10 Ways Noobs Waste Their Time at the Gym

[Meleky]

What's a good HIIT programme and how should I incorporate it into Rippetoe's Starting Strength?

[RMohio]

For example: not sweating = not working right - this is WRONG, some people don't sweat as much except with higher rep workouts

This is true. Some days I sweat like crazy and some days not at all. I hardly ever sweat when I squat or leg press but everything else is a crap shoot. And before you say its because I do not lift heavy, I squat 335 and leg press 1000lbs for 2 reps as my max. Rep'd

[JaymzZz]

Do you understand how muscle injuries occur? If you bend your muscles in a way they are not suppose to, you MAY injure them (is it guaranteed? No, but it's increasing the risk).

Examples and sources:

You're doing a bench press. Now you've done your last rep, and your arms are already weakened, and you lower the dumbbells to your side. Now you twist your arm to put it on the ground, this is risky. Do you need me to bring you a doctor's quote for it?

1. Lift weight
2. Set weight on legs as you sit up
3. Spread legs a bit
4. Set weight down in a controlled fashion like you would do a barbell row

There, now you don't have to bitch about "pulling muscles" by not slamming dumbells. Unless you're physically unable to row what you press, there's no need to do that. It's just being obnoxious and seeking attention.

You're trying to make the argument about bending muscles in a way that your body shouldn't but that isn't even necessarily the issue here.

[JPN9]

Great article! Thanks for taking the time out to write it. Noticed I'm I'm doing a couple things on the list. Time to change that.

[mayhore]

itt: op is an idiot.

[morrikj777]

I just finished reading this entire thread and some of the points the original poster said are true, but inevitably it all comes down to yourself and what you're doing. When I first started going to the gym I noticed I was watching almost everybody else except myself and not worrying about my own form. This really hurt me in the beginning and I didn't see many gains in strength or weight loss. I humbled myself after taking a week off and now I just focus on what I do and make sure I don't hurt myself. Getting your body into shape is a completely selfish act. It's all on you. You're the one to do it. Nobody else is going to do it for you. The only other person that can possibly help you do it is your gym buddy or spotter. Don't worry too much about what others are doing at the gym and focus on your workout and your diet.

In the end, you'll start to see results and those that see you there every morning, afternoon or night of the week will give you the respect earned even if you do chuck a dumbell through the wall.

[kawj7]

Nice post. The advice giving part was true. People with no visual results tend to give me advice and I'm wondering where it came from because it doesn't show as proof on them??

[GOLDENi]

Wow, great tips lol a lot of them are true!

[Realomegablaze]

true ****.

[swift64]

So I forgot my headphones for the first time so I guess that means I want people to talk to me while I work out. I was trying to do a H.I.I.T workout and the guy next to me keeps jumping off the treadmill… he then goes on to tell me that he pulled a muscle in his leg yesterday…. WHAT why are you running on it then moron. He then proceeded to stand there and talk to me about a UFC fight he watched after I clearly told him I don’t watch the fights…. Never forget your headphones.

[UsainBoltz]

this is so funny, good thing i dont do this!

[Lufbrauni]

like it dude....

especially the bit about the guy in jeans, haha!!!

i've suffered at the hands of a 'jean wearing talker' many a time, haha

[zauts]

[QUOTE=Brian94;536865433]I'm sure you've all seen it, and maybe you even thought about telling the person to do things differently but it could be construed as rude. Perhaps you have been doing things a certain way due to habit, and didn't know it was not the right way.




well then there are those who do one biceps exercise, then shoulder, then chest, then nothing finally 2 reps in a random machine....etc i just see so maaaany of them haha it's so funny we call it "the absurd race"

[armyworrell]

Jerks like you piss me off too. You just go around insulting other people because it makes you feel superior to others. Get that checked out at a psychologist man, you won't make friends this way.

If you're not dropping the weights, it's because you're a noob--- and you are, you just confessed. You confessed right here: " and dont go beyond what I cant lift"

You don't know the first golden rule of weight training: Train to fail. No pain no gain buddy. Obviously you're able to lift maybe 30 pounds but you're lifting 10 pounds so you have an easy time lifting weights and you quietly put the weights on the floor like a nice little boy. You don't lift stuff you can do easily, you lift stuff that makes you sweat and work hard.

Buddy, when you get to actually large weights, go ahead and try to put it on the floor quietly, you'll injure yourself. Then come back and give others advice.

Go ahead, go tell this guy to put his weight down quietly, tell him his technique is ALL wrong... Go ahead, PM him right now on youtube, tell me how he responds, teach him a lesson.

I agree, I was just doing 95's on my bench and there is no ****ing way I was lowering that all the way to the floor. I lowered it to my body but after that I just let gravity take it from there. One of the guys I lift with actually tried lowering his 80 to the floor and now hes complaining that his right shoulder is killing him. Great thread dude.

[BbyHues99]

Plain and simple if you can't handle the weights done use them. You pay for a gym membership, you don't own the equipment. There's nothing that pisses me off more than picking some dumbells off that rack that are loose and jacked up bc some jackass has been throwing them around. I'm not getting into ball check about how much I can push for each lift, but I can say I lift heavy and have never had a problem placing the weights down. Step into a non health club gym and go ahead and toss those weights around and see if you don't get a slap in the back of your head.

[ZazenZone]

You don't know the first golden rule of weight training: Train to fail.

Uh, that's not really a golden rule. If there ever was a "golden rule" of weight training, it would be progressive resistance. Simply stated, increase resistance on a movement over time. Volume training WITHOUT going to failure works pretty well in achieving strength and size, in turn increasing resistance, and in my experience and many others, going to failure most of the time may often heavily contribute to injury, and can also quickly lead to overtraining/burnout. Going to failure consistently is extremely taxing from physical/neurological standpoint. Is it authentically possible to achieve quicker gains in size or strength by going to failure all of the time, in the old Mike Mentzer HIT fashion? Some people say yes, but it's definitely open to debate, and I don't buy into it. I'm not saying never go to failure, by all means, challenge yourself sometimes. But to think that you MUST go to failure consistently to achieve results is simply rubbish.

[stirredcoffee]

i know tons of guys who do that all the time

[nicksixx]

There is a guy in my gym whose routine looks something like this:
1. 10-minute psyche up in mirror
2. 2 sets of lat pull down supersetted with a 5 minute stroll then machine shoulder press
3. 2 sets of a variation of lat pull-down supersetted with a 15-minute psyche up and the other shoulder press machine.

I can do a layne nortons chest/arm day (4/5 chest exercises, 3 bi exercises, 3 tri exercises) in less time than he does 5 sets.

also, HE DOES THIS EVERY DAY! my friend and I joke about him, so one day I approached him and asked him if a trainer gave him his program. He said no, so I told him to maybe google Rippetoe's SS, and he just bert stared me as I explained what it involved.

sometimes he does wrist curls - he is like 60kg (130lbs) *facepalm*

/rant

[SilvaWarrior]

Ha, gr8 post!

[Gxp23]

that's just not true, unless you're weak. i slowly set the dumbbells down when i am doing shoulder press or dumbbell press or anything like that. lying there slamming the weights is for idiots, you don't HAVE TO do it for anything over 40 pounds. i was just shrugging 80 lb dumbbells and not dropping them last night as a matter of fact.

if you drop the weights incessantly then there is something wrong with the way you are lifting.

I agree with you 100% dropping weights ( depending on the make ) could also damage them and cause an accident down the line, and lifting 40 pounds? why the hell would you need to drop them, just place them down...

[PG11B]

...You're one to give advice. Look at that ridiculous physique you have to, unfortunately, call a body. If I looked like that I'd get into Sub-Saharin African modeling, because bro, you look sick.

Anyways, when someone drops the weight, whether benching, shoulder pressing, whatever with dumbells, they a nOOb. If you dont have the strength to lower the weight to the ground, then dont use it. I've never had a problem dropping the weight, I can control it because I've built the strength and dont go beyond what I cant lift. And think about it, respect the weights you use to build that body, with all the dropping you pose more of a risk in breaking them. But In your case, you dont seem to care, and why would you? Check out those inverted bi's...

People like you piss me off so bad. Go do P90x and take some creatine steroids, junior. I'm done.

Yeah...This 100%.

[scarboro]

Plain and simple if you can't handle the weights done use them. You pay for a gym membership, you don't own the equipment. There's nothing that pisses me off more than picking some dumbells off that rack that are loose and jacked up bc some jackass has been throwing them around. I'm not getting into ball check about how much I can push for each lift, but I can say I lift heavy and have never had a problem placing the weights down. Step into a non health club gym and go ahead and toss those weights around and see if you don't get a slap in the back of your head.

I would argue the exact opposite.
It's the people at health gyms that would complain about a small noise made by dropping dbs.
More power to you if your brachialis and wrists can handle a max pressing weight on the way down. But just because you can doesn't mean others can as well. I can usually control at least 3/4 of my working/warmup sets on incline db press, but if I feel drained I control the db until a foot off the ground where I left them fall. No bounce, just a small noise.

[EvolutionSic]

I'm sure you've all seen it, and maybe you even thought about telling the person to do things differently but it could be construed as rude. Perhaps you have been doing things a certain way due to habit, and didn't know it was not the right way.

1) Taking 6 minute+ breaks. The guy occupies the only incline-bench in the gym--has turned it FLAT while there are empty flat benches available--and is taking a 7 minute zone-out looking into the ceiling. You're wasting your time.

Most optimum break-time for muscle hypertrophy, would be anywhere from 60 seconds to 5 minutes for between each set. Some researchers say that 2 minute+ breaks for hypertrophy and strength, while only 1 minute or less for endurance. The shorter breaks, the more it becomes similar to cardiovascular exercises. I tend to take around 1 minute breaks, but I think I will be more careful about going a bit over 1 minute.

2) Doing too many reps. More work = more muscle right? Yes in weight sizes, not in amount of reps. Doing more than 15 reps on any exercise is actually endurance training. You're better off just doing a 4th or 5th set.

3) Doing the same work out for over a year or simply not sweating. 2020 wrote a nice article on this, explaining that sometimes you need to change your routine so that your body doesn't get use to the same cardio or same weights/sets. The importance of failing in doing your exercises/weights is significant. You have to fail to see gains.

Don't come to the gym, and do exercises, and leave without even breaking a sweat. If you're not sweating even in a cold gym---YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG.


4) Doing light cardio, or low intensity cardio for a long time coupled with high expectations of huge losses of fat Cardio is always useful, but if you're only working out slow-twitch muscles (walking for 40 minutes), or only fast-twitch muscles (running for 20 minutes), you will not burn as much calories as someone doing HIIT (15 minutes of sprinting and walking/slow-jogging). HIIT is known to burn way more fat and burn more calories post-workout than LI training.

5) Doing 100-300 crunches per day and expecting rock hard 8-pack. My friend use to do this all the time, 300 crunches every work out, and said "hey look, I can barely see a border for my abs today--awesome!" after like 4-6 months of doing it.

First, one type of crunches doesn't work out all 8 packs. Secondly, abs are made in the kitchen--with really low body fat %. (This same friend didn't quit drinking scotch every night while working hard [in fact, today, he still drinks scotch]).

Abs are not the thickest muscle, they will show if you go low enough and do regular 3-4 sets of ab crunches. If you were to integrate some twisting incline ab crunches or work outs for the obliques, you will definitely start seeing an 8 pack, eventually, unless you have the worst genetics. But you gotta be below 10% body fat. I do crunches regularly, but you will never see my abs until I get down to 10% body fat (even if they are particularly strong and worked out currently).

6) Being too perfectly neat. We've all seen the guy or girl who goes and grabs tissues or wipes down all equipment before and after use. They give glaring stares if you happen to forgot to wipe down one equipment.

First of all, if your gym is maintained at all, there are people hired to specifically clean all equipment every week (otherwise, that's just a bad gym). Secondly, unless you just did cardio and you're all sweaty, you probably won't get the equipment that dirty. Third, if you're a clean person, you should have washed your hands and taken a shower anyway [as well as afterward], so stop wasting your time being the cleaning lady. Instead do more sets.

How about the guy who tries to lower the dumbbells to the floor after a bench. Ah yes, thanks for not dropping the dumbbells and not making some minor noises--you've saved us all. In the meantime, you could risk injury to your shoulders or other muscles. I sure hope you have a dependable health insurance. Face it, if you're lifting over 40 pounds of dumbbells, you have to drop the weights after your sets-----for those neurotic OCD people in the gym that don't like that, grow up, stop assuming you can control everyone and stop getting annoyed by every little thing or you'll live an unhappy life.

7) Doing only cardio with no weight training, expecting huge fat loss. I know a really really fat guy in the gym, and every day he does 40 minutes of elliptical, 30 minutes of bicycle, and 15 minutes of walking. He's burning calories, sure. However, it's not the most efficient way to lose the 300+ pound weight he has. Weight training is a necessity.

8) Chatting, giving advice, talking nonsense. It's perfectly fine to chat with a couple people to get to know them. It's perfectly fine to ask advice from someone about a certain exercise when they are done with their sets. --- What's not fine is when you're going out of your way to give advice to someone else. Unless you're Schwarzenegger himself, or a professional body builder or trainer, you have no reason to give advice unless what the person is doing can lead to injury (then go ahead give advice).

Also don't be annoyed when people give you advice, I take their advice and give my appreciation even when I find it annoying. It's good to chat and make friends with people who work out often, but don't get in the way of their work-out and don't waste their time.

I had an average looking guy in JEANS... IN JEANS... in the gym... telling me how to do dumbbell flyes, when I had already looked up how to do it online years ago.


------
Anyway, I hope that helps some of you not waste time in the gym. Here's some motivation for your next work out:

mmmmm things i'd do to that!

[missiontomuscle]

I'm sure you've all seen it, and maybe you even thought about telling the person to do things differently but it could be construed as rude. Perhaps you have been doing things a certain way due to habit, and didn't know it was not the right way.

Classic post - love the motivational pic!

[missiontomuscle]

uh, that's not really a golden rule. If there ever was a "golden rule" of weight training, it would be progressive resistance. Simply stated, increase resistance on a movement over time. Volume training without going to failure works pretty well in achieving strength and size, in turn increasing resistance, and in my experience and many others, going to failure most of the time may often heavily contribute to injury, and can also quickly lead to overtraining/burnout. Going to failure consistently is extremely taxing from physical/neurological standpoint. Is it authentically possible to achieve quicker gains in size or strength by going to failure all of the time, in the old mike mentzer hit fashion? Some people say yes, but it's definitely open to debate, and i don't buy into it. I'm not saying never go to failure, by all means, challenge yourself sometimes. But to think that you must go to failure consistently to achieve results is simply rubbish.

2 rm!

[ucozer]

Very interesting, I learned something from it

[PatFel]

Exactly this.
If they're not directly impeding your own progress then who cares?

This is all well and good, but try getting your foot crushed by an idiot dropping DBs from a shoulder press and tell me its not impeding your progress

[crsarellano]

Is everybody still argueing about this ****? lol.

[KarmicEffects]

My biggest pet peeve is the 150lber last week that took up the bench press, 2 20's, 25's and 40's because hes doing everything at once...i come over to ask if he can move to the other benches to do his lifts and he tells me he's using it for squats...I say " you havent done one in 13minutes though...and yea I been watching because I need a bench..." bert stared me for 4 sec and moved to the bench lol...

[HockeyJon]

IHow about the guy who tries to lower the dumbbells to the floor after a bench. Ah yes, thanks for not dropping the dumbbells and not making some minor noises--you've saved us all. In the meantime, you could risk injury to your shoulders or other muscles. I sure hope you have a dependable health insurance. Face it, if you're lifting over 40 pounds of dumbbells, you have to drop the weights after your sets-----for those neurotic OCD people in the gym that don't like that, grow up, stop assuming you can control everyone and stop getting annoyed by every little thing or you'll live an unhappy life.

OMG THIS! I want to slap people who expect the gym to be some damn library!