Okay okay…gotta vent again people! I work in a corporate fitness center and I have the luxury of working on this fine Saturday morning (sigh). So,I get to work at 8AM and I turn on my favorite radio station which was playing the top 20 rap/r&b songs of the week. Around 8:15 these two gentlemen walk in to workout and I reluctantly asked if they wanted the tv’s on and they both said that it didn’t matter. One was on the treadmill and the other was doing some circuit training. I was like, “WOW, that is rare. Usually when people come to workout here, the first thing they do is put the tv’s on!” So I was happy that the tv’s weren;t on and I was able to listen to the music. What was even cooler was these two older guys were working out to 50 cent, R. Kelly, Busta, etc…it was great. We were one big happy working out family…haha. Wellllll, not more than 10 minutes later this older woman walk in who I think is a major prissy bitch and she immediately walks up to me and asks me if I could turn the tv;s on to CNN. I was like, yeah sure. No big deal really, atleast I still had the radio on. Opps…spoke too soon. About a minute later…the lady walks up to me and says,“excuse me, I dont know if you realize this, but the radio is on and it is louder than the tv’s…can you turn it off?” In my mind, I was like, “what the hell??? Can’t you live without tv for an hour out of your life??” So, I turned the radio off so that she could hear her precious tv! How do people expect to get a good workout if their eyes are glued on the tv??? It really boggles my mind. You go to the gym to workout not, not to watch fucking CNN. As I am writing this, she is on the eliptical machine going at a pace in which my 85 year grandmother can do and her eyes are right on the tv’s. I swear to god…the second she gets off that machine, I am turning the radio back on!!! I just think tv’s should be illegal in the gym. I would love to do an experment here. One of these days I am not going to turn the tv’s on and when someone asks me to turn them on, I am going to say that they are broken and then I am going to ask them a simple question. Did you come here to A. Workout or B. watch tv? I would LOVE to see the expressions I would get! Okay, I am done. Thanks for listening. Talk to ya’ll later…Tony G
Man… it sounds like you work out in my facility. I hate the TVs too. What is pathetic is all the women who come in to walk 2.5 mph for 30 min to watch “the price is right” before going out to their cigarette break. Gets me fuming. Problem is, if I took the TVs down I would have mutiny on my hands! I have gotten to where CNN is more like white noise. I don’t even have cable at home because I despise TV so much. The worst is when this group of good ol’ boys comes in and turns it on CMTV and they crank it up. I just want to impale my ears on sharpened pencils!
jp,
I hear ya brother! The tv’s are on CONSTANTLY…and usually on CNN…I pretty much tune it out. People will come in and ask what is going on in the world, I will say, “I have no clue, I don’t pay attention to the tv!” What made me so mad was the fact that she came up to me and asked me to turn the radio off cause she couldn’t hear the tv!!! And I did turn the radio back on as soon as she got done with her “so-called” cardio workout…haha. She looked at me like she was annoyed, but I didn’t care. I totally know where you are coming from when you said that these people come in and walk on the treadmill at like 2.5 MPH and watch tv…they actually think that this is working out. Hey, we might as well install some dvd players and offer to play movies while they workout too!!! For the love of god…those tv’s piss me off.
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TVs are gay (gay-stupid, not gay-homosexual), particularly in the gym.
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Commercial gyms blow. (To think I’ll probably be working in one soon.)
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People go through their workouts with a frightening lack of intensity.
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Who can work out to R&B? To quote one of this week’s articles: [quote] “You can’t listen to R&B and try to bench 600 pounds.”[/quote]
We must workout in the same gym… need a workout parnter ??.. T.V.'s are all over the damn place in my gym. they are held high and play music videos and sports channels all the time… sometimes i like to stop lifting for a second and look around and see better than half the people staring blindly to the T.V.'s… i’ve complained and been a total smartass to the people running the gym to no avail. we also have little t.v.'s on treadmills and bikes which i think that is pretty cool, but we have more t.v.‘s than a sports bar… they even bragged on their sign outside that they have over 60 t.v.s’… no shit.
Your fitness center should invest in Cardio Theater. That way a client can bring their am/fm radio and tune in the volume of the tv as loud as the want to.
Tony G unfortunatly your going to have to live with that client and pucker up u’r lips to her to a certin degree. Because she is paying part of your salary indrectly. So put on that customer service smile and help her out. Eventhough you might not like it. You never know who she knows in the company and she could get rid of you in a heart beat if she finds out or sense that you think she’s an ass.
In Health,
Silas Chen
At my Gym, all TVs are muted. No sound ever comes out of them - EVER. What you'll hear will be nothing but music blasting, and if you want to know what the guys on tv are saying while you do your cardio, you read the captions if available. If not, you put up with 1 hour with no TV.
My gym’s just like what diesel described. Most of times I’m running too fast to give a damn what the hell’s on TV, altho it’s a distraction from thinking about pain too much. Haha. But if I can have only TV or my MP3 player, I’d pick MP3 player over TV. TV sucks.
when yo get on the cardio at my gym you plug headphones in a unit on each machine. You can turn into the tv or the radio. makes it nice.
Tony G. sorry u have to put up with that crap.
The cardio theater option that fitone mentioned is exactly what you need. I haven’t been into a gym that doesn’t have a similar option.
Also, is there no set standard as to what kind of music you play and when? I would think that the gym owner would want to respond to his/her market by playing what most of the people liked.
You also must remember that the goal of the gym is to make money, not to get people fit. It’s a business. So if catering to the people who “think” they’re working out brings in more money, then the gym is going to suck.
But people like the woman you described make me at least want to believe in a hell. I don’t know what would be more comforting - thinking of living eternal life in heaven, or knowing that certain people would go to hell. 
My “gym” has TV’s everywhere. I the Freeweight room, there are FOUR. What’s sad is that many times I’ve gone there in the middle of the day to find these freeweight room Tvs playing SOAPS. WTF?!?
You wouldn’t believe the grief I get from people when I inform them that I watch no television, save for the news right before I go to bed. They can’t believe that I don’t watch ER or Survivor or whatever else. I tell them that I don’t have time to work out 5 days a week (sometimes twice a day), prepare all my meals, sleep, clean my house, get my house renovations done, spend time with my girlfriend etc and watch television. I think tv is for people who are weak, for the most part.
Why do you care about what others do?
Are you not strong enough to fight the urge to look at the TV?
If you need music, why not just get some headphones? Does everyone need to be subjected to your music? Some people would rather not have any music at all.
I do my work regardless of my surroundings. My gym has TVs and people watch them. I don’t care, I do my thing. They do theirs. What is wrong with that?
Live and let live.
I get satisfaction from the fact that at least three people smack their heads against the hanging TV near the bench area. Never fails. Then they always walk away like nothing happened. It’s pretty funny.
Man, no offense, Tony, but i’d sure as hell rather be listening to CNN than R&B and Rap.
I think listening to lame music when working out is more disheartening than a TV could ever be, because the music is everywhere, whereas the TVs are usually just in the cardio section, thus ignorable. I hate it when the gym supervisor puts on slow/soft music… makes me crash like a mound of sugar in the middle of my set.
If you think TVs are lame, think about how many people think R&B is lame before you start bitching.