Wordpress loop inside loop - php

Question

I have a normal loop that outputs posts based on the given $args.
After three posts I want to insert a post that is from a Featured category. I've tried starting a new WP_Query, simple query_posts in different combinations. Nothing seems to work. Any ideas why ?
$args = array(
'post_type' => 'post',
'posts_per_page' => $count,
'paged' => $paged,
'page' => $paged,
'cat' => $cat,
'ignore_sticky_posts' => 1
);
// create a new instance of WP_Query
$my_query = new WP_Query($args);
<ul>
<?php
$i = 0;
if ($my_query->have_posts()) : while ($my_query->have_posts()) : $my_query->the_post();
if($i == 3): ?>
<li> //insert here one post from featured category
</li>
<?php endif; ?>
<li>
// the normal query stuff is here
</li>
<?php $i++ //post counter
endwhile; //end loop while
endif; //end loop
?>
</ul>

Answer 1

I did it this way. Before the main query I did a special query for the featured post.
$args2 = array(
'post_type' => 'post',
'posts_per_page' => 1,
'category_name' => 'TheCategoryName-Slug',
'ignore_sticky_posts' => 1
);
$my_query2 = new WP_Query($args2);
$post_ids = array(); //create an array to store the ids of the posts
if ($my_query2->have_posts()) : while ($my_query2->have_posts()) : $my_query2->the_post();
$post_ids[] = get_the_ID();
endwhile;
wp_reset_postdata();
endif;
After you have all the ids you can use them to get the data you need. Basically, all the data from the wp_posts table (http://codex.wordpress.org/Database_Description#Table:_wp_posts). The post author is returned as an id that can be used to get the name using get_userdata() function.
echo get_post_field('post_title', $post_ids[0]);
echo get_post_field('post_author', $post_ids[0]);
echo get_post_field('post_date', $post_ids[0]);