My experience with people who are really into working out is that they want everyone to be into working out, and want to help you get there. They're nerds for lifting. They're excited to get you excited.
Anyone who shit-talks you for not already being great at it is a fucking poser and you should tell them that.
Bouldering gyms are like this too. The best climbers are the ones stopping what they're doing to cheer for and hype up the beginners. Mostly very wholesome group
Same here. The real gym bros will take their time with someone who is not fit because you actually showing up to the gym, to them is a sign you want to work on yourself and they value that.
Not to mention many of them probably have been you; out of shape, showing up to the gym for the first time.
•
Nerds for lifting describes it perfectly. My friend and I used to being a notebook to the gym to track our lifts and sets. It was a vibe and I've never been able to match that energy solo.
My brother in law does strongman competitions, lifting hundreds or thousands of pounds at a time. I joked once about how I might be able to lift the bar that you put the weights onto (he said it was about 75lbs) and his response was a very positive "you have to start somewhere"
I had a similar experience with boxing. We all suffer together, and anyone who makes an effort deserves to be helped. Strong bros are nice people.
Arnold Shwarzenegger had a super motivating post on reddit(spits) to a guy who felt similar to this fellow.
I lift. I’ve lifted for years. Then I stopped Then I got really fat. I KNEW what it was going to take. 5+ years later. 100lbs body fat lost and 18lbs of muscle added later (no juice) and I’m older, but ripped. All I can think when I see people running, lifting, walking, whatever - with that ‘look’ like you know they are just trying to shed that that fat jacket - is “Come on! You can do this!” I know the discipline that takes! Young, mouthy douchebags at the gym with raging metabolisms that keep them cut, even after eating garbage all week, are just the next group of fat, old people trying to stay healthy and happy.
I helped a guy at the gym get into a solid 5x5 routine once, barely thought about it. Just a regular to chat to sometimes. You could have used this guy to clean a chimney. He got ripped up. Not bulk, but shredded and built it turns out. Few years later, at a different gym now, a guy comes up to me (him - I’d forgotten his face) and tells me what a difference it made for him and how him and 3 buddies all took what I showed him and were all still lifting. Thanked me, told me what a difference my advice made (diet too). Frankly, it was the BEST motherfucking day I ever had at the gym! I felt like my hero, Arnold.
Making fun of others at a gym is Imo, grounds for getting tossed out. Snickering included. Funny how they don’t seem to last at the gym anyway…
My best friend in a small town high school and I were outcasts but because of that we were huge gym rats. We didn’t play any sports but would ditch study hall, shop, and PT and lift in the gym. This was mid nineties and I remember us doing the bodies for life challenge even though we were young and didn’t have a starting body to work from. The most pride I have from those days is we put up a sign above the gym that said “leave your ego at the door”, we would help and stick up for anyone and everyone no matter what, a couple of our classmates parents came in to lift with us while their kids were at practice and thanked us. That meant a lot as a teenager.
Good for him. Regardless of how people feel about 4chan the users are still people.
Years ago, a buddy got me going to his gym so he could show me the ropes. He'd been lifting most of his life and I really trusted him. It was the sort of gym where people go to do serious work. A lifter's lifting gym. Everyone there looked so serious and were pressing so much weight. I have never been that sort.
But they were all incredibly kind to me. Helped me when they thought I needed it. Never in a demeaning way. Any bad vibes I got from them was pretty much on me.
Those were really cool times. The gym would shut down about two years later and I haven't really gone to a gym since.
Damn. Yeah a close friend I know has been taking me to the gym whenever he's free so it's nice to get out with him every once in a while. Gym guys are pretty nice.
Be the chad.
I've seen the snickering. I've helped quite a few people. Not everyone is open to it, but most welcome it if you treat em with respect.
Same thing with bouldering. You see someone inexperienced struggle with a route and you give em a few pointers. You show em the moves. Can even help people with routes I can't do cuz I somehow know how to read em.
Be the positive change in the world.
I miss my bouldering gym so much. It was always a great vibe there and people from all skill levels could climb together, chat, help each other out. Any time I went intending to climb alone I still ended up chatting and making friends because so many people are just friendly and happy to be there
Where I moved to has a proper climbing gym but it isnt the same vibe.
I have a question. Would age be at all a factor in the vibe? How about acute arthritis and being a newbie? I wouldn't expect to just "fit in" immediately, but I'm left wondering if a slower middle-aged dude would have a hard time hanging with that crowd.
You'll be fine, rock gyms tend to be a super welcoming place, regardless of age or experience. Things like arthritis and age will affect your ability, sure, but not enough to prevent you from doing it at all - you just might not be able to go as often or for as long as others 🤷♂️
I've climbed with 10 year olds and 80 year olds. Ive climbed with people who could climb 8 hours straight and those who can only do a few routes a day. So long as you have a good attitude, climb safely and respect others you will likely fit in fine at your local climbing gym.
Depends on the gym you go to imo. More commercial gyms there's almost no interaction but more privately owned or specialty gym (powerlifting, strongman, etc) - these interactions happen a good bit.
This sounds like the gym I used to go to. It was mostly massive powerlifters and female Instagram influencer....all super serious into fitness. And guys would ask me to spot them all the time, and we would often share racks and chat. The girls mostly kept to themselves, but the dudes were all pretty chummy with each other.
Although that being said, I still think this is made up because I've never heard anyone vocally bad mouthing other people at the gym such that they can hear, and the bad mouthing i have heard has absolutely never been about someone out of shape trying to better themselves. It's always because someone was being a jerk, or selfish or something like that.
I see this shit at my gym very rarely, but it's because they offer free summer memberships to teenagers and some of them don't know how to act in the adult world. So it's an asshole teenager thing rather than a gym thing.
It could also be that they where talking about something else and Anon, being a weirdo who uses 4chan, got the wrong idea.
Indeed. Commercial gyms are nothing like specialty gyms. First and last time I went to a commercial gym was in 2004, unless you include PowerHouse as a commercial gym. Once I discovered a full blown powerlifting/strongman gym and the culture, I never wanted to go to any other type of gym.
My old gym was in an area notorious for gang violence, but the regulars were friendly and up for helping newbies like this. This guy mistook his weird meme characters for real people.
I’ve been to a lot of gyms and people are always happy to help each other. People love talking about their hobbies and gym folk be no different.
I've been going to the gym 4 times a week for 2yrs and I've been asked exactly one time to spot someone. Not to contradict you because it definitely happens, but some gyms don't have that culture, like mine.
My gym has no equipment that requires spotting lol. If you need a spot for the Smith machine, you're doing it wrong.
100%. Also aren't your legs straight for a whole deadlift? (I don't do them, always struck me as a lower back thing)
Edit: spelling
For RDL/stiff legged deadlifts you should only have a slight bend in the knee and focus on moving your ass back during the eccentric instead of letting your knees get forward. It's a great exercise that will primarily load your hamstrings and glutes, which is why every* girl you see in the gym are doing them. Glutes and hamstring are part of a normal leg day.
For a deadlift you knees will have a greater bend and move slightly forward which puts your body in a better position for maximal force output. You can load it a lot heavier and you're putting more tension on your quads. Deadlifts isn't as much of a leg exercise as it is a "your entire posterior chain" exercise.
*not every, just a whole lot
There's a variation where you keep your legs straight to help you get more bootylicious, but generally no.
I similarly gave some side-eye at the leg-day/deadlift thing, but some people have weird schedules 🤷♂️
Chad peaked in high school and has a beer gut now. Gym bros were often losers in school who turned it around after they graduated.
I never peaked AND I have a beer gut. But I am swimming now and love it. You gotta find something that works for you. I could never run as hard as i swim. Plus it's like all the dirt and shit of the world is rinsed off my soul in the pool. Fuck the dirty dirty land, I live in the clean moist water now.
No amount of running was going to make me healthy.
Swimming? 卄乇ㄥㄥ ㄚ乇卂卄
Swimming through that water like a chubby sexy beaver. Soon to be a sleek sexy otter.
True I started fitness in college and was very thin in school. Someone who is 200% into anything tends to be a nerd.
I’ve been lifting for 25 years now and have concluded that deadlifts can fit on any day.
I lift weights at home (husband accumulated a set of bars and plates and dumbbells before we got together), it's not my main workout but deadlifts are the only lift I actually honest to God enjoy. And it helps a lot with yoga.
A lot of people start off with them and go hard but even Arnold threw them in at the end of his workout for 10 reps!
I scale the weight up as I do other things, start with unloaded 30lb bar, adding 10lb for sets of 10 until I can do only 5 reps then stop. Most stuff (curls, etc) I cannot do much weight so each exercise I drop off as I cannot do, towards the end it's literally just deadlifts, add weight, more deadlifts.
I love it. We used to do this in high school but with seated cable pulls. I didn’t understand how to activate certain muscles at that age so I ended up with big arms instead of a big back!
That’s where the deadlifts come in..
•
Arms are arms, chest is chest, everything else is legs
I use resistance bands and they have pull day and push day, which seems more reasonable
If you get yourself into a private community gym instead of Planet Fitness, you’ll realize how real this is.
I go to the Y, and it’s like this. Same for most local gyms. It’s the shit places like Planet Fitness and other mega gyms that are filled with problems.
My Y also has zero tolerance for anyone filming or taking pictures. It’s incredible.
Gym bros love people who try to better themselves. Spotting and Sauna are induction.
These guys will get you fitter than you ever thought you could be.
YMCA and College Fitness Centers are the best starting spots.
College Fitness Centers
I attend a public (US) university and on-campus gyms seem more intimidating than a Planet Fitness.
Then again, I've never been to either place, although I almost went into my university's gym but chickened out last second. I'm worried about the issue in the greentext, and I don't really know where to start. I assume that at a gym you do structured workouts and not whatever you want.
I mean, it really it is you reach out and take initiative. It's never like this if you sit around waiting for this kind of thing to happen, you will be perpetually disappointed in others.
But like our fictional hero, I can at least attest from my own long life, that if you seek out the kind of experiences and people you wish you had in your life, you will find them. But if you roll your eyes at the notion, if you are apathetic and are discouraged because you had one or several bad experiences, or if you're discouraged because you read about someone else's bad experience, or if some youtuber told you how bad things are, you will live in that world and that world only as long as you live.
A good gym, that's how it will be to some extent. Now, the shitty chain gyms where you get the kind of assholes that would disrespect a beginner in the first place may not have any serious lifters or dedicated enthusiasts of other forms of exercise to step up, but it happens.
Shit, the gym I went to for most of my twenties, and into my thirties, anyone disrespecting a beginner would be out on their ear in a hot minute, and I've been to other gyms that were like that too. Gyms for serious lifting tend to be all about helping each other and that goes double for a noob.
It isn't even something you think about after a while. You see someone struggling, you give support. Might be hyping them up, might be spotting, and it might be taking a new person and making sure they stay safe as they learn. Tbh, it's my opinion that if you won't do that, go set up a home gym and bugger off. Not everyone can do it, but if you aren't willing to try to help a new lifter out, a gym isn't really where you need to lift.
I just can't imagine seeing someone doing their best to improve themselves and not taking a little bit of time to boost them. I know I got that kind of boost at a few points, and it really was special to me. You pass that kind of thing on and it helps everyone.
I saw this older gym rat trying to chat up a younger dude. He was obviously trying to fuck the poor lad.
Fuck the haters at the gym. Fucking creeps.
Don't put yourself down for trying. The people who don't try will never get better, you have a chance at it if you never give up on yourself.
My first night at karate class was the very same.
Senpai Brown, wherever you are, thank you. Also, cool 55 Chevy delivery truck.
When I was a teenager my friend tried to get me to join an MMA gym. Said his two friends went and the instructor wanted to show them something about defending your self properly so he knocked them both out one after the other. (Like that was the plan. See how bad you are at fighting).
I didn't join that gym.
Chad is the essence of real gym culture. We don't ever disrespect new people coming to the gym. We don't body shame. We uplift and we always keep an eye out to help those who look like they need some guidance.
This is the way.
I can't do the standard gym but bouldering gym is recommended. I used to have a membership to climb whenever at any location of that gym and found people are super happy to give advice and discuss the 'beta'.
Disclaimer: I had taken a class like a decade earlier and gotten somewhat used to responding non-akwardly to people unexpectedly talking to me by the time I started going to the gym. I also went almost every day, sometimes to multiple locations. Some days I spoke to nobody, other days I got roped into group discussions on technique and posititoning. The climbing related strength training stuff people just recommended youtubers to me for the how to instead of giving potentially harmful advice.
I bet the Chad was that dude with the YouTube video who's always saying "you need to do better"