We all share the gym, so I'm often frustrated when my fellow gym members don't follow the most basic rules of gym etiquette.  This includes putting your weights back where they belong, removing weights from machines when you're finished, cleaning up a bench if you leave it sweaty, and not leaving used Band-Aids lying around on machines.  (Really, Band-Aids – ICK but we see it often….there's a trash can really near by, people!)

But I get especially frustrated when the folks not following these rules are obviously long-time lifters. If a guy with lots of muscles walks into a gym, we all know that he is not showing up for the first time…and thus assume that he will follow basic rules of being a good gym citizen.  So when these muscular folks let us down, I find it especially disappointing.

Yesterday a man in his early 20’s walked out of the locker room in a “hand-cut” tank top which showed off his hard-earned muscles well.  The fact that he had this tank tucked into his gym shorts AND was sporting black socks with this tennis shoes gave me pause.  I was even willing to overlook his displays of poses in the mirror between each set.  He was working hard and had a lot of size.

It was not long, however, before he started “the show.”  This is something that we sometimes see with members who want to make sure everyone knows how hard they are working and how huge they are becoming.  For this fellow, it meant doing a set of deadlifts with the heaviest dumbbells while groaning loudly during the exertion phase.  This fellow would bend all the ways down until the dumbbells touched the floor, then back up to standing position.  This is impressive when holding the 100 lb. weights….until he reached the end of the rep and DROPPED the weights all the way to the floor with a giant thud!  This was on a concrete floor, not part of the gym with pads on the floor.  And we wonder why our weights are loose and get beat up!

What was so maddening is that he had just shown he could bend ALL THE WAY to the ground with these weights, so there’s no reason he could not bend down one more time to set them on the ground.  The drop of the weights from waist level was clearly “for the show.”  Make a lot of noise to top off your set so everyone will see you and be impressed.

But impressed we were not.  Someone who has obviously spent many years in the gym should know how to treat the equipment.  When the giant thuds started to happen, the “gym regulars” started to look his way and then talk among ourselves about how long we should wait before we went over to talk to this knucklehead.  Fortunately, his gym workout partner seemed to notice our looks of disgust so after a few sets of this nonsense they moved on to something else and I was spared the confrontation.

Sadly it seems that the biggest boys sometimes are the laziest, or feel they are special and don’t need to follow the rules.  This always makes me scratch my head, so I share this post to encourage everyone, no matter young or old, new or long-time member, huge or not, to be a good gym citizen.  And consider white athletic socks with those short shorts!  Thanks.