Fitter & Happier

The Arcufit bar is a unique handheld gizmo designed to increase upper body strength without the hassle and discomfort of lifting traditional weights. It’s the brainchild of architect David McNaughton.

How did you come to invent the Arcufit bar? I was about 45 when I read an article about muscle wastage. Any time after the age of 30 you lose muscle mass, that’s unless you’re active and doing some sort of training. So I started training with kettle bells, and simply what happened was that I hit myself on the head with one. And that was that. So I thought to myself, there must be something on the marketplace that’s ergonomically designed that I can put weights on, something much safer that I can move freely around my body.

But there wasn’t? No, so in the morning I drew a wee sketch on my iPad. I then made a model of it in the garage with copper pipe and put a couple of sandbags on it. The concept grew from there. I then became obsessed with three-dimensional movement, the idea of being able to move in any direction in order to rebuild your muscular structure.

And how did it become a reality? We spoke to Scottish Enterprise who were brilliant, and they offered certain grants. We got an assessment and applied for a patent, so it’s going through that process. It takes somewhere between three and six years to get a patent, but it’s protected under the Paris Convention. Once you publish your patent then that’s you effectively covered.

People can train with the bar at the classes you run, but when will it become commercially available? Probably this year. We’ll also be expanding our classes into other areas. The concept of the bar is it’s a home product, the classes came about to raise awareness. It’s a big learning curve, finding out how to pitch it to people. You need a bit of authenticity in a world that’s very cynical, you need quite a bit of knowledge and experience. We’ve kind of completed that process now and we have a genuine product that can make a massive difference to people’s lives.

Find out more about the bar at arcufit.com.