You can tell school is out and summer is here. My gym is just slammed. The Subway line is filled with teenagers. The parking lot is full of people there to swim in the outdoor pool and my normal weight room is packed with teenage boys during the lunch hour.
Yet my workouts go on the same.
Today was one of those days where I did not really feel like heading over to the gym but went anyways!
The door guys know me well and upon entering the security guard asked if I wanted to leave my motorcyle helmet up with them. AWESOME, sure!!! The helmet won't fit in a locker and it is a pain to lift up my seat to strap it to the bike so I usually carry it in and try to trap the neck strap in a locker. It works but I like this idea way better!
My workout bag won't really fit into a locker well either so I lock up the important things and set my bag on top generally. If I could dream of my perfect gym it would definitely have oversized lockers to accomodate my big bag and my helmet. Also I could rent it so that I could keep stuff in there that I used daily so I would not have to lug so much back and forth all the time!
There is a gray haired, heavy set man who I see during my lunch hour sessions on a regular basis. While perhaps he may have good intentions, he always has comments for me. The one time I was using the hip machine and I pulled the knob out only to have it go flying across the room. He told me I was not supposed to twist it, I had to pull it out(Yeah, thanks for the input but someone else had loosened it just enough for me to set it off). Then another time I was doing lunges and he said that he thinks doing lunges is what ruined his knees. I smiled politely trying to muster a polite response as I went on to do several more sets. Then today I set down a the 20 pound weights and one was not perfectly down and he said I had to be careful because if one landed on my foot I would have to do an Irish jig. This comment made me chuckle, but again I swear this man just likes to critique me!
The boys were all polite and seemed to accomodate the lone chick in their free weight room.
Then I went into the other room to use the floor for some shoulder exercises while on the upside down bosu ball. Before I could do anything I picked up 2 exercise balls and 3 mats and returned them to their homes. It drives me crazy when no one picks up after themselves at the gym! As I went through my reps, my stress seemed to disappear temporarily and in turn I was getting in a solid weight training session. Typically I do not get too sweaty on weight training workouts, but on this day things were clicking and as I worked, the sweat started to build. Oops, thank goodness I sit in my little cube all alone all afternoon!
As I started on my barbell bench presses on the exercise ball this older lady came over to ask if those were 20's I had and I said yes. I had to laugh as she said "Wow, you're really strong!" as I was on my warm-up set with my light weights. I kept thinking that although dumbbells are a little more challenging, my 2 20's do not even weigh as much as lifting an empty bar and most people would not tell someone they were strong if they were just lifting an empty bar.
So many different perspectives from everyone at the gym!
1 comment:
You know the old guy just has a crush on you!!! There's one older man at my gym who always tells me I'm a dynamo. Now he can barely walk...so me using 20's or the bar seems superhuman to him! Way to keep on going despite the rush of summer gym rats. You know they'll probably dwindle as the summer goes on. Much like the New Year's crowd.
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