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Sport and Magazines • 107

in the tone of the magazine. The humour of the text described previously resides in
the way it characterises the masculinity of the reader as both heroic and antiheroic.
Benwell (2004: 14) argued that heroic masculinity could be understood as ‘active,
rational, professional, autonomous, knowledgeable and authoritative’. The muscu-
lar male is the epitome of heroic masculinity since he is literally a self-made man,
having exerted mind over matter to create armour from muscle (Easthope 1990).
The emphasis on muscle in this article (and throughout Men’s Health magazine)
conceives of the reader in the terms of heroic masculinity. However, the positioning
of the reader as lazy, really just wanting to ‘take it easy’, and the representation of
him as the opposite of active—asleep in an armchair—corresponds to antiheroism:
‘resolutely and good humouredly self-deprecating. Antiheroism is associated with

ordinariness, weakness, and self-reflexiveness’ (Benwell 2004: 14).
The subject position offered by the article, therefore, is an unstable one, and for
Benwell (2004), the ironic tone of much men’s magazine writing is part of the ambi-
guity surrounding this conceptionalisation of masculinity. For example, the secret

muscle item addresses the reader as an unfi t office worker with hunched shoulders
and as a bodybuilder at the same time. The reference to a caveman stance might posi-
tion the reader as lacking a body beautiful, but it simultaneously accords him excessive

masculinity. The use of irony in men’s health and fitness magazines could be seen as
a resolution to the confusion of gender identity occasioned by asking men to step into
the ostensibly feminine address of consumer culture. It enables the producers of maga-
zines to accommodate and capitalize on the anxieties of their readers (Benwell 2004).
This chapter has argued that the address of sports and fitness magazines is not

simply confined to an interest in sport and fitness. The title, image, cover lines, edi-

torials and contents of the magazines combine to hail readers as socially situated sub-
jects. In particular, class and gender were seen to be central to the direct and indirect
address of the magazines. As Abrahamson (2007) noted, magazines use techniques
to build close connections with their readership. The remainder of this chapter fo-
cuses on two case studies of specialist sports magazines: Climber and Crush. The
magazine covers, editorials and contents are explored to consider the ways that the
magazines attempt to address their ideal readers within the different sport cultures of
climbing and golf. The case studies highlight the degrees of journalistic distance be-
tween the producers and consumers of the magazines and their differential emphasis
on ‘serious sport’ or ‘sporting lifestyle’.

Case Study: Climber—a Specialist Sport Magazine

Climber is a glossy magazine characterised by its use of stunning outdoor pho-
tography of climbers set amid scenic and awe-inspiring spaces. The dramatic image
on the cover of a lone climber on the side of a sheer precipice is compelling and im-
pressive. The shot is taken from above the climber and slightly angled, emphasising