FITNESS MAGAZINE EXPLOSION

By RICHARD W. STEVENSON
Published: June 15, 1985

If it involves moving a muscle, there is probably a magazine for it.

Five years ago, there were only a handful of health and fitness publications. Today, a weightlifter might have trouble lifting them all at once.

''There's been a grass-roots revolution in health and fitness, and the information is following that,'' said Owen Lipstein, publisher of American Health, a monthly magazine founded three and a half years ago. ''There's a lot of activity in the field, a lot of start-ups.''

The titles range from health-oriented magazines, such as American Health; Prevention, and Health, which offer advice on everything from nutrition to muscle tone, to those with a more general readership, such as Self, which now carry more features on fitness.

But the most visible development has been the introduction of dozens of small publications aimed at readers with specific exercise interests. For women, in particular, there sometimes seems to be more magazines on newsstands designed to keep them trim than there are aerobics classes in Manhattan.

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