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Greg Grimmer is fired with an enthusiasm for fitness after poring over

GQ Active

Conde Nast is not known for its careless launches. One magazine a decade

seems to be about par for the course, so I was a little surprised to

hear about GQ Active, a brand extension of Vogue House’s youngest brand.

Surely, I thought, GQ already offers its readers something in the way of

sport, grooming and fitness. Indeed, on first glance the sibling is

almost a twin. The cover and production values are as high as you would

expect from its upmarket parent, even the spineline, ‘look after number

one’, has overtones of the 80s launch edition of its host.

However, diving to the bulk of the contents (while wearing Lauren

swimwear, controlling my breathing and checking for testicular cancer) I

came across a series of articles that wouldn’t have looked out of place

in any before-GQ male interest mag. Successful Orienteering didn’t make

much of a splash on the newsstands then and would probably struggle

today. We all have an odd friend who does triathlons, goes on holiday to

the Himalayas and kayaks to work, but surely no-one stylish wants to

read about them? But then a piece on ‘The Hash Harriers’ caught my eye -

a running club that runs between pub and curry house. Isn’t this Loaded

territory?

It took the cover star, Paolo Maldini, to get us back to a familiar GQ

landscape. Italian, good looking and the best defender in the world, he

is GQ (Active) Man. The fact that he runs a Milanese night-club, drinks

until 6am and still looks good perhaps encapsulates why I, and my kind,

will buy GQ Active. It is the desire to continue to enjoy life that

makes us care for ourselves more than ever before. So for the October

issue let’s have more sushi, less sumo.

Greg Grimmer is the would-be-fit director of CIA Medianetwork