'There are worse things to be addicted to than exercise,' says Davina McCall

The TV presenter, 51, has become known for her range of fitness DVDs and for posting messages on social media to inspire people to get fit, but she said she regularly faces criticism online.

McCall, who was previously addicted to drugs and alcohol, told ITV’s This Morning: “Realistically, I exercise maybe three or four times a week, and people are often surprised by that, they think I must be going every day. I don’t.

“But, because I’m only going three or four times a week, I will do an hour at a time and it will be quite hardcore.

“People are like, ‘are you addicted to exercise?’. I could think of worse things to be addicted to.

“If I could, I would go five or six times a week.”

The former Big Brother presenter said she finds it “really hard to sit back” when she is criticised by people for the way she lives her life.

She said: “What I love about social media is that it is a way to respond in your own way, you’ve got a voice. That’s quite interesting and I always think it’s a good thing, and also a bad thing.

“There are times I want to respond, and I’m not going to, and that’s hard. I sit on my hands and think, ‘don’t do it’.”

McCall said it can become a “whole big thing”, and that she thinks it is “ridiculous”.

Commenting on the response to her Instagram posts of her gym-honed bikini body, she said: “I don’t care what people say about that, because if I believed I was a bad role model I wouldn’t do what I was doing.

“Everybody is going to have an opinion, I try not to read it too much.

“I just think, ‘I’m going to post this, I’m 51, I feel in good shape’, and I know that looking at other people’s posts, I follow people to be inspired. I don’t follow people to troll them.”