So a couple of weeks ago a friend who I am at Uni with asked me to be his training partner (he qualified this by saying he wanted me to train him, because he “doesn’t know what to do”). I agree, stupidly, just because I didn’t want to come off as an arsehole.
After a lot of fucking around about when he wanted to come (I only go at certain times and on certain days, and I can’t really mess around when I go), finally we managed to work out a time when he could come.
I went down earlier than him and started a warm up set of front squats. He walks in and stands next to the rack; “aren’t you going to do curls or something?”. “maybe later” I reply.
I asked him what he wanted to do, and he seemed confused. Finally he said he would just work in with me. He asked if he should warm up on the bicycle. I said I didn’t usually bother, but if he wanted to he could.
I tried to explain his wrists probably wouldn’t let him do a front squat if he hadn’t tried them before, but no, he wanted to try them. Well he got a few half squats done came back to where I was squatting and said he couldn’t keep his arms up, so I showed him how to do a back squat.
I go back to my rack and hope I can now get this front squat set done, and I load on starting weight (only 45kgs), and I complete one set when he comes over, and looks at my weight. “Are you using that weight, it’s pretty big. I’m struggling with the bar”. Then he tells me he can’t squat any more because he has a leg cramp and decides he should have stayed on the bicycle for longer.
At this point he goes back to the bicycle, and basically by now I realise I’ll be doing the whole rest of my workout by myself. When he is finished on the bike he goes over to the pulldown machine. By some aboration of physics and flexability he does the deepest behind the neck pulldowns I have ever seen. I’m talking about the bar finishing half way down his spine. This was followed by a light set on the shoulder press machine (no weight loaded I think).
I ask him if he wants to do some seated dumbell shoulder press. He starts by working in on my set with 8kg weight. I told him he could probably go higher, but he said he didn’t want to hurt himself and not come back to the gym.
After 1 set of shoulder press he starts curling. That goes on for the rest of the time I was there up until I started using the seated calf raise.
Someone else in the gym was working in on the calf raise, but after I had finished, my friend insisted on going on it. He couldn’t lift the weight, and started trying to take the weight off it. I explained 2 people were already using it, so maybe he could do some leg press calf raises. He pushes his legs slightly so his legs are at a 90 degree angle and just sits there. This is aparently what he thought a calf raise was.
I didn’t even get an ego boost (which could have been the consolidating feature) because being told you are lifting heavy by someone who can’t squat the bar properly just doesn’t feel very impressive.
I’m sure some of you out there have made the mistake of offering to train someone. Any good stories??