Hey everybody, I’d like to tell you about my experience with Planet Fitness.
So I’m on spring break right now, away from college, and I need a place to go to at least maintain my bulking cycle. My mother has a membership to Planet Fitness and she invited me to join her. I figured, “sure, why not?” thinking I might as well because a gym is a gym, right?
Considering where I left off in my training last week, today I needed to do some deadlifts, barbell presses, and pull ups.
WRONG!!!
First off, there isn’t a barbell in the damn building! The racks are those pussy kind where you are stuck in a set range of motion, and there is only a small section in the corner of the gym where the free weights are located. To top it off, and this REALLY ANNOYED ME to the point of wanting to leave, was a giant horn above the freeweight section called the “Lunk Alarm.”
Drop a weight, the alarm goes off and everyone in the gym stops and stares at you. Place the weights too harshly on the floor, the alarm goes off, and you feel like an ass. Talk about limiting results; with the limited amount of weights they do provide, they try to embarrass you when you work out with intensity. Has anyone ever seen such bullshit? I was in complete awe.
This was the most watered-down, artificial, “Hey I want to pretend that I’m working out” gyms I have ever been to. I even saw a massage chair.
I’d just love to picture that meeting in the corporate boardroom:
“Sir, we only have a few dollars left on our budget. Should we include barbells or a massage chair?”
“Well, these people are supposed to be getting fit. So let’s give them a massage chair.”
Unbelievable. I suppose when anything is mass marketed (even fitness), companies are great providing to 50-something’s looking to burn a few cals here and there but abysmal at actually providing a decent workout. Seeing probably 50+ cardio machines next to 5 benches was sad indeed. It’s sort of like a brand new $800,000 house that has a “stone facade” and vinyl siding–unauthentic, watered-down crap for the masses.
Thank God they had cables to work out with. All I can say is, for kicks, you should really go check one out some time. Definitely look for the Lunk Alarm and go drop a weight next to it.