Dealing with jerks at your gym (muscles, lifting weights, treadmill, programs)
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I came across this article on cnn.com titled, Dealing with jerks at your gym.
Have you had to deal with this? For the most part, I haven't. I tend to filter out people grunting, screaming and use a towel to protect the equipment from my sweat and my body from others' sweat. OK, so maybe I'm a little guilty of checking out some chicks.
ROFL @ singing on the treadmill! I have never heard this.
At one of my gyms there was a crew of guys, very heavy lifters, in which some did yell far too loudly at the ends of their sets. It was like "will someone call the doctor into the delivery room? Someone's having a baby!" type situations. Otherwise, I've not really seen issues.
ROFL @ singing on the treadmill! I have never heard this.
At one of my gyms there was a crew of guys, very heavy lifters, in which some did yell far too loudly at the ends of their sets. It was like "will someone call the doctor into the delivery room? Someone's having a baby!" type situations. Otherwise, I've not really seen issues.
I go to the campus gym here and there definitely are a handful of guys who do that. I really don't mind that much, but what bothers me is when they grunt and then throw their pair of 80 or 100 pound dumbells to the ground. I'd really hate to have one of those land on my foot, and its really loud so if you don't expect it it can make you jump, in additon to being hard on the equipment.
And yes, I too may be guilty of checking out the girls too much...but its not my fault some are in such awesome shape and wear such revealing clothes to the gym! haha
I go to the campus gym here and there definitely are a handful of guys who do that. I really don't mind that much, but what bothers me is when they grunt and then throw their pair of 80 or 100 pound dumbells to the ground. I'd really hate to have one of those land on my foot, and its really loud so if you don't expect it it can make you jump, in additon to being hard on the equipment.
And yes, I too may be guilty of checking out the girls too much...but its not my fault some are in such awesome shape and wear such revealing clothes to the gym! haha
Oh, yes! Good reminder. People who throw dumbbells to the ground. I can't stand that discourtesy.
I also hate those who slam dumbbells and barbells on the floor. I always drop them gently. Gyms should enforce the "no dropping" policy b/c if a member dropped weights on another member's foot, he can sue the gym for negligence.
I used to grunt, but I've calmed it down a a bit. My previous gym had a "no loud noise" policy, including grunting, and the owner strictly enforced it. At my current gym, they don't have such a policy, but I've learned to not grunt as loudly.
In spin class once there was this lady who got really into her workout....way too into the workout. She started yelling, OH YEAH.....OH YEAH.....OH YEAH. This was said in a tone similar to what you'd hear in the bedroom. I don't know if that was her purpose or what...but I was definitely not turned on by it....and was actually pretty weirded out by it. I stopped going to the class for a while.
In spin class once there was this lady who got really into her workout....way too into the workout. She started yelling, OH YEAH.....OH YEAH.....OH YEAH. This was said in a tone similar to what you'd hear in the bedroom. I don't know if that was her purpose or what...but I was definitely not turned on by it....and was actually pretty weirded out by it. I stopped going to the class for a while.
I take it she was not an attractive woman.
One guy at a former gym used to do "drive-bys", where he'd pass gas as he made the rounds between stations. He blamed it on too much protein.
The gym I go to is actually fairly decent for the most part, but there are a few things that irk me.
For one, there's a halfway house nearby and all of the people who live there are allowed to come to the gym for free (it's a YMCA). Some of them are good and courteous gym patrons, but some of them aren't. You'll get some big gorilla who just spent the past 5-8 years in prison lifting weights who will come out, pick up the 130lbs dumbbells, do some sort of stupid exercise, grunt a lot and then spend the rest of the time mean mugging everyone else and blatantly staring at all the women while making grunts of approval. Of course they leave all their weights on the ground for the female gym staff to pick up.
The gym is also one of the very few places they can interact with people who aren't their employers or the staff at the halfway house, so sometimes they'll meet their girlfriends there and they'll go to a corner of the gym and make out or something... or girl of ill-repute will take up a bench to sit there and watch her boyfriend workout and of course mean-mug everyone and talk like she's on Jerry Springer.
The cellphone guys. People who carry on conversations while they're working out. I don't mind people having cell phones and answering them at the gym, but when people have conversations, it bugs me. I remember this one guy who had a cellphone that would "blow up" and he would always answer it "Mandingo Interprises". I guess he claimed to have some sort of a business. I will admit it was funny to listen to him talk to people about how his business is a "hot blue chip stock".
Teenagers. At my gym we get a lot of thugged out teenage kids who come in, all wearing wifebeaters and usually beanies or doo-rags who crowd around the bench and see who can get 135lbs up once or twice. I'm not going to make fun of someone for not being able to lift much, but when these kids come out all cocky and act hard they're fair game. They spend a lot of time making up excuses for why they can't lift like "Yeah, last night I benched 200 so I'm all sore", they leave weights on the floor and spend a lot of time looking in the mirror at muscles they don't have.
I like watching the pullup bar. Pull-ups are harder to do than most people think. When people like the above-mentioned teenagers try to do them, jump up on the bar and pull themselves up a little bit and realize it's a lot more difficult than they thought, I always make sure to make eye contact with them as they look around to see if anyones watching before they drop without getting one. When I was in the Marines, people would always ask what do you do for the physical fitness test. I'd tell them a 3 mile run, as many sit-ups as you can do in two minutes and pull-ups, where you at least have to get three and twenty is a perfect score. It's hilarious to hear some 30+ year old who hasn't done anything physical since high school and has enough blubber on him to feed an eskamo family for a week tell me "That's it? I could knock out twenty of them easy". Right. Maybe when you were 125lbs and in good shape in high school gym class. Once again, it's not a matter of making fun of people for what they can't do, it's an issue of the people with cocky attitudes.
wow sounds like everybody that lives here got together and car pooled to your gym.
i was thinking of getting a gym membership. thank you for your article very timely.
Glad it is not like that at the gym we go to. YIKES! I would NEVER go and I sure as heck would not be taking my kids. My oldest (13 y/o) can go upstairs and use any and all of the workout facilities on her own. I would NEVER let her go to the gym if the environment was halfway what any of y'all are describing.
However, there is one funny thing I've noticed. The gym we are members of (LifeTime) is fairly new (4 years) and very nice w/ great programs and an awesome outdoor pool area and slides and stuff for the kids. Plenty of lounge chairs around the pool and lifeguards on duty. What is funny and kind of sad to see are the women that come to "the gym" w/ kids in tow, head straight out to the pool, let the kids loose and then mom takes a nap, talks on the phone, visits w/ her fellow "gym" friends or takes a nap. Besides these "pool visits" the person has NEVER stepped into the gym for ANY kind of physical activity. It really is sad though.... spending all of this money on a gym membership to a GREAT facility and not take advantage of it to at least get HALF WAY into shape.
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