the image on the top of the screen to hear the full chat. 

 

Today we ask the question what is AI and how does it affect our future? Joining Mario for this discussion was Professor Barry O’Sullivan who is an award-winning academic working in this very fields of artificial intelligence, ethics, and public policy for AI and data analytics. 

The headlines of killer robots, weaponised artificial intelligence and automatised weapons have been circulating in recent times and according to a report that surveyed the leading tech companies about their stand point on this topic - Amazon , Microsoft and Intel came out as the ones that could potentially lead us into an global artificial intelligence arms race.

What are the consequences for the development of this technology and where does it lead us when it crosses over into warfare?

 

Press the play button on the image on the top of the screen to hear the full chat.

Joining Mario this week for the Story Behind The Song were Luke and Rob from Irish rock band "Otherkin" who sadly announced their split last week.  Sad news for them to share but they have said it has been an amazing 7 years with the band.

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Joining Mario this week for the Sunday Roast panel was one third of comedy troupe CCCahoots Tadgh Hickey and journalist Larissa Nolan.  Tadgh kicked things off with his perception of Dublin City maybe taking pity on anyone who had to come from outside the city to do anything in their city.

It got him thinking that quite often there is a perception that getting up to Dublin - to the city is where its all at! He lets us in that this is not the case - the city he wants to get back to is his own!

I bet Cillian Murphy at this very moment is on the set of some movie and on his break is just endlessly scrolling through daft.ie checking out house prices in Ballincollig!

Larissa was up next celebrating the success of the song that has most fascinated her this summer - it`s Old Town Road by Little Nas X.  Larissa believes it is one of the most important pop songs ever recorded because of the diversity of the song , the singer and the audiences and the creation of a new genre - Hip Hop Country!

Mario threw time wasted from being on hold and dealing with poor customer service into this week`s roast - he has been having a nightmare recently with his broadband provider and has had to spend far too much time going round the block to get a solution. He tries out some new solutions with Larissa and Tadgh on how to deal with this - Karoke hold music anyone?

Press the play button on the image on the top of the screen to hear the full chat.

Former Ireland soccer manager Brian Kerr was Mario`s profile interview this week, of course they talked sport and the fascinating story of how he managed to get Roy Keane back playing for Ireland again after Saipan.

One thing people may not know about Brian is that he is a HUGE music fan, he talks about his favourite Irish bands right now, the musical genius of Bill Bailey and The Commitments.

Sorry, the Q-Park ticket!!