British Military Fitness (BMF) has criticised the "unacceptable" comments made by the Daily Mail newspaper in relation to the service offered by military-style exercise providers.

In an article headlined Why Army-style fitness workouts are all pain and NO gain, published in the paper earlier this week, personal trainer Lucy Fry accused army-style training of potentially causing serious injury to participants.

Fry, who is on the books of London-based personal training consultancy E-Fit, claimed that the instructors in charge of military-style group exercise sessions "clearly do not have enough eyes to ensure everybody is doing everything right".

She singled out BMF, the UK's leading military-based exercise provider which runs sessions at 24 London locations, describing the exercise sessions mainly consisting of "endless jogging", sit-ups, and stretches that "only the orthopaedic industry will profit from". Fry also claimed that BMF provides "no screening" before allowing people to take part in exercise and outlined

In response, Robin Cope, managing director of BMF, said that a number of the items highlighted in the article were simply incorrect.

Speaking to Leisure Opportunities, he said: "It was clear that the writer had not researched the topic correctly, let alone come along to one of our classes to try it out.

"Any first timer to BMF has to complete a health questionnaire before they can take part in the class. The questions focus on the main areas that may affect physical performance during an exercise class. If an individual answers 'yes' to any of the questions on the form it is highlighted that they need to consult with their doctor before increasing their physical activity.

"For all BMF members that attend on a regular basis, at the beginning of each class the instructor asks if anyone has any injuries or medical conditions that they should know about such as asthma, diabetes or epilepsy."

Cope also rubbishes the suggestion that instructors struggle to properly supervise large groups and "bully" members into exercise routines that could cause them injury.

"The way in which the writer questioned our instructors' knowledge and expertise was unacceptable, as all our instructors are ex-armed forces physical training instructors with recognised fitness qualifications.

"At no point would any of our instructors ignore that a member had an injury and make them perform specific exercises to aggravate their injury.

"Also, she implied that military classes of this nature cause back injury by quoting an osteopath who has treated many soldiers. Of course serving soldiers may have developed back problems during their service by continually carrying heavy backpacks or jumping out of planes, neither of which, obviously, we ask of our members during classes, as was implied by the article."

Cope added that he doesn't believe that the article, which is readable online at the Daily Mail website, will have any affect on the success of BMF or military training in general.

"I don't feel that this article has damaged our reputation in any way, you only have to look at the number of positive comments posted to the article to see there are many people out there who are encouraged by different ways of getting fit and also from the many thousands who do take and have taken part in our BMF classes."

"However, the person in question has been allowed to provide the public with a false perception of our classes which is highly disappointing. It has never been my policy or that of the company to criticize the competition regardless of what I may think and certainly without any basis in fact. At the end of the day, people will choose exercise regimes that are most effective for them."

Cope, a retired British Army major, set up BMF in 1999 as an alternative form of exercise to gyms and personal training. It currently has more than 19,000 members across the UK taking part in sessions every week.