Meeting him in a suit and tie is a more unique than rare event. “Maybe it just happened for my wedding, in 1967,” she jokes. Tracksuit, sweatshirt and sneakers are his faithful companions in his daily life. Together with the inseparable teardrop eyeglasses. Enzo Laghi, for all “Enzino”, the king of fitness of Forlì, celebrates 80 years. The one he opened in via Ravegnana, a few steps from the Foro Boario, the Record Body Line, is in fact among the first gyms that have sprung up in the city.
The music
“And after a day, you realize that a year has already passed”, Pink Floyd, Laghi’s favorite band, would tell him. Enzo’s is a life full of anecdotes and passions, starting with music. “For fifteen years I have been playing and recording. I was a guitarist in two bands, the “Rangers” and “The end of the world 2000″. We had fun, performing in clubs and even at the seaside on summer evenings. I still have my electric guitar at home, a 1964 Fender, but in the last forty years I have touched it five times ”. He was also a composer, “but then I gave up everything”.
The role of prof
After graduating with a specialization in metalworking in a professional institute, Laghi was a teacher at the Industrial Technical Institute for about thirty years, where he taught technical and practical subjects. And between one lesson and another he devoted himself to his other passion, that of bodybuilding, also building specific equipment. “Among my students – he confesses – there was also Nevio Alessandri, who would become the patron of Technogym. I have given him so many valuable suggestions “.
A life as a sportsman
But how did the fitness world spark? Laghi recounts: “I used to practice running and cycling as a kid and I weighed 54 kilos. Then I started training with a 38 kg anvil, lifting it and making it fall to the ground, and I remember that my father got angry because I made holes in the ground “. Workout after workout, he continues, “I reached 75 kilos of healthy muscles, naturally built, trying to interpret the important rules of good training combined with a healthy diet. They ate not too many carbohydrates, decent proteins, but without exceeding, because too many are not good for you. Fruits and vegetables have always been my most important food. I didn’t have the physique to become a mountain of muscle; I did not want to follow the path of the bodybuilders of the time, but to have a resistant, harmonious and well-structured body “. Laghi tried his hand at the Italian bodybuilding championships, “with not even mediocre results”, the last of which was held in Florence in 1960.
Studying and getting federal diplomas, he began teaching at Polisportiva Edera, before setting up on his own and starting his own gym. “About fitness and not bodybuilding, because I focused on aerobic activities”, Laghi is keen to specify, revealing how the idea was born: “My daughter Milena did rhythmic gymnastics and needed to carry out a training program dedicated to tendons Achilles heel and back. It was Professor Leonardo Gui, a great orthopedic doctor, teacher and author of numerous publications, who gave me the idea to start a motor activity dedicated to women. It was 1979. And she trained by listening to music, which was new at the time ”.
The gym
Since 1983 the “Record Body Line” has been housed in via Ravegnana, a few steps from the Foro Boario: “Over the years it has become bigger and more spacious, offering the possibility to participate in more courses and activities. The hall has 85 machines, with traditional tools that have evolved over time “. The secret of a good workout? “I am of the opinion that it is necessary to train with overloads to maintain efficient muscle mass, because it curbs sarcopenia. Up to 40 years it is possible to increase the lean mass, then gradually it will be lost “.
Entering the gym, Laghi mixes with his customers, carrying out exercises and dispensing advice: “At a certain age I had to give up doing exercises with some machines, because the cartilages become thinner and physical problems such as atrium can occur. Fitness is an activity that varies over the years, transforming itself from a hard sport to a soft and medical one to keep the body active. I train practically every day, doing fewer sets, but with more repetitions, without using the once-over “.
The secret’
Years go by, but Laghi does not at all show the age engraved on the identity card: “I have been exercising for 65 years and I abandoned bodybuilding when I was 20. Work in the gym will accompany me throughout my life and I think I can having figured out in time how to do it to keep myself as healthy as possible. Of course, I sometimes suffer from back, joint, shoulder problems and calcifications ”. At the table, he allows himself to break the rules: “My wife works very well in the kitchen, so I let myself go to her culinary virtues, from first courses to desserts. But fortunately, by training six times a week, I was able to contain the weight gain ”. Enzo is the classic example of how a good wine improves as it ages. But no pacts with the devil, unless he is a Rossoneri: “Milan is another great passion, but it’s making me suffer and not a little.”
The future
As for the present future, to inherit the good things built over the years by Enzo is his son Cristian, in the past also a third dan black belt in karate: “In addition to being a physical education teacher, with a diploma from the Isef in Bologna and in motor science, he became a nutritionist biologist doctor. He not only carries on the activity of the gym, as an instructor and course guide, but he has completed what I have not been able to do “.
