MICHAEL: Being at the gym is like a birthday
present, I'm at my happiest when I'm in the gym.
COMM: Think you sweat it out at the gym? This
40-year-old from London will put your workout to shame.
COMM: Michael Tavernier can do one hundred
press ups in a minute and a half, and he's mastered one of fitness' toughest feats, the
human flag.
MAN: Give me a peace up.
COMM: Michael has been a fitness fanatic for
almost a quarter of a century, and incredibly he's self taught.
MICHAEL: I first started exercising when I
was fourteen to fifteen years of age, and since that time the journey has never stopped.
Initially when I first started it was very much about heavy weights, who could lift the
most. So I started to play around - in the last three years I've started to play around
with bodyweight training.
MICHAEL: It's come from the genre of calisthenics,
all I've done, I've just added my own twist on it.
ROBSTER LE MONSTER: I wish I could do it,
it's actually very, very impressive indeed. I mean to be honest I won't lie, I don't think
I could do that.
COMM: As well as turning heads at the gym and
in the local park, his workouts have attracted tens of millions of views on social media.
MICHAEL: On so many exercises I do, like the
variations of the human flag exercise for example. I'd be called Spiderman, Superman.
Hercules. Certainly when I do my one hand pull ups, and I find that very flattering.
COMM: Outside the gym Michael has been a full
time carer for his parents for the last eleven years.
MICHAEL: My dad, he suffers from dementia,
stage three, the worst type. It's very demanding and also personally it can flatten you, so
gym has been so important for me to keep me going, gym is like a counsellor to me. Medicine.
It's really kept me mentally strong, physically strong, and happy.
COMM: Now Michael is determined to push his
limits even further.
MICHAEL: The next level is where I'm trying
to be at in terms of mastering these moves and then performing them one handed which
will gain a lot of respect because most people out there who know how difficult these exercises
are already but then do it with one hand is - amazing may not cover it. It's what we call
Beast Mode. There's a Beast Mode in Michael Tavernier and he comes out when he's in the gym.