How am I percieved at the gym?

I'm the girl who looks like she's not working out hard (but she is!!) and is sweating and dripping everywhere...and who occasionally checks out her form in the mirror next to her and also checks out her *kitten* in the mirror behind her. :blushing: I also like to sing along with my iPod when I'm in warm up (any faster, and I can't sing!) or when a particularly motivating song comes on. I may even do a little dancing as I'm on the elliptical or yell at the machines when they don't cooperate with me.

God knows what people think of me

I'm the dorky guy wearing the "doo rag" rocking out with my ear buds on the elliptical for an hour and a half.

I'm also the dorky guy (same headgear) in Zumba class struggling to keep up with the instructor.

Sometimes I'm the dorky guy swimming laps in the pool while wearing a heart rate monitor, which nobody at my gym seems to have ever seen before. The other night some dude hollered at me: "what's that around your belly?" ... Belly? Really? *sigh*

So yeah, I'm the resident gym dork.

i'm the girl with a long sleeve shirt that has seen much better days, hair past my knees - but it's all pinned up so it won't get caught in the machines - and a skirt (!?!?) over my leggings or yoga pants underneath lol i'm sure i'm a riot to watch but i like exceeding people's expectations.

I'm probably perceived as the maniac, and I used to care for a very short while, and then realized I won't see results if I slow down or "take it easy" like everyone else there......If I'm doing HIIT, going slow and steady isn't gonna cut it. I blast my iPod anyway so half the time I'm really not worried about what's going on....not to be inconsiderate, but I'm in my own world blasting Disturbed as I power my way through lol....and yeah, I sweat like there's no tomorrow

I'm definitely the "baseball girl" at the gym. Hands down.

Honestly? I have not often given it much thought to what others thought of me at the gym and I don't know why. There are other times and places I've worried needlessly about this person thinking this or that about me. But I'm a terrible mind reader and 99.9% of the time I am so far off base, I really need to quit doing it:laugh:

When I began going to the gym 3 years back 200lbs more than I weigh today it never made me uncomfy because I knew I was in a place I wanted and needed to be, a place I could get healthy in. I couldn't possibly let myself get self conscience or I'd never have started getting fit.

I have no clue how ppl perceive me. lol I guess I'm the girl that wipes the machines before and after use, picks up towels I see on the ground and toss them in the towel bin along with mine. If I'm picking up my deep water weightbelt for the pool I'll help others pick the rest up that got just dumped (some ppl put theirs away, some leave them sit) after class etc.

Not sure how others perceive that. It's my gym too so I would like it to look decent when I work out. I figure why the heck not help out when I'm picking my own stuff anyhow/:flowerforyou:

Becca

i am the "ride the stationary bike ten miles, and weight train for 30 min and after ten min on the treadmill i think i might die, but make myself go atleast 20 more min" girl.. but i've not been that girl in months.. i think it's time to get to know her again....

Ewww used cloths? Whats the point? Our gym has paper towel and spray!

I'm the "I don't give a crap what I look like" woman with my hair thrown up in a pony tail! I glue myself to the tv the whole time and YES I wlll laugh out loud if something funny is on! If a machine doesn't have a tv I don't use it, lol. Don't care what ANYONE thinks of me when I'm at the gym, I'm not there to impress anyone but myself! And YES I wipe down each machine after using it EVERY time, I hate watching people walk away without wiping, they put the paper towels and spray there for a reason along with the big signs !!!!!

It is somewhat ironic that this topic is "how am I perceived" when, for the most part, I don't pay that much attention to what other people look like or what they are wearing. I do paid more attention when I was working out at the park district fitness center because it was small and they had limited machines (e.g. one bench press and one squat rack). I had to do so in order to work around the other people there.

I am also in a different situation in that it is MY JOB to watch people exercising. But most of the time, I am looking only at their form. I don't really notice clothes or even physical appearance, but I do know who is engaging their lats properly during a row exercise and who isn't!

I think I'm the "how in the hell is that fat girl still running after 30 minutes?!" girl. :laugh:

Last night I caught a very fit guy looking at me for extended periods of time many many times (did he really think I couldn't see him in the mirror?!). At first I thought maybe he was interested (haha) but then I talked myself into thinking he was just looking at me in disbelief. :laugh: We had started about the same time and were going about the same speed (7-8mph) on the elliptical and he was obviously majorly struggling after about 20 minutes while I was just chugging along watching TV. He quit 10 minutes before I did.

That's awesome! You go gurl!!!! Next time wink at him and see if he turns red...

I love it!!! I am the Fat Kid at my gym. I almost always have on the way tooo big T-shirt (including odd sayings). The butt jiggles, I sweat profusely (mostly because I live in Texas, work out in a garage style gym, and its usually somewhere between 80-105 degrees depending on the humidity). I am always the last one in from group runs, huffing and puffing all of the way, but I am always hanging in there and doing the best I can. :laugh:

The clumsy red-faced girl who looks waaaaay to happy to be sweating. I always have a goofy smile on my face after a good workout, or especially during a class. I guess I should adopt a scowl so I can look a little more "hard core".

THats not annoying! Thats someone I would love to workout with

I workout at home, so it's only me and my kids and my dog.
- the dog probably thinks - why doesn't she take me out on a run, instead of using that dumb noisy machine.
- the kids think "there's mommy exercising again"
- the neighbors think - thank gawd she's exercising, maybe she'll look half decent sitting around her pool
- I think, thank gawd there's no one here judging me!
:laugh: :ohwell: :embarassed: :huh:

I also go to a CrossFit "box" - I prefer to call a warehouse. No mirrors there, people leave all their BS at home, and their sweat on the ground. It's not how you are perceived, but how much you give - and I know the other two in my group appreciate that I put in 110%, because it motivates them to do the same!

Honestly I'm very certain that nobody even notices me at the gym. But sometimes I like to pretend they think of me as that crazy dude who's trying to break the elliptical by pushing it as hard as he possibly can. Or the guy who's sprinting on the treadmill in training to avenge his honor against his arch-nemesis who dishonored him and his family long ago - some kind of really cool back story that justifies all the seriousness I'm putting into the workout, lol. Working out seems so much cooler when you've got some kind of dramatic reason for it, like when Rocky was training to take down Ivan Drago towards the end of the Rocky IV... that was a cool workout sequence.