Trend Watch: Soft Porn Fitness

"If you've got it, flaunt it!" so the saying goes and fitness people certainly subscribe to this mantra. Seen a health or fitness mag lately? Unless it is Experience Life, I'd bet you a trailer of tuna steaks with whole wheat couscous and arugula ('cause everyone has those on hand right?) that the cover model is in some state of undress. The bikini-clad-standing-thigh-deep-in-generic-water pose is so popular that I don't think Shape has done a cover in the last 5 years without it!

Fitness TV shows, DVDs and podcasts are no better with female trainers sporting tiny booty shorts and sports bras. All the better to show off your hard-won physique right? Why else do we work out if not to get a body worth publicly baring? Ahem. Heck, even CrossFit's been porni-fied. And if you've ever tried CrossFit you will understand how very weird that is.

But is the trend going past flat abs and cut biceps towards something more... porno?

Reader Katie recently wrote me about a fitness site she feels very conflicted about:

The website is www.bodyrock.tv . [...] This website has really started to transform the way I approach workouts. They are short, intense workouts--from as little as 9 minutes to 45 minutes-tops. It's all bodyweight based and just requires a floor mat and the ability to do pull-ups someplace. The woman on the site is very fit and is not shy about sharing that these workouts are ALL she does and that a lot of her battle is also in the kitchen.

It all sounds great. Until you look at the site. I'm embarrassed to look at the site around other people because of the way her videos are shot, and the photos taken to show the individual movements. I feel like I'm looking at a soft-porn fitness site! When I've showed people where I've been getting several of my workouts from, they react with this same mixture of raised eyebrows, but then respect for her solid routines (and body). On the one hand, she sends such a positive message about being physically fit, nourishing your body with healthy food, and to a degree to not be ashamed to show off your hard work. On the other hand, she totally exploits her body and this razzes my feminist sensibilities. Therefore, the message gets a little muddled between the obvious display of silicone and play toward sex appeal and lack of modesty. This site combines so many of my vices---fitness, sex appeal, my love/hate relationship with this site's goals, and finding the real reason I work out--how much is for my own fitness and how much for outward appearance?

Here's a screen shot of one of the videos Katie is referring to: (to see the whole video, click the picture to go to her site. Her videos aren't enabled for external embedding - sorry!)

And here's a shot of Zuzana from her home page demonstrating a lunge:
I have to admit that while I am very used to seeing how sexified most fitness women are, this site seemed a little extreme. It wasn't the clothing per se but more the poses, expressions and mannerisms - ones our society normally associates with porn rather than fitness. Hawt TV trainers may dress like the sexy gym teacher or co-ed cheerleader every man dreams about but - here's the difference - they don't usually act like it. Zuzana calls our bluff and refuses to allow us to pretend that we're not looking at her boobs.

Celebrities on magazine covers and mad-hot Czech women on the Internet are one thing but what about real life? I remember the last time a girl showed up at my gym with night-club makeup, teased hair and sporting cleavage on both ends. People, both men and women, made negative comments about her look and the attitude they assumed she had. Jealousy rearing its ugly head? Or indignation about the breach of the implied moral code? Both?