Are you ready to sweat with the Victorians? A newly discovered book The Portable Gymnasium originally published in 1861 by Father Gustav Ernst shows that when they weren’t busy getting poor children wedged in looms, they were busy getting ripped. So charge up your flux capacitors, set the date for the mid 1800s and accelerate to 88mph, we’re going Back To The Future!
Presuming you survived your journey and you didn’t get murdered by Libyan terrorists the first step is to pick up one of these beauties.
The Thighmaster’s Great-Grandfather
This is the “portable gymnastic apparatus” that Ernst used for his workout. You just know that had you been alive in 1861 you would have telegrammed £59.99 for one of these contraptions in the hope that it would make a new you.
Now, let’s start our workout. To begin give me 50 reps of these:
Tone those gruel-refusal muscles
Have you noticed yet that the look for gym bros in the Victorian era was a tad more formal than our modern outlook?
The sweat-wicking properties of frock coats is well known.
Just make sure your chest expansion doesn’t disturb your cravat.
Now let’s beast those arms. Let’s do 25 of these, both sides.
Feel the burn.
Now, unlatch the ear trumpet attachment for your portable gymnastic apparatus and do this for 15 minutes.
Isn’t this the dance steps to The Time Warp?
Now you may have expected that because this was the Victorian era, that buffing up would be for men only. How wrong you would be. Come get yours ladies…
Phwoar, look at those toned legs! Somewhere in there. Under at least an acre of crinoline.
Give your daughter freakishly large deltoids for no reason whatsoever!
Now do The Flush!
Far too much wrist is on display, cover up woman!
Ok, you’ve had a great session, take a break, rehydrate with a cup of tea and we’ll be back shortly for some reps of repressing our emotions and upper-lip stiffening…
