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How not to act like a wanker when you’re at the gym

Amy Noonan

by Amy Noonan

02 Oct 10:55am

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Filed under: Etiquette, Excercise, Fitness, Gym, Health, Society

39 comments

Constant CPR vigilance is exhausting. Trust me. I’m there, ready to give chest compressions as I learnt in a scuba diving course as soon as someone keels over.

I bet we look great doing this, huh?

The only problem is, I don’t work in a hospital. I just go to a gym.

I recently joined one of those 24-hour chain gyms where you can work out to your heart’s content… or discontent.

Everyone’s going there to get healthy, but it honestly sounds like they’re about to die. 

The straining. The clanging of weights on metal. The grunting. The puffing (actually, the puffing is me, riding the devil’s bicycle, otherwise known as interval training on the treadmill. Sorry about that.)

Even with my headphones in I still feel like I can hear people about to keel over.

And when I realise they’re not going to die, I’m actually quite annoyed. Exercise is meant to be good for reducing stress levels but I can feel mine rising.

So, as a “normal-ish” person going to the gym, here are my tips for the proper gym etiquette.

When you’re grabbing weights, it really messes with other people’s programs if you take two dumbbells or barbells in two different weights. For some reason, using one 5kg dumbbell and one 6kg dumbbell together seems to be popular (and, coincidentally, all I ever use are 5kg or 6kg dumbells).

If you’re going to spend a long time flexing and posing and looking in the mirror between sets, could you put your weights back? Chances are someone else will have completed their entire workout before you need them again.

If you want to have a chat on the phone, could you get off the machine you’re using, rather than just sitting there not using it and talking to your mate about “being at the gym”?

You might think it looks impressive to use the heaviest weight. It’s probably part of your program. But if you can’t control putting the weight back on the floor again without a thump that makes the whole gym shakes and you grunt like you’re, well, doing something private, I’m going to guess your weight is too heavy. Keep control, dude.

Working out with a gym buddy is great. It helps motivate you to go. Having more than one gym buddy must be great, too – but is it really necessary for all of the gym buddies to watch one guy on one bench, then take it in turns watching each other?

Finally, use a towel and wipe your sweat and hair product off the equipment. Surely we all know that one by now? 

So that’s it. Six quick tips to make the gym a better place for everyone. And as for me, I’ll try to keep the puffing to a minimum. 

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39 comments

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    • Sydney Swans Song says:

      01:31pm | 02/10/12

      Club Song Sydney Swans
      Cheer, cheer the red and the white,
      Honour the name by day and by night,
      Lift that noble banner high,
      Shake down the thunder from the sky
      Whether the odds be great or small,
      Swans will go in and win overall
      While her loyal sons are marching
      Onwards to victory!

      Reply

    • arms next week says:

      01:30pm | 02/10/12

      Amy, I am with you. However the worst are the summer warriors. Call me selfish but I spent the whole winter working out in the gym. Sometimes with two jumpers on. It was like heaven quiet and calm. Now here come the hoards buffing up for summer, (men and women). The worst are the ‘I go to gym, however stand around and talk about going to the gym. Or ring their friends to tell them they are in the gym. The worst are the ones with no plan walking aimessly, like a friggin zombie. for gods sake can’t people leave there bloody phones at home for 40 minutes.

      Reply

    • Kika says:

      02:40pm | 02/10/12

      Oh far out… the posers. They drive me nuts! Why are they there? And the ones who hog 2 or more pieces of equipment at once. Like placing your towel over something means it’s yours… far out.

    • AdamJ says:

      01:13pm | 03/10/12

      What I find amusing are the gym buddies, usually (but not always) women, who go to the gym and end up working their tongues more than anything else.

    • Joe says:

      11:07am | 26/10/12

      @Kika: Lol, that’s called supersetting. It’s a technique to increase the intensity of a workout and you won’t see many seriously jacked guys or girls who never do supersets. Sometimes trisets and giantsets are used too, which is either three exercises combined or four or more respectively. The basic premise of it is to do one exercise, move straight onto the next one and so on until your extended set is done and you rest.

    • Mahhrat says:

      02:00pm | 02/10/12

      I have to tell you, it’s always been the vast mirrors that have put me off.

      I know I look bad exercising.  I’d prefer not to be reminded of it by my own eyes. 

      I get some mirrors for checking form and so on, but full body things all along one wall?  Don’t we have Facebook for that sort of crap?

      Reply

    • martinX says:

      04:10pm | 02/10/12

      It’s so you can do correct technique. Using visual feedback in conjunction with proprioception keeps things moving as they should. It’s very easy to do something the wrong way which can make an exercise either not as good as it could be, useless or damaging. Proper technique is more important than heavy weights.

    • Shep says:

      06:27pm | 02/10/12

      @MartinX. 

      Dude youre the problem NOT the solution.  Youre like the gym fun sponge, waaay too serious.

    • sunny says:

      02:05pm | 02/10/12

      “using one 5kg dumbbell and one 6kg dumbbell together seems to be popular”

      That might explain why my right bicep is 20% bigger than the left!  ..but it’s been 20 years since I’ve been to the gym, so maybe it’s caused by ..well I won’t speculate on the cause because this is a family oriented website smile

      Reply

    • Markus says:

      01:56pm | 02/10/12

      I was actually expecting a bit more of a rant about ridiculous behaviours of some gym junkies, but the advice seems to revolve purely around basic decency.
      Laying down a towel on equipment before use is not just courteous, it is a hygiene requirement in every gym I have ever been to (admittedly not a large number).
      Being regularly caught not abiding by that requirement by staff can even have members ejected from a gym, so don’t ever feel as if you are just being pedantic if you see it.

      And while I personally find it hilarious, my advice for anyone who has an issue with guys who constantly check themselves out in the mirror, is ask whether you would prefer they were constantly gawking at you instead raspberry

      Reply

    • The Free HB says:

      02:19pm | 02/10/12

      Sorry but a gym is there so you can workout.  I have no problem with the big guys dropping their weights afterwards.  Try dumbell pressing two 50 kg weights and tell me how you are going to politely put it back on the ground.  It’s impossible and there are bigger things to worry about.

      The same goes with grunting, the females seem to have such a problem with it, but again, sometimes it’s unavoidable and if I’m pushing out the last set on a killer workout, I might very well grunt.  I always use a gym towel, never hog equipment and never come to workout sick.

      There’s always Fernwood or Curves you know?

      Reply

    • Kika says:

      02:42pm | 02/10/12

      Hey people complain about how sexist Fernwood or Curves is yet you are advocating that women should be going to all women gyms for these reasons? Hey my husband works out with his weights 3 times a week and he doesn’t have to clunk the weights - he is strong enough to handle them gently. Plus he doesn’t grunt. And he doesn’t stink. Maybe he can come to Fernwood with me.

    • Giraffe says:

      02:54pm | 02/10/12

      Sounds like he would fit in well, Kika

    • The Free HB says:

      04:26pm | 02/10/12

      Kika, rather than filling in blanks on a page I never wrote, what I WAS saying is that if you can’t handle big guys working out hard at a ...gym of all places, you have options.  If you can handle it, then carpe diem.

    • Shep says:

      06:31pm | 02/10/12

      @ The Free HB.

      Hahahaha .... I can smell the roids from here .... No seriously that was a pisstake, Surely!

    • Mike says:

      06:36pm | 02/10/12

      They don’t seem to have a problem with females grunting when they are playing tennis…too right on the Fernwood / Curves gyms…. “oh, it’s a women’s only gym because we feel intimidated by men” - give me a break.

      Some of the guys might feel intimidated by a girl who walks in and is drop dead gorgeous and know that she’s WAY out of their league (some of us, as proper weightlifters and not gym/phone posers KNOW our limits smile ),

      More likely, our girlfriends and wives in the gym with us feel intimidated by her and how hot we might think she is, and hence, they want a place where she can get removed to (a women’s only gym) where we can’t gawk at them - as they think we do.  Take it from me, some of us are there to lift, not gawk, and some of the women who think that men spend their gym time gawking at them out are either spoilt little princesses or deluded - and both belong in their own little gyms.

      Therefore, funny how some women actually go to a gym because they want to meet men who look after themselves and keep in shape…how dare they !

      FreeHB is right, you try benching some of the weights that the serious lifters do and see how delicately you can put it back afterwards.  Not very, I’d bet.  That’s why I at least try and have something like a mat underneath me because out of respect for the gym, I don’t like putting holes in the floor.

    • Joe says:

      11:19am | 26/10/12

      @Kika: Three times a week? Pretty much a bodybuilder. f you’re doing an exercise like deadlifts, for example, correct form is to let the weight hit the ground and ‘collapse’ with it after you’ve brought it back down past the knees, so as not to screw up your back. And I don’t think you understand. If you’re using 50kg dumbbells for shoulder press, and need a spotter to help you get them up, unless you’re biceps and other stabilising are completely disproportional to the rest of your body, you can’t control them on the way down. To hit a certain rep range on DB shoulder press, you need the 50kg DBs, but you can’t necessarily let that weight down gently. Look at Ronnie Coleman ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKS6AYWy-1c ) - he drops the weight, and he’s the most successful bodybuilder ever, and very strong as well.

    • neo says:

      02:22pm | 02/10/12

      It’s a bit hard to gently place a heavy weight on the ground after you pushed your muscles to their limit. And using a lighter weight would be going backwards.

      How about we both agree that the clunking of weights is a relatively normal sound to hear at the gym and that if one does not like it, one can go to Fernwood.

      Reply

    • martinX says:

      02:08pm | 02/10/12

      “Working out with a gym buddy is great. It helps motivate you to go. Having more than one gym buddy must be great, too – but is it really necessary for all of the gym buddies to watch one guy on one bench, then take it in turns watching each other?”
      Bugs me too. High-schoolers are the worst offenders at my local gym. Great that they’re working out and all that, but for them it’s just time to fill between “school’s out” and “dinner-time” (about 3 hours) while for me it’s the hour (or less) I can grab between getting home before the kids send the wife mental.

      Reply

    • Dan says:

      02:25pm | 02/10/12

      I thought exercise was meant to make people happier. Amy obviously needs to do more!

      Reply

    • Rebecca says:

      10:49am | 03/10/12

      Exercise makes me happy, but maybe that’s because I go outside in the sunshine and do it for free rather than paying hundreds of dollars to do it in a small, sweaty space filled with annoying people smile

    • Tim says:

      02:28pm | 02/10/12

      Here I was thinking I was an odd person.
      Turns out I’m just “normal-ish”.

      Reply

    • S.L says:

      02:36pm | 02/10/12

      How not to act like a wanker at the gym? Don’t go!

      Reply

    • Richard says:

      02:40pm | 02/10/12

      Well, this article seems specifically designed to dissuade anyone from doing a, you know, real workout, i.e., one which might actually be beneficial in building muscle and losing fat.

      Yes, I’m sure real men (and tough-grrrls) doing real, intense exercise must be annoying to many middle-aged fat women at the gym. But then again, watching you waste your time doing gentle steady state cardio and circuit training with ridiculously light weights is annoying for me too, because its just so pointless!

      In any case, gyms aren’t really the place for doing real exercise any way, unfortunately, because of all the people like Amy Noonan that are there, and because of the ludicrous rules and regulations imposed by anal gym staff.

      Therefore, I present to you, courtesy of ‘The Crossfit Journal’:

      “HOW TO GET KICKED OUT OF YOUR GYM IN 10 DAYS OR LESS”
      Day 1
      Bring your own music – use a boom box – and turn it up to inspiration levels and start working out. ACDC’s “Thunderstruck” should do the trick.
      Day 2
      Set up a circuit like one of the typical CrossFit “Workouts of the Day” and put a sign up at each station advising others that this equipment is reserved for accurate timing of your effort.
      Day 3
      While practicing the Olympic lifts, drop a max load from overhead. This may do it right here.
      Day 4
      Find a twenty-inch platform and perform box jumps. Try three sets of two minutes of max jumps. Bizarrely, this one irks the shit out of most gym
      management.
      Day 5
      Take a pair of dumbbells out into the parking lot to do walking lunges. You may be accused of theft.
      Day 6
      Bring several powerlifting buddies to do some super heavy deadlifts. Don’t forget to grunt, scream, and use chalk!
      Day 7
      If the gym has support poles climb them. If not find something to climb; sling a rope over a beam or rafters, attach some climbing holds to the wall and use them. You won’t get to the climbing part if you need to attach anything.
      You may get stopped at the door coming in with a twenty-five foot coil of two-inch rope.
      Day 8
      Workout with your shirt off. If you don’t get a reaction have your girlfriend or wife take hers off.
      Day 9
      Walk on your hands, or do handstand push-ups or some other basic gymnastics stuff.
      Day 10
      If you’ve gotten this far, this one is the clincher. Record your efforts by writing them on the wall.

      Reply

    • fastidious says:

      03:48pm | 02/10/12

      Youre better than everyone Richard. I just wanted to tell you that. Everyone should just listen to you about how to do everything.

    • Tubesteak says:

      05:05pm | 02/10/12

      Richard
      I was going to make a comment that succinctly pointed out that Amy doesn’t know what she’s doing if she’s getting picky with people who are there to actually work out and not just do some light cardio on a cross-trainer before heading home with a cream bun or packet of rice crackers in hand because they “earned it”.

      But you have put it correctly in long form. Good stuff.

    • Sheldon says:

      05:39pm | 02/10/12

      I haven’t been to the gym in about a year but this has just inspired me.

    • bec says:

      07:20pm | 02/10/12

      More crossfit and olympic lifting. Less chronic cardio.

    • Shrikey says:

      10:37am | 03/10/12

      I think I love you Richard

    • Emma says:

      03:18pm | 02/10/12

      How’s about a little ‘live and let live’? While I agree with some of the basic gym etiquette rules in Amy’s article, if a gym-goers behaviour isn’t hurting anyone else then let it go.

      Having worked in the fitness industry for 10 years, I’ve seen many people visit the gym for many reasons. Some go to escape their children and flirt with their personal trainer for an hour, some go to catch up with a friend whilst doing something a little healthier than sinking pints at the pub. All go to improve themselves in some way - and that should be respected.

      Reply

    • sunny says:

      04:24pm | 02/10/12

      Did someone mention sinking pints at the pub? Well why the hell are we still here at the gym! Let’s go - my shout first round.  ..actually now I know why my right bicep is 20% bigger than my left smile

    • Black Dynamite says:

      03:20pm | 02/10/12

      Cliffs - Summer gym warrior doesn’t want people to lift weights in a way she doesn’t understand because it inconveniences her. In an attempt to add credit throws in “use a towel”.

      Solid writing…..

      BD

      Reply

    • Josephine says:

      04:33pm | 02/10/12

      This isn’t helping my gymophobia.

      Reply

    • Bolz says:

      05:02pm | 02/10/12

      I’m pretty much oblivious to anything that’s going on around me in the gym. I train as hard as I can for 45min and get the hell out of there.

      I think some individuals go to gym for a nice stroll on the treadmill and chat. Not really what it’s about!

      Reply

    • Matt says:

      05:41pm | 02/10/12

      Dropping the weights is valid for certain exercises, and doesn’t necessarily mean you are lifting above your limits, especially when you don’t have someone to spot you, which you also seem to have taken exception to.

      Perhaps you should consider the possibility that the groups of 3,4 or 5 people are dragging their less-fit friends along to help them get used to the gym, and help them on their path to a healthy lifestyle.

      If you want a ‘relaxing’ experience during exercise then I submit than you are either in the wrong gym, or taking the wrong form of exercise altogether.

      Reply

    • Aaron says:

      05:47pm | 02/10/12

      If someone is lifting so heavy they have to drop their weight, maybe congratulate them on their effort! Or maybe they’re doing a lift like the deadliest where moving it back down in a controlled manner can be dangerous sometimes. Get over yourself.

      Reply

    • Sickemrex says:

      05:56pm | 02/10/12

      Clanging and sweat? It’s a gym! But I agree with a bit of courtesy sharing equipment. We’ve worked and lived in so many shitholes over the past 10 years we’ve accumulated enough weights to stay home and work out. Nude, if we want grin
      Massive pecs and biceps with pin legs in a gym make me giggle.

      Reply

    • VJR says:

      04:17pm | 04/10/12

      Most people go to the gym without any real understanding of how to use the equipment to get the most benefit out of it.  They think trying to lift heavy weights is the answer to build sagging mussels or riding the bike falt out to improve your cardiovascular rate. In fact it’s far betteer to take it slow and easy learn the methods first pace yourself and don’t lift too heavier weight. .  I had no idea till I started out with a PT best money I have spent.  She taught me how and what to do and most importantly how not to hurt myself.  Going to gym and puffing your guts out without knowing what your doing is a complete waste of time and money.

      Reply

    • Lloyd says:

      07:13pm | 05/10/12

      I don’t see why it ‘bugs’ people if they stand around a bench if someone is doing a bench press. A spotter is usually needed for safety and the other person is just watching. So freaking what. I have a problem only with people who invade your space unnecessarily, or do things which lack respect or consideration for others.
      Talking on the phone on a machine i get- but still there is such a thing as resting between sets.
      Same goes with looking at the mirror whilst dumbells are on the floor, you need to rest between sets, what you propose that the person do in that time?
      Generally one muscle or arm is strong than the other, if you’re right handed then its generally the right and vice-versa. So this is the reason people use different weights for different arms.
      But granted there are a LOT of wankers who go to the gym, and they care about how much weight they lift and constantly checking out other dudes to see if they match up to them, so they can feel good about themselves. But this is just the way the gym is, if they dont do anything that lacks consideration, what can you do?

      Reply
 
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