holy shit HEAVY…yeah, I think that takes the cake! You should of stuffed him the closest garbage can…haha.
Jared…nice idea for the shirt, I like it. You’s so fuuuuny…;o)
I get some looks when doing overhead figure 8s. Honestly, if I hadn’t read about it myself, and saw someone else doing them, my reaction would be WTF?
I do feel kinda stupid doing them, but so far, it seems like they have strengthened my shoulders.
This is a great thread!
Apparently, my commercial gym is an exception–it’s a common site to see 18 year old girls doing deads and heavy barblell squats. I mean, they have about 60 machines and 2 power racks and the lines for the power racks run out the door. I often wait a couple of hours just to have a crack at it. Unfortunatly for the gym, the ab & adductor machines are collecting dust…HA!
-Heavy
Thats the classic line from PT’s or guys who think they’re “in the know” when it comes to lifting…
Right Side Up, wow what “fitness center” do you work out at?!?
YEah not shit Right Side…where in the world is this gym. I swear I am one of MAYBE 3 guys at my gym who does squats and deads, let alone having a bunch of t-vixens in the making doing them on a regular basis like at your gym. Jeez…sign me up!
How bout Meltdown Training. “Why don’t you rest, that looks hard?” “Hey, are you suppossed to run from exercise to exercise, I thought you were only supposed to work one muscle at a time?”…times like this when I enjoy throwin 45’s around like frisbees at these boners heads.
As far as I’m concerned, if you aren’t getting strange looks, you’re probably not doing something right. I’ve outgrown the need to explain to people what I am doing when they stare at me. The laughs and smirks just make me work harder. The worst has got to be pull throughs. 20-30 reps gives everyone in the gym a chance to stare.
Heh. I don’t really look to see, but I’m sure Ko and I get plenty of stares.
Well, we sure do when we’re either deadlifting or performing snatches and cleans. Which is fine with me. Especially when I’m sure alot of those stares are the “DAYUM, whatever they’re doing…it’s WORKING…” stare.
Which makes me think, it’s probably due time we define the many types of stares: The “WTF?!” stare; “Oh My GAWD” stare; “Pigs DO fly” stare; “Is that exercise for legs…or back…” stare; “He can’t be serious” stare; “Is that legal in this gym?” stare…and so on.
Doing Fat to Fire II this past week has netted me plenty of stares from the people in the Rec Center (the big fitness center here on campus, it includes an indoor track, roller hockey rink, a few basketball courts, a climbing wall, yoga rooms, and the biggest weight room in town). Especially doing the one-armed barbell snatches…that has garnered more than a few “WTF” stares.
This gym exists only in my nightmares. I love having the iron and gravity sections to myself!
Stares…Jesus, people have looked at me like im wearing a jock strap and a turban.
People look at me funny when I jog at 8 in the morning (I’m on a cutting diet). Imagine how they’ll be looking next summer when I start jogging without a shirt on, sporting a 5%BF sixpack!
I’m going to be brave and admit that I go to a Women’s gym. I have had CGB teach me some specific lifts . If you could imagine me (I’m 5’11 so I don’t hide well) doing cleans, snatches and figure 8’s all over a Women’s gym, you’ll understand the horrified looks I get. I also make noise (God forbid) when I wrestle with a heavy weight or when I push through my last rep. My cheeks turn a wonderful shade of reddish/purple and I sweat. Yes, that’s right, I sweat, not glisten. Most of the women in the free weight area stare or check me out from the corner of their eyes. It doesn’t bother me one bit. I look at the progess I have made in the 8 months I have gone and I look at them. Not much to report on their end except for new spandex 
I’ve got one along the same lines as Heavy. When my buddies and I first started Westside stuff we were doing some heavy goodmornings at a health club my friend belonged to. Some old “trainer” came up to us and said, “Those sure are funny looking squats you guys are doing. Ha, they almost look like goodmornings.” One of us simply replied, “They are.” He walked away after that, but watched just about our entire workout with a “stupid kids” look on his face.
Let me sum up this thread in three words:
I hate people.
At my gym back home I always got some pretty weird stares just from deadlifting. Between going there my junior and senior years of high school and whenever I have a break from school the last two years, I’ve seen ONE other guy in there doing deadlifts, and they even made him stop.
One time a “trainer” there told me that I either needed to let the weight down slowly, or stop doing them altogether because I was making too much noise and “bothering the other patrons.” I responded by saying, “well the treadmills and this shitty music bother me.” She turned around and walked away. I haven’t heard a complaint since.
oh yeah, the good morning comments.
Had one of those myself, a trainer walked by me with a new client and answered her question with “that guy isnt doing squats right”.
Funny thing is several other trainers actually do deads/squats, but Ive yet to see anyone else do good mornings or box squats. Front squats are sorta rare too, and never with any real weight on the bar (im talking the only ones doing them are using less than 45’s and most times on smith machine).
About box squats. In one of the gyms I’ve been using, they have all of those little Mr. Anatomy Guy signs with him doing exercises and it showing what muscles are worked. One of them is a list of no-no’s. The one that made me laugh was the wonderful analysis of how “Squatting onto a Bench” is about the most dangerous thing in the world. I need to take a picture of that. I might do that on Saturday.
I do my box squats onto aerobic steps, just like “The man on the high horse” himself.
Or at least how i’ve seen him do them in some of his videos. Those work great, just a few supports, a main flat step and one pad and im set at ~14 inches. Only thing that needs work with them is they are so wide they force you to go with wide stance.