Jack LaLanne, Pioneer of the Fitness Industry

Francois Henri LaLanne (pronounced La-Layne and nicknamed Jack by his elder brother Norman) was born of French immigrants in San Francisco in 1914. He had been a very sickly and scrawny child and a troubled teenager. In fact, he was so bad tempered and disruptive that he once attacked Norman with an axe, and on a different occasion, with a butcher’s knife. Another time he tried to set the house on fire. He failed at that, thank God, just like he was failing at school, and at sports.

He was a mess. He was out of control and totally misguided. Because all the while, he was suffering intense, blinding headaches that were ruining his life. Indeed, by the age of 15 he desperately wanted to end it all and tried to commit suicide. Thankfully, he failed at that too!

Listening to one lecture changed everything

That’s when he had his epiphany – he attended a lecture by Paul Bragg, a health nutritionist, who told his audience they could be virtually born again if they just obeyed nature’s laws: exercise regularly and eat proper food. Jack sorely needed that simple, straightforward advice, and by God he took it!

He decided there and then that he would stop eating sugar completely and ditch all the sugar-loaded garbage that his diet had been packed with. He realised he had been a ‘sugar-holic’ and a ‘junk-food junkie’ and that was what had been ruining his health. He started to replace it with more healthy foods and lots of fresh fruit, which had an immediate effect – the headaches stopped!

And, of course, with them, all the bad temper and bad behaviour came to an end. It was proving to be the best advice he had ever had. He only very rarely used sugar since that moment, and he never stopped his daily exercise routine till his dying day, after 96 gloriously healthy years!

As well as improving his diet, he also started exercising. If you’re old enough, and you live in America, you might have seen his TV fitness show, which ran from 1951 to 1985, the longest running fitness programme ever on television. He was truly passionate about spreading the word on fitness. In fact, Vincent LoBrutto, who wrote TV in the USA, said of him that he was “full of charisma and vitality and determined to make everyone look and feel better.”

He was on a mission to change the world!

Jack saw it as his bounden duty to try to change the world, the way he had been changed. He encouraged people, of all ages, to take up fitness training. He didn’t expect them to spend hours a day at it, just a few minutes, but to do it every single day. And he didn’t expect them to join a gym either – for the very good reason there were virtually none in those early days. He just suggested that they use everyday objects, such as chairs and stools and broom handles in their training.

He didn’t train for just a few minutes a day though. His transformation from food junkie to finess advocate meant that he would go to extreme lengths to improve and maintain his fitness. He would get up at five o’clock in the morning and train for a couple of hours, which would often include a run or a swim, and he’d be finished by 7:30.

After that, he’d often spend much of the day reading and studying, and of course relaxing. He might have been passionate about training, but he wasn’t ridiculously obsessive about it – he knew the value of balance in all things. Among his reading material was Gray’s Anatomy, which he studied avidly, learning all about how the human body worked. Using the knowledge he gained, he became a licensed chiropractor.

A true pioneer in the fitness industry

He went on to open the nation’s first health and fitness club in Oakland, California, promoting fitness training and a healthy diet, both of which were looked down on by the medical profession of the day. Such things were thought to damage the body and possibly cause heart attacks, insomnia, haemorrhoids and loss of sex drive.

Things have changed since then, of course, and largely due to LaLanne’s pioneering approach to fitness training. In fact, he designed the first leg extension machines, pulley machines using cables, and the weight selectors that are now standard in the fitness industry. And he invented the original model of what became the Smith machine.

Before there was HIIT, or resistance bands, or Tae Bo, or Pilates, or leg extension machines, or fancy exercise machines with pulleys, before there were even gyms readily available anywhere … before everything … there was Jack LaLanne!

He was instrumental in changing the habits, and indeed the lives, of millions of people through his TV show. Many older people today are still in good health and surprisingly fit because they followed his advice and took up daily exercise. He became a multi-millionaire through his fitness books and videos, his vitamins and minerals, his juicers, and his string of fitness studios, and every penny well deserved. If he had thought to patent his own brand exercise machines it would have happened a lot sooner.

Time and again he performed almost superhuman feats of strength and endurance both to show what could be achieved by regular exercise and a healthy diet and to popularise his show and his books. So extreme were they that they have mostly never been attempted, let alone achieved, by anybody else, even to the present day.

Would you want to try to replicate his achievements?

Here’s a list of just a few of the things that Jack LaLanne did, and trust me, there are many more:

• 1944 (age 30) – Did 100 unsupported handstand push-ups in under 6 minutes.
• 1954 (age 40) – Swam the entire 8,981-foot length (that’s over one and a half miles!) of the Golden Gate in San Francisco, under water, with 140 lb (64 kg) of air tanks and other equipment strapped to his body; a world record.

• 

  1959 (age 45) – Did 1,000 jumping jacks and 1,000 chin-ups in 1 hour, 22 minutes, to promote The Jack LaLanne Show going nationwide. He said this was the most difficult of his stunts, but only because the skin on his hands started ripping off during the chin-ups. He wouldn’t stop though, because it would be seen as a public failure.

• 1974 (age 60) – He swam (for the second time) from Alcatraz Island to Fisherman’s Wharf. Again, he was handcuffed, but this time he was also shackled and towed a 1,000 lb (450 kg) boat.
• 1979 (age 65) – Towed 65 boats in Lake Ashinoko, near Tokyo, Japan. Again, handcuffed and shackled, and the boats were filled with 6,500 lb (2,950 kg) of Louisiana Pacific wood pulp.
• 1984 (age 70) – Towed 70 rowboats, one carrying several guests, from the Queen’s Way Bridge in the Long Beach Harbor to the Queen Mary, one mile away.    

As mentioned earlier, he did these things to raise his profile, but his main reason was to encourage people to live healthier and fitter lives. He didn’t want or expect others to emulate these feats, but he did want them to take up regular exercise and to eat a healthier diet. His entire life was lived as an example of what can be achieved by following nature’s guidelines and adopting a positive mental attitude.

He showed Arnold what an ‘old man’ could do!

Oh, another thing he did that might make you sit up and take notice: he was at Venice Beach, doing what seemed endless press-ups when Arnold Schwarzenegger came over and challenged him to see who could do the most press-ups and pull-ups. Arnold was 21 at the time and had just become Mr. Universe, so I guess he felt a little put out that this little man (54 at the time) seemed to be outdoing him, and in public.

Bad move, Arnie!

Even though Jack had been training for quite a while already, they got to it. And Jack was still going strong when Arnold called it a day. Asked about it later, Arnie commented, “That Jack LaLanne’s an animal!” and admitted he could barely move his arms for days afterwards. Maybe Arnold hadn’t heard, but Jack was already a legend on Venice Beach among the weightlifters, gymnasts, circus acts, and stuntmen.

To be fair to Arnold, he could be forgiven for mistaking LaLanne for some no-hoper. How could he have known that Jack had an open challenge for anyone to match him in his morning workout? If anyone could manage it, he’d give them $10,000, no questions asked. Only no-one ever did, not once! He kept that challenge open right till 1970.

He wasn’t blindly obsessed with exercise, it was simply his way of life

Some would say he was obsessed, and, to be fair, they’d be right, but in a good way. He was obsessed with fitness and helping people become fitter and healthier. He espoused living a healthy life and adopting healthy habits. He made people aware how important it was (and is) to start these habits early on and to keep on with them for the long term, in fact, for life. He found his strength (physically, and in the sense that it mattered to him and he was good at it), and he pursued it with a passion and a vigour we can only admire and be amazed at.

He saw his lifestyle as his religion. As he used to say, “It’s my life. That’s why I was put on this Earth — I believe this — to help people. I enjoy it.” But as for being obsessed, no, he valued exercise, but he used to say “I never liked to exercise, but I like results.” There’s an invaluable pearl of an idea in that … it’s vastly more important to focus on the end result than on the journey.

Apart from his training, LaLanne kept himself busy in all kinds of ways

LaLanne was busy and prolific in other areas besides his own personal fitness – he published several books and videos on fitness and nutrition, appeared in movies, and made guest appearances on several TV shows, such as The Addams Family, You Bet Your Life, Batman and The Chevy Chase Show. Oh, and of course he promoted his famous Power Juicer on the shopping channels!

He also received numerous awards over the years, including (and this is only a small selection):

• Founding member of the President’s Council on Physical Fitness under President Kennedy
• The Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans
• Patriarch Society of Chiropractors
• National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Gold Circle Award commemorating over 50 years in the Television Industry
• The Freddie, Medical Media Public Service Award
• The Academy of Bodybuilding and Fitness Award in 1992 (age 78)
• The Dwight D. Eisenhower Fitness Award in 1996 (age 82)
• The Spirit of Muscle Beach Award in 1999 (age 85)
• A star on the Hollywood Boulevard Walk of Fame in 2002 (age 88)
• Inducted into the California Hall of Fame in 2008 (age 94)

We can’t all be Jack LaLanne, but we can take his advice!

Each of us could do worse than to adopt the healthy habits he suggested (way before they were mainstream), and stick with them. We don’t need to be as focused as he was (that would be amazing, but also unrealistic). What we do need to do is to live healthier lives, eat a healthier diet, ditch the toxic garbage we blindly shove down our throats every day, and do just a little exercise (or maybe a bit more than that!), and do it every single day.

We can’t (most of us anyway) do 1,000+ press-ups inside of 25 minutes, and we can’t tow boats full of people across rivers, but we can do some exercise, no matter how light, and we can do it every day. And when you consider how he used to work out for two hours every morning, and still managed to live a full and productive life, can you still cling to the idea that you haven’t got time for exercise?

Remember some of the aphorisms he repeated endlessly:

• “Don’t exceed the feed limit. Ten seconds on the lips, lifetime on the hips.”
• “Anything in life is possible, if you make it happen”
• “The only way you get that fat off is to eat less and exercise more”
• “Probably millions of Americans got up this morning with a cup of coffee, a cigarette and a donut. No wonder they are sick and fouled up”
• “Do you know how many calories are in butter and cheese and ice cream? Would you get your dog up in the morning for a cup of coffee and a donut?”
• “I live my life as an example to show people that I practice what I preach,” he wrote. “You don’t get old from calendar years; you get old from inactivity.”
• “You need to make good health a hobby.”

He lived a happy and industrious life, and had a happy marriage too

You might think this man must’ve been so obsessed with exercise that he ignored other things in his life. Not so! He was possibly the most devoted husband you could imagine. His wife Elaine said, soon after his death, “I have not only lost my husband and a great American icon, but the best friend and most loving partner anyone could ever hope for.” And what more could a man hope for but a comment like that from his wife?

How could you sum up Jack LaLanne’s approach to life? Here’s a few points:

• He decided, early on, what was important to him
• He decided to pursue it wholeheartedly
• He sincerely wanted to help improve the health and happiness of the entire world
• He did everything he could to spread the word about fitness and health
• He did it with vigour and passion, thoroughly enjoying every moment of it
• He became the ultimate expression of a life well lived and a shining beacon of health and fitness

A life well-lived

Jack LaLanne was endlessly energetic, imaginative, innovative, creative, industrious, passionate, inspirational, and in his time one of the most famous people in America. He was known as the Godfather of Health and Fitness. Any time he was interviewed, specially in his later years, he would trot out the same line: “I can’t afford to die, it would ruin my image!”

He was utterly true to the idea that YOU are responsible for your life, no-one and nothing else. As he said, “Everything you do in life, I don’t care, good or bad — don’t blame God, don’t blame the devil, don’t blame me, blame you. You control everything! The thoughts you think, the words you utter, the foods you eat, the exercise you do. Everything is controlled by you.”

When he died in January 2011, aged 96, he was still doing his two-hour morning workouts daily. “When I pass on to that great gym in the sky,” he wrote, “I want no more than for people to say: ‘He was marvellously alive!’ And I want the same for you.”