ArmdandFabulous’s BodyBlog

Ok I’ve heard lots of complaints about gyms that are too busy and people hogging machines you want to use..but it hasn’t really been an issue for me, probably because I have two gym memberships and can go to either of them 24 hours a day…one of them I primarily go to because they have a lot of good cardio equipment, and the other I like to do my weightlifting in…the best of both worlds so to speak..

Yesterday I wasn’t feeling too hot and instead of going to the gym at my normal (morning) workout time to lift, I went in the evening…and I went to the gym that I normally only do cardio in…ended up getting there around 9:30, thinking it shouldn’t be too crowded at that time…(this gym is CROWDED from about 5-9 pm all week with so many people standing around chatting it’s like a night club instead of a gym!)..so after I get there and do my warmup on the treadmill it’s almost 10pm before I even get in the weights area…but it’s still pretty crowded..I start off with bench presses and it wasn’t too tough to find an open bench…but after I finish those, I look around for an incline bench to do chest flyes and shoulder presses, but it had gotten even more busy!!…WTF…did someone drop off a bus load of people in here at 10pm or what I started thinking…I wander around for a couple minutes looking for ANY open incline bench but there are none and then I spot an empty incline bench at an empty Smith machine station…ooooooO the wheels are turning in my brain and I think a-HA I can do my entire chest/shoulder/tri wkout there if I just bring over some dumbells…so that’s what I did..and it was working out fantastically..I was supersetting almost every exercise and really getting chest/shoulders to burn…no moving around wasting time looking for an open bench for me!!

 ** I know it sounds like I was hogging the machine which everyone hates—but I’ve never done a workout this way and wouldn’t have this time if this gym didn’t have about 8 Smith stations in it!!!…and it was after 10pm!! I’d never try this between 5-9pm!!

So I was in my own little world and everyone was leaving me alone…until a lady (probably 55-60+ yrs old) comes over and questions whether I am really using the Smith machine or am I just using that bench and not the bar…she happened to walk up when I was doing chest flyes with db’s and asked how many more sets I had…I told her I wasn’t sure, I have a lot to do…she questioned again "but you ARE using the bar??…this bar?? as her disbelieving stare had me wanting to dis-respect an elder right then with dumbell upside the head!!!…y…e…..s…I said…..I felt like a second grader who was getting in trouble for something I didn’t do…I badly wanted to send her on her way with a kick in the a** cuz my head was pounding and I still wasn’t feeling well but was trying to push thru and finish the workout…she walked away (FINALLY!)..and I got back to concentrating on my workout..that lasted about 20 mins until a guy came hovering around and I had my earphones in but could tell he wanted my attention…so I took them out and he asked how many more sets I had left..now, people by this time it’s around 11pm..OMG this is irritating!…LEAVE me Alone I was shouting in my head!! (which surprisingly had stopped pounding by this time)…and I even have a MEAN mug on at the gym–I never usually have a problem with people coming up and interrupting me…but these people were completely ignoring mean mug due to it being sooo busy in there and benches being used…so when the guy asked how many sets I had I decided to be nice and let him get his sets in, as long as he told me when he was done and didn’t let that one lady near it as I went over to the cable area and did some other exercises while he used my smith station…he came and got me when he was done and he had even organized my db’s that I had sprawled out all over the ground…I had sets of 15’s, 17.5’s, 10’s laying all over…lol…I wondered if he did it to be nice or to not be embarrassed and have people think he was the one who was THAT messy…probably the second one, huh?

ANyways, I felt like it was a decent workout (and my headache went away!) despite all the concentration breaks…and that guy who interrupted me was some good eye candy at least!  …next time I have to workout when it’s busy I’m gonna find some stranger who appears to be working the same muscle group I am and ask them if they want to tag team with me and go thru our workout together…much more efficient than trying to maneuver through a busy gym alone!

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 8th, 2009 at 5:35 pm and is filed under Training. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.