Beefcake to Cheesecake

8216;8216;MY very first visit to a gym got me hooked. As I saw my body changing, I trained variedly and tried just about every diet schedu...

8216;8216;MY very first visit to a gym got me hooked. As I saw my body changing, I trained variedly and tried just about every diet schedule. My desire for the type of physique I saw in the magazines saw me touch 120 kg, just short of double my original weight. Training was an addiction with me, and, like any addiction, not healthy. For, after I went to the US for a management degree, I just couldn8217;t find the time to work out. And soon afterwards, my muscles started sagging.8217;8217;

IT may have been fortuitous for 21-year-old Akhil Patel. His switchover from the pumping-iron body to the guy-next-door look 8212; a worked-on, but not overly muscular body 8212; happened just as the international profile of the Hot Male was changing. From the beefcake to the little-big-boy, you could call it the coming of age of the male image.

THE DEVGAN DIET
8216;8216;You are what you eat, and how much you burn and in what way,8217;8217; says dietician Vrushali Khare. Here8217;s her advisory for those seeking the lean-mean look:

8226; Go easy with read meat
8226; Avoid packaged food
8226; Beware of sauces
8226; Opt for the broiled, the baked, the steamed
8226; Junk traditional snacks
8226; Drink at least eight glasses of water a day

8216;8216;Men moved from beer to brawn and pubs to gyms a long time ago. But now, they are taking a step forward, away from being in love with every diminutive muscle that flutters in their body,8217;8217; says Firdosh Anklesaria, a personal trainer specialising in corporates.

Result: The MuscleMan, with his big chest, narrow waist, huge biceps and six-pack stomach, is out. And that8217;s a big thing, considering how ubiquitous he had grown over the years in the glossies Salman Khan, Hrithik Roshan, on the ramp Rahul Dev, Arjun Rampal and even in the toy-store He-Man, GI Joe. His universality played a consistent, surround-sound message: Men are judged 8212; even socially preferred 8212; by their muscles. Not only was this generic Adonis on most underwear boxes, he was also sprawled across five stories on Times Square. Talk about a well-hung billboard. 8216;8216;While the shibboleths on men 8212; that they should not care about their appearance 8212; were broken down long ago, in the past couple of years the male body ideal has moved faster from hunkdom to a carefully moulded physique. They don8217;t want heads to turn any longer. They want to be part of the crowd, yet stand out,8217;8217; says Anklesaria.

8216;8216;No spare tyres around the midriff, no chest hair,8217;8217; Sameer Shah, 19 and a Sydenham College student, lays down the parameters. 8216;8216;Nobody can deny the advantage of fitness that comes with a well-tuned body. Despite my craven habit of smoking, I want to fully enjoy these years as a fit person, I want to look good even when I8217;m naked.8217;8217;

Rocky, just a couple of years older at 22, is as determined: 8216;8216;I8217;m always on a diet; I don8217;t eat sweets or consume alcohol; I8217;m at the gym four times a week. It requires a lot of discipline and sacrifice, but it8217;s a matter of priorities and what8217;s important to you.8217;8217;

What is important is also the evolution of the definition of 8216;fitness8217;. 8216;8216;It took on a completely different flavour in the late 8217;90s,8217;8217; says Somesh Marwah, a trainer at Moksh, Pritish Nandy8217;s upmarket gymnasium. 8216;8216;While the 8217;70s were clearly for distance running, in the 8217;80s leg warmers and head-bands took over as aerobics classes sprouted up all over the country, which were then followed by low impact step classes. In the 8217;90s we took our exercise home with us in the form of treadmills, stationary bikes and a surplus of as-seen-on-TV products like the ab-flex, ab-roller, bow-flex and the thigh master. The new fitness trends give the participants the chance to work out their minds as well as their bodies,8217;8217; he says.

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Walking, hiking and weight lifting now known by its softer, gentler name 8216;strength training8217; will always be popular, but now more and more men are heading to the gym with a different motive. There, they work their minds, too, consulting the dietician regularly on the dos and donts. From high intensity classes like Tae-Bo and Spinning to lower impact, stress-reducing activities such as Yoga and Tai-chi, they keep themselves motivated.

8216;8216;Rather than pushing themselves and sneaking peeks around the room to see what everyone else is doing, the idea is to listen and adjust to what your body is telling you and to focus on your own breathing,8217;8217; says Javed Khan, a personal trainer who has worked with gyms like Talwalkars and Exert.

As always, its the West that is setting the trends. 8216;8216;There, almost all forms of yoga are variations of hatha yoga, which is geared toward improving the body so that it is worthy of self-realisation. In less spiritual terms, it is an excellent way of calming the mind and reducing stress. In other words, it8217;s goodbye to Adonis syndrome,8217;8217; says Khan.

Today, the modern male body image bank is made up of men like Ajay Devgan, Leander Paes, Mahesh Bhupati, and even Brad Pitt. 8216;8216;If it was about chicken legs, then I think both Salman Khan and Hrithik Roshan have them. So why not flaunt what you have unabashedly? Small frames in well-fitting clothes 8212; not baggy T-shirts 8212; are in. And shorts are in, too. So is undressing in communal changing rooms,8217;8217; says Vrushali Khare, a freelance dietician who gets, on an average, two calls daily from those wanting to get the Ajay Devgan look.