Bodybuilder is muscling in on meals market

Gary Thornton, who set up Aktiv Bodz Muscle and Fitness in Bradford 11 years ago, created Muscle Meals after spending several years preparing and cooking six to seven meals a day, which he found time consuming and lacking in choice.

Mr Thornton, 49, who runs the business with partner Tracey Abbott, is targeting amateur and competitive bodybuilders, fitness enthusiasts and sports people who need a nutritionally balanced diet to build their physique and then maintain it. The business expects to turn over 200,000 to 250,000 this year.

He said: "Muscle Meals are designed to take away the hassle of having to weigh and measure everything you want to eat and give you the assurance that you are eating a healthy, well-balanced diet.

"They are not meant to replace the whole of your diet, but to fill in for those times when you need a high-quality meal and time is an issue such as after training and early mornings, or at the weekend when you want a few days off from cooking."

There are 17 varieties in the range, which includes breakfasts and dinners and each contains at least 40g of class A protein and have been

devised by chefs who also provide food for Harrods and Selfridges.

Each meal is blast frozen once it has been cooked to preserve its nutrients and freshness, and contains no added preservatives or e-numbers.

Mr Thornton, who came fourth in the over-40s Mr Britain competition in 2003, will sell the meals in the store and through his website initially but said he may choose to sell entirely online in the future.

Ms Abbott makes the bikinis and trunks which Aktiv Bodz sells alongside dietary supplements.

Mr Thornton said: "It is good to do something I enjoy. Muscle Meals is a niche. No doubt in a year or two there will be lots of people doing them.

"The supermarkets have only just got into food supplements but if there is a market there (for Muscle Meals) then good."

Mr Thornton, who is from the Wibsey area of Bradford, has been doing weight training for 34 years but his interest in diet increased after a spell of enforced idlenesss early in his career.

"I had a motorcycle accident in 1979 which put me back for 12 months and I wanted to get back in the gym and train. Then I did a few shows and won a few prizes."

He set up his own firm in 1999 when the Bradford health and fitness store for which he had been working closed down.

"I though I have been doing this for six years so the only option was to set up on my own. A lot of people knew me from the shops and from competitions."

Mr Thornton, who has stepped back from competitive bodybuilding since 2003, said business conditions were "harder now" because of the state of the economy and increased rivalry from gyms, shops and websites selling similar products.

A QUESTION OF BULK

Gary Thornton said he paid little attention to what he ate in his first four to five years of weight training, which meant he made slow progress. Once he joined a gym he got advice on diet and began eating more protein.

Competitors in many other sports take diet products to bulk up, most notably sprinters, but Andy Murray, Britain's number one tennis player, has achieved his weight gain on the back of long workouts and a high intake of sushi, steak, protein bars and peanut butter.

Tim Henman said he tried the weight gain product Creatine but didn't like the side effects. Some Premier League footballers, however, use similar supplements to help bulk up and to quicken the healing of damages muscles.