Unseen

by Reggie Yates

  I’d made a decision at the beginning of the year to train hard and feel healthier while gaining a body I felt comfortable in. Somehow, I’d done it. Clothes fit better, my energy and self-confidence had sky-rocketed; yet my physical achievement continues to receive the strangest of reactions. I’ve learnt that the gym and fitness in general can mean many things based entirely on who it is you’re talking to.

  For some, achieving the perfect physique is the only way to battle insecurity, while at the other end of the spectrum, a weird mix of ambition and narcissism can fuel an addiction. I’m definitely somewhere between those two extremes and have begrudgingly accepted that my commitment to health and fitness doesn’t sit well with everyone. The change in my appearance and self-confidence seems to hold up a mirror for other people, encouraging reactions ranging from the supportive to the judgemental. Whatever the case, I’m the happiest I’ve been with myself in as long as I can remember.

  I haven’t always been this content. In my early thirties things got weird, but thankfully it wasn’t just happening to me. For some reason, my closest male friends and I started carrying around that extra bit of flab that seemingly appeared from nowhere. The fact that we were all in relationships, had good jobs, full fridges and brilliant excuses for smashing an entire packet of Hobnobs during Match of the Day had nothing to do with it. Obviously.

  At the time, a fashion aesthetic I’d dabbled with via the ridiculously priced designer Rick Owens found its way into the mainstream and became a trend. Suddenly, dropped-crotch pants and oversized T-shirts were affordable and everywhere. All my friends were suddenly wearing bigger T-shirts and more forgiving denim or joggers that brilliantly cloaked the fact we all suddenly had rugby thighs. Outside of how on trend we may have looked, that slouchy look delivered another way to be overweight without anyone knowing.

  By the time I’d gotten over wearing trousers that made me look like a toddler with a heavy nappy, nothing in my wardrobe fit. I had to change something and started to work out religiously for the first time in years. What kept me going was making a big deal out of my routine via social media. I’d roped in a few friends and we started a six-week challenge to sort out our fitness and physical appearance for good.

  I was eating better and training harder than ever. My followers across social media cheered me on and their awareness of the six-week challenge applied a pressure to keep it up. Small changes began to happen and I was over the moon with the shift in my stomach size but not the time it was taking. I wanted those big results to hurry the hell up so I could take my feet off the gas – or in this case off the damn treadmill.

  Thankfully, my career on screen hadn’t slowed down as I’d begun shooting the new series of ‘Extreme’ but this time at home in the UK. The Extreme UK series set out to cover British issues skipped by mainstream media. As I finally began to see noticeable progress with my own fitness challenge, fate stepped in with the timely film Dying for a Six Pack.

  For the film, I set out to establish the moment when self-improvement becomes self-destruction. What I ended up doing was exploring themes in a way relating just as much to myself as to the men I’d meet.

  Dying for a Six Pack placed me directly – and unintentionally I might add – in a subject matter that mirrored my own personal journey. I found myself confronting my own motivations to change my physical appearance and asking the question, why do I want what I want?

  There have never been as many gyms in the UK, and young British men are now far more aware of their physical appearance than ever before. With everyone from schoolboys to white collar business types packing out weight rooms countrywide, something has changed. What was once tied to sports stars, the minimal body fat and six-pack aesthetic was suddenly much more common in normal guys.

  Not only has working out been normalised, it has almost become expected to share your results. With platforms like Instagram totally inundated with images of pecs and progress, it’s easy to be inspired or intimidated. Knowing this going in, I started making the film worried about what lane I truly belonged in. I felt that my motivations were genuinely about being happier with myself for myself, but were they?

  I was in Swansea, south Wales, and was meeting twenty-four-year-old Kyle, a builder who worked out daily. With a social media feed made up of shirtless photos and/or clean meals, this was a man proud of his body and determined to share it.

  As Kyle’s building site day job was physically demanding, he made the most of his time on site fighting to do the heaviest lifting or most demanding tasks. This need to continually move wasn’t to gain approval from peers or a promotion from superiors, it was about burning calories. Motivated by a breakup, Kyle’s workouts went into overdrive eighteen months before I met him. His hobby had become an obsession and fitness took over his life.

  At the time of shooting, I’d been with my then girlfriend for years and hadn’t been pushed to change my appearance once. If there were subtle hints to fix my flab, I’d definitely missed them. My appearance was something I cared about but had never been fixated on, as I’d always relied on my personality when it came to women.

  The idea that this rejection might be the motivation for a healthier lifestyle didn’t sit well. His breakup seemed to have put him in the gym and he sounded obsessed with being healthy, but for unhealthy reasons. I was invited to join him for a workout and gladly accepted, intrigued by what his time in the gym would look like. To get anywhere close to his physique, I knew I had a way to go. Seeing how he did it wasn’t going to be brilliant just for the film, I was eager to steal as much as possible for my own regime.

  The familiar smell of cheap deodorant and socks filled the male changing room as Kyle and I got our gym gear on. Before I could even pull kit from my duffel, I was floored by a familiar sound I’ve only ever associated with the kitchen. Kyle had begun to apply what he referred to as ‘a cheat’ ahead of the workout. This was a trick he’d used before and one I couldn’t follow. Stood shirtless in the middle of the room, Kyle wrapped clingfilm around his thighs and torso in an effort to shed more water during exercise. I’d never seen anything like this before and couldn’t help but smirk as he finished up and let out a loud creaking noise with every step as he made his way out.

  With his ‘cheat’ hidden beneath a pair of shorts and a vest, the ridiculous nature of the situation fell away the longer we worked out. Kyle was working double hard only to improve what looked to me like the dream shape. I somehow managed to keep up but was totally distracted the entire time as I was training with a man who was desperately trying to sweat out excess water, risking dehydration and heat stroke.

  Openly referring to his body as ‘shit’, Kyle hated what I thought was a near perfect physique. He didn’t see enough cuts and pointed out abs that weren’t defined enough. Adamant his body was crap, he saw a stomach carrying too much water weight, whereas I saw the flat stomach I was eating rabbit food to achieve.

  Desperate to sweat as much as possible and as a result lose more water, Kyle pushed me to speed up. He wanted to complete each set quicker and wasn’t acting up for the camera, he was genuinely pissed off that I was slowing him down.

  Upon leaving the gym, I became aware of just how much his appearance affects every corner of his life. Kyle micromanages every calorie and had decided that his post-workout meal would be a single bag of beef jerky. The packet of lean meat proudly shouted the fact that its contents were only 140 calories. This to me said snack, but for Kyle, this was lunch.

  I’d made a promise to myself to watch my diet but hadn’t been paying attention to calories or fallen into the crazy routine of prepping meals in tiny little Tupperware boxes. I wanted to look and feel better at the end of my six-week challenge, not be worse off in terms of my health.

  All you have to do is type ‘six-pack advice’ into Google and everything imaginable comes up. The researched and proven sit side by side with the ill-advised and falsehoods, all presented as equally valid and effective. In figuring out wha
t I needed to do for the results I was after, my building blocks were simple. Diet and training. Call me old fashioned, but going with the safest and most proven route felt like the way to go.

  That didn’t seem to be the case for Kyle as his ‘by any means necessary’ attitude towards results seemed to also define his drive. Unfortunately, Kyle wasn’t an anomaly. Young men up and down the country have shifted their ideals and what is being deemed as the new normal ironically isn’t.

  While my wardrobe had played a huge part in letting me ignore and maybe even hide a decline in physical fitness, what younger guys wear today is becoming part of showing off what they’ve grafted for in the gym.

  Online retailer Reem directly markets clothes at that younger male audience obsessed with not just dressing like their idols, but also emulating their physicality. I attended one of their open casting calls attracting a load of normal guys. Business owner Simon was scouting for new models for his newest collections; only he wasn’t looking for new faces, he was far more preoccupied with their bodies.

  Only two of the men that turned up were models, the other twenty or so were average Joes and you couldn’t pick out who was who. These weren’t the lean, sharp-cheekboned, high fashion models that come to mind when you think ‘model’. These were commercial models that didn’t look too dissimilar to the inexperienced new jacks. Everyone was in shape and everyone fit a specific look. Simon was totally open about which looks and body shapes sold better to his audience of young fashion-conscious men. They wanted clothes that made them look better or showed off their best attributes. Based on Simon’s customers’ buying habits, the bicep size and type of tattoos on the models were key factors in which products sold.

  One by one the guys were called up for their own little test shoot. With their competition in full view, each young guy had to strut his stuff, and the presence of my inquisitive eye (and let’s not forget the camera crew) definitely didn’t help.

  I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many red faces back to back; nonetheless the guys all got through their awkward moment in the spot light. Watching each wannabe go up one after the other, the common theme became obvious. There were two definite, separate looks, and each model fit into one or the other. There was the clean-cut look where a sharp side parting or cropped haircut was accompanied by ice white teeth. Then there was a heavily tattooed and fuzzy faced dude who had the piercings and grimace to match.

  It was almost like watching two different McFlurrys being served on a McDonalds counter. One with this topping and the other with that. Both served on an ordinary and apparently commonplace base that in this case was toned physique and the obligatory six-pack.

  When I spoke to the guys during a short break, they were open about their chosen look and just how much it had been influenced by the content they consume. Some talked about the men’s magazine fitness models they’d grown up learning workouts from. Some spoke about the reality TV stars seen on shows like Geordie Shore and Ex on the Beach, who are all shoulders and plucked eyebrows.

  The conversation got awkward as I realised I was definitely the old geezer in the room as I didn’t know any of the people they were referencing. The shows they watched were on my radar, but I generally struggled to watch them because of the shit show of on-screen behaviour featured in them. That being said, the minutes of TV I’d subjected my poor eyes to did leave me thinking, blimey, those blokes are bloody ripped. And they literally went out in tight tops having a great time while getting all the attention from the women in whatever bar they’d chosen to gyrate in that night. As one of the wannabe models explained, ‘Lads these days are seeing that and want a piece of it.’

  As most of the men I spoke to repeated the same thoughts, I began to see the motivation. It wasn’t just about feeling better, it was about the reaction those hours in the gym received. ‘Changes become lifestyle and a habit, then you’re set for life,’ claimed another of the wannabe models. Set for life? I had no idea pulsating triceps could cover your council tax.

  Either way I had a lot to learn. For this generation of younger gym addicts, their toned bodies were more than just the visible results of hard work; they’d become a status symbol.

  Leaving the shoot, my belief in what young men were striving for in the gym had been totally knocked off centre. I’d spent the day surrounded by a load of blokes with no shirt on, which was odd for a start. I’d also left the casting call with a completely new set of references as to what the new normal had become. With modern icons like footballer Cristiano Ronaldo and (as much as it pains me to type) the cast of reality TV tripe having a huge influence over this generation of men in their late teens and early twenties, how built you are and how masculine you are has become more important than ever.

  I’ve never seen surgery as an option in terms of getting my body closer to my ideals. That isn’t me turning my nose up at anyone who chooses otherwise, that’s me being sure about only going under the knife when I know it’s for something I can’t fix myself. But as the science improves and cosmetic surgery continues to drop in price, the stigma it’s carried for so long is falling. Increasingly, men are finding new ways to change their bodies. For some, the gym just isn’t enough to achieve the results they’re after; the amount of time required for perfection (whatever that is) is just too high. That’s when the scale of your bank balance comes into play.

  Some men are going further afield in their pursuit of the perfect six-pack. Turkey is fast becoming a go-to destination for British men desperate to achieve their dream appearance. I hopped on a flight and attended an abdominal etching surgery where Lee from Leeds (no, really) underwent a procedure to change the visibility of his abdominal muscles.

  Spending six days a week at the gym just wasn’t enough for Lee, so he had decided on the £3,500 procedure. The minute Lee took his shirt off in preparation for his operation, I had to say how confused I was, as the man was clearly in shape. We went back and forth, but what became obvious quite quickly was that his issue wasn’t with what others saw, it was almost entirely about how he felt.

  The etching process saw a doctor melt the little fat Lee had using ultrasound, which was then sucked out strategically to accentuate his muscles. Lee lost the count-to-ten game under the spell of anaesthetic and he was taken down to theatre. I changed into scrubs so I could get a front-row seat.

  I’ve never liked hospitals. I think it’s the unavoidable stink of sickness in competition with nose-burning hand sanitiser I’ve always seen as an assault to the senses. Walking into the operating room was a strange place to be, considering my main aim was to stay out of the doctors’ way and try not to throw up at the sight of things going in and out of Lee’s body.

  A long steel pole I can only describe as the lypo thingy poked its way around Lee’s chest area just below the skin. It hummed loudly and spat bits of fat into a jumbo-sized glass beaker making me go a little green – and I can confirm that it wasn’t with envy.

  Watching the procedure come to a close, I was amazed at just how quickly the difference was visible. Lee was away with the fairies and had no idea that his abs already looked like he’d been training a lot harder for a lot longer. I caught myself while watching the surgery touching my soft bits suddenly more conscious of my own flaws.

  Thinking about the operation, I tried to take a step back. In one short procedure, Lee had put himself in a position where he’d never have to do a sit-up again. Did he have the right idea while I was totally wasting my time? This gave rise to a whole range of thoughts and feelings in me that I couldn’t really make sense of as I felt suddenly hyper aware of how much more work I had to do on myself to be fully satisfied with my own results. It also made me instantly paranoid that my journey to being happier with my body could become a losing battle for perfection.

  My addictive personality has led me to some real positives in my life. I’ve conquered things I’d never dreamed of, from completing Super Mario on the hardest setting (impressive, I know) to putting mysel
f in therapy in an effort to become a better man. With all the positive results of my ability to focus combined with my addictive traits, could I ever find myself doing something as extreme as Lee should I not achieve my physical goals naturally?

  I wasn’t born this way, I made myself this way

  With all this in mind, I decided to meet a man who made Lee look like a total beginner in the surgery game. If Lee’s surgery, though intrusive, seemed doable and had incredible results, then I wanted to speak to someone who’d gone all the way.

  I found myself in a super-posh London hotel that smelt as good as it looked; it was the type of place you’d regret not stealing from. Directed upstairs to one of the bigger suites, I was greeted at the door by Rodrigo. At thirty-two, Rodrigo was a flight attendant with dreams of a glamorous life played out with fantastic flare on his Instagram page.

  This was a man who knew how to have a good time, or at least he looked like he did online. With a relentless stream of glamorous locations and designer outfits, Rodrigo bombarded his followers with images of opulence. The strangest thing was that I found with every image, regardless of the location, what demanded my attention wasn’t the opulent setting or his flamboyant wardrobe; it was his face and physique.

  At just thirty-two years old, Rodrigo has had thirty-five cosmetic procedures and finally feels he’s achieved his goal. If I were to list his page-filling surgical breakdown, you’d think that he should look every bit the image of perfection. In my humble opinion, he was quite the opposite.