I wouldn’t say you guys are being assholes… but the key to this is that other paying mambers are bitching about the screaming and yelling. So losing you is probably not all that bothersome to them when you’re irritating multiple other members. The gym shouldn’t be treated like a library but it’s not your basement/garage/poll barn either, it’s a business that provides a service to more people than just you.
I quit going to Powerhouse a long time ago when they asked me not to bring in chalk. I was annoyed that their dumbells only went up to 100 as well, you can’t do decent flat dumbell presses with that Went out and bought some pads that they use to line horse trailers, perfect material for a gym floor and cheap too, lined the basement with those and started building a home gym. All the chalk, heavy weight, loud music, etc that I want and after the first 2 years it paid for itself in what I would have been spending on gym dues.
[quote]OARSMAN wrote:
SWR-1222D wrote:
Whoever threatened him is a jack-ass.
Threaten back. If they take away those weights, you should both threaten to cancel your membership and not pay any penalties/fees, since you only joined because they had those weights.
Then slap him in the face, call him ‘Susie’, stick his head in the toilet and give him a swirly.
That’s an empty threat. They’ll gladly give them part of their membership back.
You guys have to realize that commercial gyms HATE guys like us.
We show up all the time,lift heavy, put wear and tear on the equipment (b/c we go heavy and work out consistently), not to mention the fact that we probably scare the living shit out of all the fat housewives and flabby chuckleheads who just like to “workout” and are afraid to lift heavy because they’ll get all “bulky”
Gyms lose money on guys like us. Ideally, they want the fat housewife on the monthly dues autopay who comes to the gym twice a month. they take their money and they help keep the gym looking all shiny and new (so they can attract even more customers).
Face it fellas (and hardcore ladies), at commercial gyms, we are bad for business.
[/quote]
Funny you should mention this. I work at a gym and the management likes to put out large tins of cookies or chips and soda and have “member appreciation nights” like once a month with cheese and crackers and chips/soda and shit. I bitched about the sugar cookies one day and got yelled at by my boss…“How do you think we keep people comming here?” Basically we fatten them up in-house. Fuck my gym.
[quote]rrjc5488 wrote:
Find a new gym, then pee all over the lighter dumbbells. Or at least shit in a skillet and put it on the check in desk or something.
Go out with a bang.[/quote]
Oh man, i will forever remmember that dumping a girlfriend story. (no pun intended)
[quote]FightinIrish26 wrote:
I am dumbfounded that a gym doesn’t expect people to lift heavy shit. I can’t believe you took it so well…I would not have.[/quote]
I was 17 and had been training there for a few years and was really fed up with the place.
Plus I’m not Irish nor from New Jersey. That may explain a few things…lol
[quote]AgentOrange wrote:
Any gym manager who threatens to remove the heavy dumbbells probably can’t lift them…[/quote]
Hey I can lift them, and I managed a gym for a long time…
In the defense of the gym, you still have to be polite when lifting heavy. They don’t want you to go, but they do require that you are courteous to the others around you while you are lifting who do not necessarily want to hear you screaming. My workout partners and I yell and scream and get pretty rowdy when we lift. So we come in at an off time, and have never once had a problem.
Wanting 2 visit a month customers is all business. Gyms just bank on it a lot more than other places.
[quote]TrainerinDC wrote:
AgentOrange wrote:
Any gym manager who threatens to remove the heavy dumbbells probably can’t lift them…
Hey I can lift them, and I managed a gym for a long time…
In the defense of the gym, you still have to be polite when lifting heavy. They don’t want you to go, but they do require that you are courteous to the others around you while you are lifting who do not necessarily want to hear you screaming. My workout partners and I yell and scream and get pretty rowdy when we lift. So we come in at an off time, and have never once had a problem.
Wanting 2 visit a month customers is all business. Gyms just bank on it a lot more than other places. [/quote]
That’s pretty much it. From the gym owner’s perspective, its all about the greatest revenue. If they get more from the jokers who want a quiet, wimp gym, they make it uncomfortable for you so you leave. And, if you balk, they’ll just give you your money back and send you on your way.
It’s just business. If gyms cater to the hardcore lifter, there is typically only one gym in town, or they go out of business because they lack revenue. Plain and simple.
[quote]rrjc5488 wrote:
Find a new gym, then pee all over the lighter dumbbells. Or at least shit in a skillet and put it on the check in desk or something.
[quote]cap’nsalty wrote:
Sounds like you’re the asshole here. Don’t yell at each other when you’re using weights, it’s pretty simple.
It sounds like they have no problem with you lifting heavy weights, they just don’t want you to be jackasses about it. I don’t know why everyone thinks this is so unreasonable. If you really can’t get a workout in without screaming at each other, then find a different gym where people are ok with screaming.
I remember a quote from Jim Wendler which I’m going to paraphrase here “We tell them ‘Go to a different gym’ they hear ‘Go to the same gym and treat everyone like crap because I am the man!’” [/quote]
This is one of few posts on this threat with merrit. Why are you yelling? Keep it down. Do you need the attention? Study after study shows yelling doesn’t help you get the lift.
If you are tying to psyche eachother up and need to do that, go to a powerlifting club or train at home. You train at a commercial gym, they are designed for the average Joe.
From what I have seen most of the guys slamming weights, yelling, and making a spectacle of themsleves were wanna be big guys who thought that is what lifting is about.
Fuck what the studies tell you, if it helps him lift the big weights then I say go for it. Go tell Ronnie that yelling doesnt help when you lift. I dont care if its mental or not. If I thought it would help my lifts when I rubbed my nutsack in front of the mirror before my heavy set, I would do it.
He also said he does a bit of yelling and it wasnt offensive so I am ssuming no curse words. Unfortunately you are right about gyms being for the average Joe. The option to join a hardcore gym is not available to a lot of us. I also agree with you that if you merely do it to attract attention, you have no business acting like that.
I have run into this issue in the past so when I know I am going to lift heavy and may grunt or blur out an ocassional roar, I go on a day/time where I know there are as few people as possible. in my gym. we also have two free weight areas. If you have the luxury, move the DB’s and your bench into a separate room as far from the housewives as possible.
AA
[quote]petrainer wrote:
This is one of few posts on this threat with merrit. Why are you yelling? Keep it down. Do you need the attention? Study after study shows yelling doesn’t help you get the lift.
If you are tying to psyche eachother up and need to do that, go to a powerlifting club or train at home. You train at a commercial gym, they are designed for the average Joe.
From what I have seen most of the guys slamming weights, yelling, and making a spectacle of themsleves were wanna be big guys who thought that is what lifting is about.[/quote]
Although your first inclination is to kick ass and take names you should remember that you are negotiating from a position of weakness. They can give you the boot and there is not a damn thing you can do about it except find another gym. So if you like the gym and it’s convenitent for you I would suggest being very respectful and tactful in speaking with the management. Otherwise find some hole in the wall gym where you can scream, stomp, spit, slap chalk, and sniff ammonia.
I thought this might be something that you guys would aprpeciate.
I recently went to train with my mate at his gym, not too far from my own, and as we were training chest I told him that it was time to crack out the 65kg dumbells for flat bench. So in our usual fashion (and maybe a little more so because its a rare treat to train with eachother) we psyched eachother up and there was bit of yelling, nothing that anyone could find offensive though.
Two days after the session my mate rings me to tell me that the gym is threatening to take the 65kg dumbells because they’ve had complaints about him yelling when he uses them.
I wonder how this sounds to the rest of the heavy lifters on this site…[/quote]
Start yelling when you use the light weights as well, that should really confuse them as it sounds like they aren’t too bright anyway.
[quote]cap’nsalty wrote:
Finally, people comparing this to 1984 and the matrix are being really melodramatic. It’s not like they are doing anything particularly sinister here, they’re just catering to the bulk of their customers. If you’re going to blame anyone, blame the customers not the gym owners.[/quote]
I wasnt comparing 1984 to this situation… I was comparing it to what [whoever] said about the government wanting a certain type of person.
[quote]oboffill wrote:
OARSMAN wrote:
Beware of the Matrix. [/quote]
There’s More Than Meets The Eye…
I’d like to set this straight for all you T-Nation knuckleheads. The Matrix as you know it is a complete and utter fraud. Stolen from a real gem of a movie, the Matrix was used as early as THE TRANSFORMERS MOVIE if not even earlier.
Anyhow, dude, like other people have said, if you need to yell and scream in order to lift heavy, then you’ll probably need to find another gym - I’m not immune - I grunt and sweat and let out the occasional roar myself - but I workout at HOME, or at the rock climbing gym where nobody gives a shit because EVERYONE is hardcore, and people shout and clap all the time every time someone sets a new personal best climb or something on that order.
I mean really. You SURE you want to keep your membership at “Family Fitness”? Gimme a freakin’ break dude.
My problem with screaming is I try to concentrate especially on heavy lifts and if some moron lets out a rebel yell it totally blows my concentration and pisses me off.
Sure I groan and grunt too, but I try to keep it under control. It’s called having respect for your fellow lifters. I’ve been training for nearly 35 years and have never had to yell on a lift and I lift pretty damned heavy.
[quote]ATOMemphis wrote:
oboffill wrote:
OARSMAN wrote:
Beware of the Matrix.
There’s More Than Meets The Eye…
I’d like to set this straight for all you T-Nation knuckleheads. The Matrix as you know it is a complete and utter fraud. Stolen from a real gem of a movie, the Matrix was used as early as THE TRANSFORMERS MOVIE if not even earlier.
Just wanted to clarify.
…Robots In Disguise.
[/quote]
I cried the first time that i watched the transformers movie.
Went out and bought some pads that they use to line horse trailers, perfect material for a gym floor and cheap too, lined the basement with those and started building a home gym. All the chalk, heavy weight, loud music, etc that I want and after the first 2 years it paid for itself in what I would have been spending on gym dues.