Fitness Solutions for You blog

1.) Dressing like you just auditioned for the new Soulja Boy video or like you’re going out clubbing doesn’t impress anyone. In fact it makes you look ignorant and inhibits your ability to exercise effectively. Dressing in appropriate gym attire allows you full mobility and flexibility, promotes airflow (which in turn minimizes perspiration), and you don’t risk ruining clothes you care about.

Ask yourself something: who do you hope to impress and what do you hope to accomplish by “dressing up” to go to the gym? As a male, you aren’t going to impress any females, as females generally don’t like to be approached in the gym anyway. They are underdressed (assuming they are dressed appropriately), sweaty, and many consider the gym their “private time.” As a female, dressing up for the gym is only going to get you gawked at.

2.) Don’t fill up your water bottle at the drinking fountain when there are one or two people behind you. I see this far too often, regardless of how simple a concept this may seem. As a common courtesy, if there are a few people in line behind you while you fill up your water bottle, let them go first. Most people in the gym going to the water fountain are finished in a matter of seconds, while your water-bottle-filling can take more than a minute.

3.) If you are prone to sweating excessively, wipe down your equipment after you’re finished using it. There is nothing more disgusting than approaching a new piece of equipment, be it a treadmill or a bench, and finding that it looks like someone dumped a bucket on it. Wiping away your mess is not only common courtesy; it is necessary for even the mildest of sanitation standards. If even the slightest amount of wetness is visible after you use it, wipe it down!

4.) Don’t drop your weights if at all possible. Unless you’re a world class deadlifter and you just put up 800 pounds, you aren’t going to impress anyone by dropping your weights. You are going to look like a moron meathead, and it could even potentially get you kicked out. Dropping your weights is not only dangerous and damaging to gym equipment, it is disrespectful to the gym owner. So, as the old adage goes, don’t abuse something any more than you would if it was your own.

However, there are some instances in which dropping your weights is unavoidable, such as going for a max effort without a spotter and failing. But there are more things wrong with that scenario that you should address first. Some gyms are very strict about this because it can be very bothersome to other gym-goers when it sounds like the Blitzkrieg is coming.

5.) Put your weights away when you are finished using them. Your mother had you put your toys away when you were a child; why wouldn’t you do that as an adult? There are few things more frustrating than looking for a medicine ball, dumbbell, or any other piece of equipment, only to learn that some inconsiderate gym-goer left it at the opposite side of the gym.

6.) Don’t offer unsolicited advice in the gym. While I always find it flattering when someone approaches me for advice or picks me over anyone else in the gym for a spot, for whatever the reason may be, offering advice to someone when they don’t ask for it is going to make for an awkward situation. It doesn’t matter if you think someone is doing the silliest, most pointless exercise known to man; offering unsolicited advice generally doesn’t bode well.

There are certain situations where the method in which someone is performing an exercise can be directly harmful to their health or wellbeing (doing deadlifts with a rounded lower back, or bouncing off the box during box squats, for example) where unsolicited advice may be beneficial. But I would advise that you are completely sure of yourself before approaching the person, and do it tactfully (i.e., don’t say “Hey, retard, you just did that wrong”).

7.) Don’t monopolize equipment to talk on your cell phone or chat with your buddies at the gym. If you want to socialize, wait until after you’re finished working out. There have been instances in which I could have taken over a piece of equipment and finished 5 sets while someone who was standing around socializing hogged the equipment.

While I pride myself in being a very reachable individual, gym time is not social time, and short of someone coming to the gym to talk to me personally, I am unreachable at the gym. So unless you absolutely need to have a phone on your person for emergencies (which is very legitimate, but don’t use it as an excuse), leave it out of the gym!

8.) Being big doesn’t give you a “get to act like an a**hole and get away with it” license. No matter how big you are, there is always going to be somebody bigger than you, and there will always be somebody smaller than you. Simply put: you wouldn’t want to get pushed around, so don’t push other people around. People will respect you far more if you are big and courteous. Hold the door for people after you pass through if they are close to it, don’t cut in line, put your equipment back when you’re finished, and exercise common courtesy.

Tags: gym etiquette

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 2nd, 2008 at 10:47 am and is filed under weightlifting. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.