IT is January 3 so you should be well into your new year exercise regime. Because this year will be different. Yeah, right... like all the others. Here CLAIR WOODWARD runs through a few of the daft crazes we thought would change our lives, but didn't.
THE TRIMWHEEL
A wheel. Yup, a wheel about four inches across with a handle on either side which you were supposed to push yourself forwards and backwards with as you were on your knees. Did masses of damage to living-room carpets across the nation, but far more to backs. Kept osteopaths in business for years.
FITNESS ALBUMS
Long before videos and DVDs celebrityfronted fitness LPs had stars shouting at us over a disco beat as we strained to look at the wallchart that came with them to ensure we didn't do ourselves a mischief.
The most popular were the Shape Up And Dance series, the first of which was by Felicity Kendal, Angela Rippon and The Generation Game's Isla St Clair.
Radio 1 DJ Peter Powell also did one (for K-Tel, fact fans), as did George Best with Miss World girlfriend Mary Stavin.
Listening to Best tell Mary to "lie flat on your tummy and legs straight, arms out to the side" is hysterical. It will give you an abdominal workout by laughing so much, though possibly also a hernia. Not very healthy.
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| The Monty Python boys modelling Trim Jeans |
TRIM JEANS
Looked like a pair of inflatable, rubberised space-age bloomers, "guaranteed to reduce your waist, abdomen, hips and thighs a total of 6 to 9 inches in just three days or your money refunded", according to the advert. It would have been more truthful if it had said "guaranteed to make you look like a sweaty giant baby who has filled its nappy several times over".
Monty Python immortalised them in Trim Jeans Theatre, where TS Eliot's Murder In The Cathedral, Monty Python immortalised them in Trim Jeans Theatre, where TS Eliot's Murder In The Cathedral, Swan Lake and The Great Escape all wore the knee-length inflatables that made people look like a miniature zeppelin.
AYDS
Little chewy appetite suppressant tablets that became less popular in the 1980s with the advent of Aids.
you slim!". Yes, just two Limmits plus
LIMMITS
"The meal in a biscuit that helps you slim!". Yes, just two Limmits plus a cup of tea or coffee makes a delicious and satisfying meal. NO, IT DOESN'T. After two of those you would be reaching for an entire packet of chocolate digestives. And a pie.
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| Journalist Esther Rantzenlets her feelings about Bai Lin Tea be known |
BAI LIN TEA
In the 1980s, according to Peter Foster, the "slimming tea" was an "ancient Chinese diet secret". It gained some amazing publicity in a programme watched by millions: That's Life. The show revealed the product to be nothing but ordinary tea and Esther Rantzen described Foster as, "the most ruthless con-man I've ever met". The only thing that lost weight was Foster's wallet as he was fined thousands of pounds for the fraud.
THIGHMASTER
It sounded like something from Doctor Who but was, in fact, two pieces of bent tubing with a hinge in the middle which, as Arnold Schwarzenegger would say, you'd "skveeez" with your knees. It was sold as a product you could use while doing something else like watching telly and eating a lard sandwich.
VIBRATING BELT MACHINES
Popular in the 1960s and 1970s, you would sling one of these around your rear end as you stood up, with the machine vibrating your fat away. Or rather, only made your wobbly bits really wobble. Very popular with cartoonists who wanted to illustrate women with big bottoms and with Carry On films set in health farms.
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| Lenny Henry gets to grips with a Chest Expander |
CHEST EXPANDERS
How very retro: three springs with handles designed to form a more manly chest. How manly you can be once you are screaming when they have ripped out half your chest hair when it gets caught is debatable.
You can hear George Best's workout at footballandmusic.co.uk/shape-up-and-dance-with-george-best/
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