There is Internet and Other Media Everywhere

I just got back from the gym and half the people in there didn’t know what the hell they were doing. Even most personal trainers I see here teach people lifts and training concepts don’t know a thing about proper exercising. And I wonder why.

There are so many possible ways out there to gain knowledge: DVDs that show proper exercise form, websites such as T-Nation that discuss a great variety of training concepts, books on training theory and application, Youtube to see how not to do things, …

Why don’t people try to educate themselves before purchasing a gym membership. Why do they pay people 50 bucks an hour for teaching them something that doesn’t work? I really don’t understand.

I understand that rich people hire qualified coaches for several hundred bucks an hour since they are too busy to read and learn or rather spend the money than invenst the time, but the average joe? What’s holding them back?

The internet and “other media” are the problem. There is too much of a market selling bullshit. Once upon a time, people just lifted things up, then put them down. And they noted how many reps/sets/etc. produced the desired result.

So those poor schmucks you look down upon from your ivory tower probably did plenty of research. There is just too much garbage to sift through.

Maybe you should help them.

I’m with dmunro on this one.

A lot of misinformation is out there. My old roommate thought he’d get absolutely ripped if he gained 15 pounds (he was 140) and if he got functional muscle. His planned routine? Push ups. Sit ups. Pull ups. Jump ropes. Side Straddles. Running.

He once refused to drink juice because it had more calories per oz than soda. I have no idea how he intended to gain weight or gain ripped on that kind of program. I’m just glad I didn’t let him suck me into it.

The thing is, he did research. It was just bullshit research. He bought into everything Men’s Health told him, and all that fitness marketing crap. Most people stray away from bodybuilding forums because they think they’ll get “too big” (they vastly overestimate the effect of ten or fifteen pounds) or because they think it’s all roiding. Instead they rely on the bullshit they see on TV, find in a magazine, or hear from their friends.

If a friend of mine wants to get jacked, I’m sure as hell going to make sure he gets properly educated before dipping into things. A huge chunk of men think that lifting a weight instantly makes you jacked and doing 5 kinds of arm curls in a sitting is a good idea. Another chunk think it’s all about reps and not about weight at all. A third chunk thinks you have to mix up the workouts to confuse your muscles, otherwise they’ll get really good at doing that one thing (they’re too stupid to grasp that the improvement is the point, and we call it strength gain.)

[quote]dmunro wrote:

So those poor schmucks you look down upon from your ivory tower probably did plenty of research. There is just too much garbage to sift through.
[/quote]

^This. While there a tons of great free resources out there on how to lift and eat, there are even more TERRIBLE sources out there. Just look at some of the fitness advice in most mainstream magazines and on popular sites such as MSN and Yahoo. Too many people out there are just happy with being mediocre. On top of that, their friends, co-workers and family usually spread the same terrible garbage info which seems to validate it in their mind as fact.

It’s hard to learn what info is garbage and what is not without spending your time in the gym. That’s why people who are new to the gym have the most difficult time.

Your name, just works so, so well.

[quote]bro1989 wrote:
I just got back from the gym and half the people in there didn’t know what the hell they were doing. Even most personal trainers I see here teach people lifts and training concepts don’t know a thing about proper exercising. And I wonder why.

There are so many possible ways out there to gain knowledge: DVDs that show proper exercise form, websites such as T-Nation that discuss a great variety of training concepts, books on training theory and application, Youtube to see how not to do things, …

Why don’t people try to educate themselves before purchasing a gym membership. Why do they pay people 50 bucks an hour for teaching them something that doesn’t work? I really don’t understand.

I understand that rich people hire qualified coaches for several hundred bucks an hour since they are too busy to read and learn or rather spend the money than invenst the time, but the average joe? What’s holding them back?[/quote]

This misinformation shit drives me nuts. At my gym there are TVs that have looped clips giving training and nutrition “advice.” One time I watched as a computer-generated character demonstrated the “proper” technique for deadlifts. The character’s low back had a severe degree of flexion during the entire movement. This was a COMPUTER-GENERATED character! They couldn’t even get a FAKE person to deadlift safely!