Les Mills, the man who turned the simple act of lifting things and putting them down into a multi-billion-dollar global religion of Lycra and endorphins, has shuffled off this mortal coil at the age of 91. The UK-born Olympian, who once hurled a discus for his nation, ended up hurling motivational platitudes at millions of housewives, gym bros, and corporate wellness enthusiasts from Auckland to Zurich. His legacy: a sweat-drenched empire of choreographed exercise that has made the phrase 'pump it' as ubiquitous as air.
I am, of course, talking about Les Mills International, the corporate behemoth behind BodyPump, BodyCombat, and a dozen other 'Body' prefixes that have colonised gym floors worldwide. Mills, you see, didn't just invent a workout. He invented a liturgy.
Every instructor a priest in neon shorts, every class a congregation of the willing, moving in sync to a remix of 'We Will Rock You'. The man himself was a 1950s throwback, a proper British athlete with a neat side-parting and a stiff upper lip. He competed in the 1950 and 1954 British Empire Games, and went to the 1952 Helsinki Olympics.
But it was in New Zealand, to which he emigrated in the 1960s, that his true genius emerged. He founded a chain of gyms, and then his son Phillip – a man who reportedly once bench-pressed a small car – distilled the whole thing into a marketable, franchisable, scalable phenomenon. The result was a global pestilence of fitness that has made the world simultaneously fitter and more insufferable.
Every time you see a person 'lunging' in a park with a grimly determined smile, you can thank Les Mills. Every time you hear a colleague extol the virtues of 'CXWORX', you can blame him. His death, announced by his family with the dignity of a press release, has sent ripples through the wellness industry.
Tributes are pouring in from personal trainers, yoga instructors, and the kind of people who use words like 'journey' and 'mindfulness'. I, for one, will raise a glass of gin to the man. Gin, at least, doesn't require a mat.
But let us not mourn. Let us, instead, do a squat. Or a burpee.
Or whatever the hell else Les Mills told us to do. Because that, dear reader, is the enduring legacy of a man who turned pain into profit and sweat into salvation. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a date with a cheese toastie and a bottle of Gordon's.
That's my workout. Rest in peace, Les. You've earned it.
Your final reps have been counted. The barbell has been racked. The music has stopped.
But the echo of your 'Five, four, three, two, one' will haunt us forever.
