Cell Phones In the Gym? WTF?

Training Bodybuilding
1

So, at 45 and after about 18 years,for a new year’s resolution I’ve finally started back seriously lifting.Started at my condo’s cheap ass broken bike, mismatched dumb bells and some crappy machines.But I stuck with it,saw some good results and said ok, I’m joining a gym. 18 years ago, I was the only guy in the basement of my YMCA doing freeweights (no heat, lots of mold, right beside the smelly old clothes lost and found-very handy), using cybergenics…everyone else up stairs on the nautilus with headbands and legwarmers, scared when I came upstairs to do calves. So I join the local fancy gym (no alternative where I am) and those same people have moved and followed me to this gym!Using the phone while you lift?

“Hey whatsup?..nothing, just lifting…”

And then keep on talkin while your nutsack is over my head?? Giving the entire club plot details to some dog ass movie pride and predjudice?

Guys jumping around doing handstands and then struttin their shit like it don’t stink? And they keep picking music that just plain sucks.What is wrong with people? 2 months later and I’m a prick because I don’t talk to anyone when I’m on the floor.Talk to me b4 or talk to me after but not when this old fart is just trying to squat my own weight w/o poppin a nut.

I might blow the payment and go back to the condo ‘gym’. There are some guys who are freaks there and its great to just say hey to 'em, otherwise lead/follow or piss off. WTF!

2

Yes, I find that there are a bunch of asses that dont follow etiquette.
One of my biggest issue is muscle heads too weak to replace their wieghts.

Anyway, glad to see your getting gains. I suggest sticking it out a bit longer to see if maybe the later/earlier you go it might be different. My gym gets a ton better after 8pm.

mp

3

Hey Colonel,
I’d echo a comment maxx made, maybe you could alter your schedule to go to the gym later. I hit 40 in January, but I’ve been going 8:30-ish for a couple of years. By then most of the dinks have cleared out. For those that remain, I have my headphones on as a clear signal that I don’t want to be disturbed.

I agree with what you said, talk to me before or after, but not during, my training. I’m not going to break any powerlifting records, but leave me alone. I’m not there to socialize. Keep it up, glad to see you’re back in the gym after such a lengthy layoff.

4

just do your thing.
what other people think of you is none of your business.

5

there’s nothing funnier than people who obsess over what other people do in the gym.

it’s people like you who stare at guys like me in the gym like we’re aliens… ‘omg is he really gonna lift that? is he really gonna squat that? why is he doing squats and military press on the same day?’

get a life, old man. don’t let what other people do at the gym distract your focus.

i generally ignore everyone at the gym while i train, even my friends. i talk only before and after my workout… never in between sets.

6


there’s nothing funnier than people who obsess over what other people do in the gym.

it’s people like you who stare at guys like me in the gym like we’re aliens… ‘omg is he really gonna lift that? is he really gonna squat that? why is he doing squats and military press on the same day?’

get a life, old man. don’t let what other people do at the gym distract your focus.

i generally ignore everyone at the gym while i train, even my friends. i talk only before and after my workout… never in between sets.[/quote]

I could care less what others are doing when they work out. Anyone who makes the effort to enter a gym has shown more motivation and determination than 90% of the general population and my hat’s off to them. It’s fools who waltz around talking loud on a cellphone, doing slammer handstands in front of me in my space when they could go do spinning, pilates or jazzercise while the rest of the gym is trying to focus on their own lifts that amazes me.
Kind of like a canuck who trys to scorch me but ends up repeating the things I already said.Lift like your a madman, that’s great, just don’t walk around the whole gym 8 times after they did 15 jumping jacks screaming “whew” and singing out loud to Stayin Alive that you just put on the sound system w/o bothering to ask anybody if they want to listening to your crappy choice of music. Was this too close to home? Must have hit a nerve.

7

[quote]Colonel Dinque wrote:
there’s nothing funnier than people who obsess over what other people do in the gym.

it’s people like you who stare at guys like me in the gym like we’re aliens… ‘omg is he really gonna lift that? is he really gonna squat that? why is he doing squats and military press on the same day?’
[/quote]

How do you know there are people like that in your gym unless you’re paying attention to them???

A little hypocritical don’t you think?

Anyway, it’s not like people wear blinders and are oblivious to everything that’s going on around them just because they’re working out.

You can be minding your own business and notice when other people are acting inappropriately.

8

[quote]Colonel Dinque wrote:
there’s nothing funnier than people who obsess over what other people do in the gym.
[/quote]

That’s all well and good, but when you have some jackass using the gym floor as his personal office, it’s hard to ignore.

I’ve even seen guys setting up their little drug deals on a cell phone… on a gym floor!!! (How much does he want, blah blah blah)

I have been sorely tempted before, to grab someone’s cell phone and smash the shit out of it.

My gym just posted a sign, that using a cell phone on the gym floor is grounds for instant membership termination. HOORAY! Somebody must have pissed off the owner during his workout. Good!

Leave your damn cell phones in your locker unless you are a doctor on call, your wife is pregnant, or you have a reason to be contacted urgently. Using the gym floor to organize your social calendar is idiocy even beyond the level of curling-in-the-squat rack, because now you are affecting the entire gym. STFU and WORK OUT!

9

i just think it’s kinda funny when people get worked up about what other people do at the gym. you have work to do and shouldn’t waste your energy thinking about what other people are doing. let me guess, do you take a look around the gym before every set to see who might be looking at you?

if some people want to come to the gym to socialize that is THEIR perogative. people don’t have to work hard if they don’t want to.

that being said, i still do get a irritated with people who don’t put their weights away and might occupy equipment for longer than they should simply because they talk to much.

but then, i train early in the morning when it isn’t too busy, and when i’m using equipment, nobody ever ever ever asks me if they can work in. i definitely give off a ‘does notm share well with others’ vibe.

and your suggestion that i am one of those social butterflies on my cell who doesn’t focus hard on the gym could not be further from the truth. nobody in the gym is more focused than i am when i’m training.

10

Don’t get me wrong… I don’t care what other people do in the gym. I don’t talk to people at the gym. I don’t watch other people work out. I don’t give a crap how much you’re lifting, Im not paying any attention.

But when people use the gym floor as a personal office, that is infringing into my space.

Almost every gym has a lobby or a locker room. That’s the place to make phone calls, not on the gym floor. It’s a matter of common sense and common courtesy.

11

[quote]hueyOT wrote:
there’s nothing funnier than people who obsess over what other people do in the gym.

it’s people like you who stare at guys like me in the gym like we’re aliens… ‘omg is he really gonna lift that? is he really gonna squat that? why is he doing squats and military press on the same day?’

get a life, old man. don’t let what other people do at the gym distract your focus.

i generally ignore everyone at the gym while i train, even my friends. i talk only before and after my workout… never in between sets.[/quote]

*SuperMouse–Don’t blame me for what he wrote.
*Huey, as much as you wish, no, I’m not looking at you while you lift and I’m not looking around hoping everyone’s looking at me when I lift. I just try to focus and get distracted when people invade my space in the middle of a workout. That’s it.

I just don’t get idiots who feel the need to share their personal business with the whole gym out on the floor when, if they want to talk, they could go talk with the fat chick at the check in counter. Go back and read the original post.

12

For all the guys who said. “Stop paying attention to other people.”…

How can you? When people are yelling on their cell phones, reading the paper between (or during) sets, or making out with their ugly-ass girlfriends…it’s distracting.

When you’re driving, can you “ignore” people going too slow, or talking on their cell phones while eating? 'Course not.

The people who are doing what they’re supposed to, well, they’re ignorable.

(And the making out with girlfriend thing happens in my gym. I’m about to throw a plate at the two ugly old fuckers.)

To the OP: what happens in the gym is just a reflection of the increasingly rude and narcissitic behavior displayed everyday in America.

13

[quote]harris447 wrote:
For all the guys who said. “Stop paying attention to other people.”…

How can you? When people are yelling on their cell phones, reading the paper between (or during) sets, or making out with their ugly-ass girlfriends…it’s distracting.
…[/quote]

You can only tune so much out. It is not natural to ignore strange things.

When you are wasting mental energy concentrating on ignoring things it takes away from your lifts.

You cannot be in the zone all the time.

When I used to train in a gym (it was fairly hardcore but still had its share of weirdos) I used to visualize my workout right before I went to the gym.

It helped me maintain my focus.

14

I’m left with the question, “What’s the bid deal”?

15

[quote]hueyOT wrote:
there’s nothing funnier than people who obsess over what other people do in the gym.[/quote]

It hardly sounded like obsessing. It sounded like venting, bitching, ranting, raving, but not obsessing.

Humans are, after all, social animals. We evolved to gossip and tell stories. I mean literally–that seems to be the best explanation anyone has for the rapid evolution of our brain size is that we needed big brains to evolve complex social strategies. I don’t know that I buy that, but, hey, its a good of a hand waving explanation as any. The point is, life would be pretty dull if we didn’t tell stories and anecdotes, if we just lived in our own little heads and didn’t share anything with anyone.

I guess you wouldn’t have noticed, what, with your monk-like focus and all, but most of this site is just gossiping and bitching and ranting. I found the story amusing. Personally, I’ve long been perplexed at cell phone users in the gym. How can you work hard and talk at the same time?

Really, there is nothing funnier than holier-than-thou types that obsess over what other people post in threads.

Now you’re just self-inflating here like a scared little puffer fish. We’ll just call you Nemo, how’s that? So you’re not paying attention to anyone at the gym, but you notice people paying attention to you? And you think that anyone actually finds it odd that you would squat and military press on the same day? Ummm, ok.

Little Mr. Center of the Universe here, aren’t we?

You’re posting on the same website as him, which would suggest you are every bit as lacking in a life as he.

That you’re even noticing people gawking at your mighty lifting powers suggests that you have, in fact, lost focus.

Except that you notice everyone looking at you.

How do you actually have any?

Good for you. Thanks for sharing. Now maybe you can extend the right of sharing to everyone else, seeing as that is the whole point of any of us logging on here.

16

rg: all i’m saying is that he’s getting frustrated for the dumbest of all reasons… because someone in the gym is on the phone and not working hard.

i’m thankful for people who don’t work hard and only use the smith machine. less competition for the squat rack. and i can feel the stares, but trust me i’m ignoring virtually everyone during my workouts.

17

[quote]Colonel Dinque wrote:
So I join the local fancy gym (no alternative where I am) and those same people have moved and followed me to this gym!Using the phone while you lift?

“Hey whatsup?..nothing, just lifting…”

And then keep on talkin while your nutsack is over my head?? Giving the entire club plot details to some dog ass movie pride and predjudice? ![/quote]

How small is your gym? Guys stand over you and talk on the phone, and while staring at their nutsack, you listen in to their entire conversation? Sounds like your looking for issues. Get an IPOD, and ignore them! Cripes. If some guy has his nuts over my head, I would find some other exercise to perform. I sure wouldn’t stare up at his nuts and enjoy the movie review to complain about here later.

I’m hearing you here, but again, what kind of a bathhouse did you join? Guys doing handstands? Does your gym have a tent that says Barnum and Baily outside? I hate the gym’s employees choice of music. Thats why I bought an IPOD. Always have my choice in tunes and again, people leave me alone. I don’t care who’s watching me. I’m too busy watching my form, focusing on my reps and building muscle.

It sounds like your allowing outside distractions to rule your workout. Don’t. Go in, do your workout, and leave.

18

Give the guy a break.

It’s been a while, but last summer there were three dudes reliving their glory days in high volume in the gym.

They were loud enough to break over the music, and they clustered around shit without using it for about half an hour.

It was a pain in the ass. It’s hard to focus when some asshole is talking and laughing intermittently at high volume while you are trying to prep for a heavy lift.

Yes, I wear earphones while working out. I’m glad some folks crank their music up loud enough they can’t hear fuck all, but that doesn’t work for everybody. Get over it.

19

[quote]Colonel Dinque wrote:
So, at 45 and after about 18 years,for a new year’s resolution I’ve finally started back seriously lifting.Started at my condo’s cheap ass broken bike, mismatched dumb bells and some crappy machines.But I stuck with it,saw some good results and said ok, I’m joining a gym. 18 years ago, I was the only guy in the basement of my YMCA doing freeweights (no heat, lots of mold, right beside the smelly old clothes lost and found-very handy), using cybergenics…everyone else up stairs on the nautilus with headbands and legwarmers, scared when I came upstairs to do calves. So I join the local fancy gym (no alternative where I am) and those same people have moved and followed me to this gym!Using the phone while you lift?

“Hey whatsup?..nothing, just lifting…”

And then keep on talkin while your nutsack is over my head?? Giving the entire club plot details to some dog ass movie pride and predjudice?

Guys jumping around doing handstands and then struttin their shit like it don’t stink? And they keep picking music that just plain sucks.What is wrong with people? 2 months later and I’m a prick because I don’t talk to anyone when I’m on the floor.Talk to me b4 or talk to me after but not when this old fart is just trying to squat my own weight w/o poppin a nut.

I might blow the payment and go back to the condo ‘gym’. There are some guys who are freaks there and its great to just say hey to 'em, otherwise lead/follow or piss off. WTF![/quote]

Stick with the gym and ignore the assholes. Laugh at them when you hear them complain that they’re not getting any results and tell them to get the fuck off the phone!!!

20

I always tell people who are talking on their cell phones in the weight room (when it’s loud enough to bother me): do I come in your living room and lift weights? Then keep that crap out of the weight room.