Bernard O'Shea - The Dad Bod Diaries: It's high time I asked... what IS a 'dad bod'?

From ancient Greece to present day, the classic male form has changed shape. So what exactly does a 'dad bod' look like, asks Bernard O'Shea

'The Greeks were absolutely obsessed with the male form. Their statues were basically the Instagram fitness influencers of their time'

I had spent weeks writing about diets, exercise, midlife motivation, and the peculiar humiliation of squats, but I had never stopped to define the thing I was supposedly trying to change.

The first thing you realise very quickly is that the “ideal male body” has been changing for thousands of years. Which is reassuring, because if history has taught us anything, it’s that today’s peak physical specimen is tomorrow’s museum curiosity.