I JUST WANT TO SHUT YOU UP

UPDATE Our July story on regulation in the fitness industry (“The Hans and Franz Syndrome”) dropped a barbell on a hornet’s nest. STAN TRACHT (part owner of Colbert Tracht Fitness Service Unlimited. Inc., and holder, he told D Magazine, of a degree in exercise physiology) cited LARRY NORTH (Northbodies, KLIF-AM radio, etc.) as one fitness expert lacking a proper educational background. North, who doesn’t have a degree but has been in the bicep business for 13 years, agreed the industry needed some regulating.

But when the story appeared. North almost blew a deltoid grabbing the phone to complain, saying he’d never have agreed to an interview had he known Tracht was part of the story. According to North, rival Tracht has long wanted to put him out of business.

Tracht says he’s heard through the grapevine that North threatened to have some husky dudes rearrange his attitude-a charge North calls “ludicrous.” In fact, North says he was calming down when he got a call from “a female voice” advising him to check out Tracht’s credentials.

So North called Baylor University, Tracht’s alma mater, and learned, he says, that Tracht’s degree is in business, not exercise physiology. Tracht now admits he doesn’t actually have the degree but claims to have “the equivalent”- enough hours, he says, to admit him to the Ph.D. program at the University of North Texas. D’s own calls to Baylor revealed that 51 of Tracht’s 189 credit hours are in ex phys.

Both sides are now in cool-down. Tracht says he’s gotten lots of support for speaking up about qualifications, and business is booming. North, who dismisses Tracht as “a gnat in my face,” sees the affair as “a wake-up call.”