so there was this guy in the gym . . .
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OK. I will admit that I was "this one girl at the gym" last week or the week before. I was having a good day.
Did my SL and was dead-on target for all my lifts: Squats, OHP, and Deads. Was feeling Awesome until....I went to take the weight off of the deadlift barbell. Could not get the freaking weight off of the bar. It wasn't that I couldn't lift to get the weight off, it was stuck. I struggled and struggled but to no avail. The weight room was packed too of course. Huge men out the yin yang! And me the only girl at 5'1" and 130lbs. Fighting with a stinking bar that I've used at least 50-100 times.
I got so pissed, ended up turning the bar on its end, stood on the weight, and yanked the flipping bar out. Put the crap away, got my stuff, and left. Did not look around. Didn't want to know how many people witnessed my struggle.
So I get home and tell my hubs this story and added "you know I probably gave everyone a good show"
Flash forward to Today. I finished my SL and worked extra on my Deads. See a guy (seasoned lifter) watching my area, so I'm thinking he wants it after me. I finish, Dude walks over with his headphones on, and proceeds to help me unload the Deads without saying a word. I thank him. He nods, turns, and goes back to doing his landmines.
Now I wonder if he witnessed my "difficulty" the previous week and thought he'd help me out or if he was just being nice. I was both mortified and thoroughly appreciative. I'm going with nice as I found out this past weekend the inner ring of that weight is bent and gets hung on the bar. They should mark that sucker so I know to avoid it from now on.8 -
OK. I will admit that I was "this one girl at the gym" last week or the week before. I was having a good day.
aaaggh. i hate it when external circumstances walk you right into other people's assumptions about your competence. giving your helper the benefit of the doubt for now seems like the smart move. if he does turn out to be a manspleping dick you'll have tons of time to blast him later . . . and if he isn't no bridges are burned.
i dropped in to give a little shout-out for my mr squats. haven't seen him for a few weeks but i knew he was planning a full dexa scan to kick off his year of eating keto to see what happens. last friday mr t and i were talking about how the reality check is always a bit of disappointment around things like that, so i asked squats the follow-up question last night. did he do it and how did it go.
mr squats: "oh, i'm a fat *kitten*"
i'd want to check a woman who referred to herself in those terms, but i've gotten so fond of this man.
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On Wednesday I was working out with my trainer and usually he does not say anything about the other people in the gym, but this time he could not help himself. It was the busy part of the evening and there was this guy doing squats in the squat rack. Not really funny until he was resting between sets. Not only does he rest in the squat rack but as he is checking his phone he is picking his nose. Once he is done this he adds some weight to the bar does a few squats with really bad form. Then during his next rest period stays in the rack checks his phone and picks his nose again. I left before he was done so not sure if he wiped down the bar after he was finished.0
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On Wednesday I was working out with my trainer and usually he does not say anything about the other people in the gym, but this time he could not help himself. It was the busy part of the evening and there was this guy doing squats in the squat rack. Not really funny until he was resting between sets. Not only does he rest in the squat rack but as he is checking his phone he is picking his nose. Once he is done this he adds some weight to the bar does a few squats with really bad form. Then during his next rest period stays in the rack checks his phone and picks his nose again. I left before he was done so not sure if he wiped down the bar after he was finished.
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EWWWW. and you people all know what i mean.
i've only approached the attendants twice. once was a gang of 8th-graders being downright dangerous with the horseplay - tickling whichever of them was trying to bench, as a matter of fact.
the other was this kid who sat in the smith for half an hour picking at zits and ingrown hairs all over his legs. like, really absorbed and elaborate about it. i could tell he wasn't quite with it so i stood it for as long as i could, but it was making me so queasy i finally did say something.1 -
At a gym I went to years ago, there were a couple of trainers who would qualify.
One of them was this big tall massive guy who was "helping" a client do pushups by lying on top of her. Another time he was yelling "Come on! two more! If you can't, I'll make you do 20 more!" okay...
The other was my trainer.
One time she had me doing some sort of exercise in which I was on my knees, then leaning to the left and then doing leg lifts with the right bent leg. The next day I woke up to find I had hip bursitis.
Then she was testing my bodyfat change after 8 weeks. Please note: I was on Weight Watchers (that's another story)
1) She used one of those handheld BIA devices
2) I lost 8 pounds in 8 weeks and according to the device, 7 pounds were fat "Why didn't you gain any muscle?" At the time I didn't realize that you couldn't gain muscle in a deficit.)
3) She also tested my RMR before and after with a BodyGem device. My RMR decreased slightly (week 8 - about 50 kcal lower than week 1). "Why didn't it increase?" Uh because I'm smaller now?2 -
Today it was one of those couples at the gym...you know the ones, the couple that's practically having sex in the squat rack? Yeah, them. Beefy dude teaching his girlfriend how to workout with weights, and doing a *kitten* job of it. I really considered saying something to one of the gym trainers bc she was cruising for a serious injury with the crap he was having her do.
First off was squatting. He had her loaded up with at least 150 lb on the bar, but she was doing quarter squats and struggling. They worked in but he would hang over her from behind with his arms draped over the bar while she was resting, then saunter over to do his set, so they took forever to do their workouts. The worst was that his form on his squats was actually good. He got all the way to depth, straight back, etc, and he just let her do these quarter squats with almost the same weight he was using, and her having a hard time with that.
They eventually moved on and did some other stuff. After I finished my squats I went on to benchpress, and while resting from a set of those I see them across the gym, doing Romanian deadlifts. He had a 70 lb fixed barbell for the deadlifts, and he had her jump onto his back, piggyback style, and cling to him while he did the RDLs. They looked ridiculous, and it was so obviously showing off that it was eyeroll worthy. I happened to make eye contact with the only other female in the workout area, and her friend that she was working out with, and we all shared an incredulous chuckle. I don't mean to be mean, it's great that the girl was working out and trying stuff, but the way he was going about teaching her was so ridiculous!
Finally, the part I almost went and tattled on, was that he had her doing jump squats.....with a 50 lb fixed barbell on her back. Her neck was cranked back and I was so afraid for her spine. She kept her back pretty straight but I feel like that is just a major injury waiting to happen. I feel like a wuss for not speaking up, but if I see them there doing that again I think I will. Maybe that's rude but she just looks like she is going to end up hurt bc he was so busy showing off that he didn't give her any pointers on form.
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amyinthetardis1231 wrote: »Maybe that's rude but she just looks like she is going to end up hurt bc he was so busy showing off that he didn't give her any pointers on form.
yeah, i might tattle too. i don't when someone's only going to hurt their own self but it gets me going when they're endangering somebody else . . . especially when that person just doesn't know enough to defend themselves against whatever's coming.
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sigh. i was That Girl On The Road today . . . both directions. downtown bike commuting needs a phd or something. they have this messy network of terrific small sections . . . but cohesive they ain't. nor consistent neither.
so both coming and going, i managed to airily follow what i thought was the established practice, and be travelling the wrong way down one way streets. i'll tell you people, an oncoming onslaught of lawyers in cars is not something you want to find yourself looking at. but nobody told me the bi-directional thing suddenly wasn't a thing right around the law courts.
otoh, when i got into the gym there was an actual member of that mythical species on site. a guy curling very in the squat rack. i was pretty tired and my social circuits got wet on the ride, so i didn't even try to pretend not to look. he was pretty serious about it, and i just stood there dripping all over their floor in my orange giant-pumpkin rain cape, and watched him the entire time. not sure my tongue wasn't sticking out because i was so entertained and so mesmerized 4 -
canadianlbs wrote: »sigh. i was That Girl On The Road today . . . both directions. downtown bike commuting needs a phd or something. they have this messy network of terrific small sections . . . but cohesive they ain't. nor consistent neither.
so both coming and going, i managed to airily follow what i thought was the established practice, and be travelling the wrong way down one way streets. i'll tell you people, an oncoming onslaught of lawyers in cars is not something you want to find yourself looking at. but nobody told me the bi-directional thing suddenly wasn't a thing right around the law courts.
otoh, when i got into the gym there was an actual member of that mythical species on site. a guy curling very in the squat rack. i was pretty tired and my social circuits got wet on the ride, so i didn't even try to pretend not to look. he was pretty serious about it, and i just stood there dripping all over their floor in my orange giant-pumpkin rain cape, and watched him the entire time. not sure my tongue wasn't sticking out because i was so entertained and so mesmerized
Lol. Thank you. Very entertaining1 -
Now I wonder if he witnessed my "difficulty" the previous week and thought he'd help me out or if he was just being nice. I was both mortified and thoroughly appreciative. I'm going with nice as I found out this past weekend the inner ring of that weight is bent and gets hung on the bar. They should mark that sucker so I know to avoid it from now on.
Count it as a win either way! So many people would see someone struggling and not even offer nowadays.
As for marking, I'd totally bring some washi tape and put a little at the far end of it. If you're lucky, it'll stay there.1 -
Today it was two guys, and then it was a little bit me.
I usually avoid the gym on Saturdays but my schedule was wacky this week so I had to go today or wait from Thursday until Tuesday. There were two teen boys using the lone rack when I walked in, "squatting" 200 lbs (quarter squats with scary bad form) and lots of dudes doing other exercises on most of the available benches. I asked the kids how many more sets they had, to which they responded by staring at me like I had two heads before saying 4 each.
So I settle in to wait, and within about 30 seconds one of the kids rushes through unracking his bar and drops the whole thing behind his back. The entire gym stopped what they were doing to stare. I felt bad for him and I'm pretty sure he hurt his hand a little. Fortunately for him, another guy who was there to deadlift came over and helped him re-rack his weights. I saw the DL guy just standing and watching them after that so I asked if he was waiting for the rack too, and he said no, he just wanted to make sure they didn't kill themselves.
The kids continued to rotate through crappy squat sets until the DL guy finally couldn't take it any more and went over to give them some form pointers and show them a pretty perfect squat. Another guy who was also watching them gave DL guy some silent applause, and we all shared a "good job" nod as he returned to his DLs. The kids' squats were still pretty rough, but at least they didn't break themselves.
Then came my turn, and I lost my grip on a 35 lb plate and dropped it, banging it into my shin. At least I didn't make noise so I don't think many people noticed it....derp!2 -
amy- I hope you didn't hurt yourself!0
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fanncy0626 wrote: »amy- I hope you didn't hurt yourself!
Nah, just a tiny bruise. Mostly just chagrined at dropping a weight after feeling smug about my squat form
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amyinthetardis1231 wrote: »fanncy0626 wrote: »amy- I hope you didn't hurt yourself!
Nah, just a tiny bruise. Mostly just chagrined at dropping a weight after feeling smug about my squat form
heh. my klutz specialty is posing my flexed foot to 'catch' the bar end after i pull a plate off it. i never do learn that feeling strong doesn't mean your foot likes having that might weight dropped onto it. i yell OW! like it's never happened before, every time.
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zomgs, this is an awe story. there was this guy in the gym . . . . i happened to glance at his warmup and it was incredible. he was doing idk what to call them, cossack squats i guess. where you go one-legged, but with your other foot out to the side.
absolutely rock-solid perfect form, and a cadence that was more like tai chi. he'd go all the way down *kitten* to grass on one side, and then he'd just turn the off foot until it was forward and planted and then flow himself sideways until he was *kitten*-to-grass on that side. then he'd flow up until he was standing again, go back *kitten*-to-grass on that side, shift and plant the original foot and flow over to the original side. kind of thing where you can't figure out how a person even learns to do it, because it looks like you'd tear some important groin muscle right off the bone at the very first try.
i just tried them out for myself anyway, out on the back deck. couldn't do them without leaning way forward like a bad taco squat, couldn't get my bum below parallel until i'd done five or six reps either. and still they felt pretty incredible.4 -
the selfish relentlessly self-advertising crossfit woman . . . she was there on monday or wednesday this week. haven't seen her for months and i almost turned on me heel and/or said 'oh *kitten*' out loud when i recognised her. i hate only one other regular in that rec centre, but i hate her. veered straight off to not line up for the rack when i realized she was in there with her latest. she just has this way of inserting stingy little left-handed dyel negging into every interaction she starts, that i hate.
so this time she had a guy who looked almost . . . normal. loserish, but somewhere not too far from the margins. this worried-looking 50-somethingish dude, sort of sitcom-dad type. aaand i didn't even realise they were associated at first, because he was in teh rack 'squatting' all by himself, and all i noticed was how uncomfortable [and noob-form-ish] he seemed. at first. then later i realised she'd set him up 'squatting' and gone off to do her own thing, like the way a parent gives a kid something to make a mess with and gets on with the real work themselves.
i just thought he was another of her randoms. she does this; i've noticed it. seems to hang out in idk, biker bars or something looking for excuses to display her muscles and show off her strength, and then her showing-off extends to forcing these people into 'her' environment by some form of 'i'll teach you to lift!'. where she basically has a captive audience and shows off some more.
so i rolled my eyes and carried on, especially when she put him into the smith to squat more and then forgot about him. but lo and behold, after a while she does one of her drive-by drop-ins to see how he's doing - and damn me if she didn't lean in and start giving him kissy-face stuff! she put one hand on his knee but i was so relieved she didn't try to sit down on him. he would have collapsed under her like a dry twig.
i was like, wow. captain[ess] tacky is necking in the smith with mr rogers, and i think i just want to go home.0 -
Definitely sounds like someone to avoid.
I went to a different location. These 24 Hour Fitness places are nice because they are all over and it's interesting to see the very different layouts. This one has racquetball courts. I've seen basketball courts at them all but this is the first one with racquetball. It was after 6 pm, so very busy. Saw a guy doing bench press, which that was normal. Often see guys doing that or using dumbbells for upper body. However, his grip was different. I know wide and narrow grip but his approach was underhand. Looked a little uncomfortable.1
