I generally find myself doing my training either outside, or in my own “pain cave” in my basement, except of course to swim which I can’t do at home. So yes, I pay a monthly gym fee to use the pool almost exclusively. But today, that changed…. with the snow yesterday, and the high cold winds today when I got up, I didn’t want to run outside because I’m already feeling a little stuffy, so I thought I would head to the gym and run an hour on the indoor track and then cool down with a 40 minute bike ride on the stationary bike….

Then I remembered some of the reasons why I stopped going to the gym regularly .. (besides the nice weather outside when it comes)..

1. Super muscle guy … yes, you know him, he walks around the floor in his half shirt from the 80’s with these huge upper body muscles, but these little chicken legs. He obviously only does upper body weights but makes himself annoying by offering to help everyone else out by suggesting they add more weight to the machine or by stating they are “not doing it right”. He also bathes in cologne before working out, so everyone can smell him coming and knows when he breaks a sweat… (I had to share the picture to the right, thats hilarious and reminded me of him)

2. The grunter … this may or may not be the guy mentioned in #1, but he’ll life weights that are way too heavy, or run faster than he can, or do too many stomach crunches so that he makes himself grunt loudly with each repetition over and over. Of course, it gets everyone’s attention, which is what he wants, but he looks like a moron. It sounds like he hasn’t had a bowel movement in a few days though, i’m not impressed…

3. The prom queen … this is the woman who goes to the gym in the best looking outfit, with her hair done and makeup all done up. She talks to everyone at the gym, but not once touches a weight or a machine. She also bathes in perfume and you can smell her coming (and going).

4. Speed racer … so I’m on a stationary bike doing about 7 effort just cooling down on a recovery ride and the lady next to me keeps looking over at me and pedaling faster and faster as if she is racing me. She was very annoying to me but she should realize that WE’RE NOT OUTSIDE…

5. Old guy in the locker room … this old guy is sitting on a bench a few lockers down clipping his fingernails and toenails, which by itself isn’t terrible, but he left his gnarled up nails to just lay on the floor all along the aisle. GROSS! And to make it worse, he sits there naked, talking to the other old guys while they’re naked. Come on man, we don’t need to see that, really.

So maybe i’m a little too critical of people and too judgmental, which is probably why I train best when i’m alone, however i’m sure if you belong to a gym, you’ve seen some of these characters running around, so you know what I mean. At least I didn’t have to face these characters until I was done running on the indoor track (which was the long piece of my workout), but from what i’ve read, my gym is totally remodeling itself which means the indoor track will be over the cardio and weight area sometime in the future… wonderful.

Either way, I got my workouts in and will think twice before I head back to the gym. I do think i’ll end up there again more and more over the coming month or so until the weather starts to get better. I fueled up with a good breakfast prior to my day at the gym consisting of almond pancakes…

Almond Pancakes

3/4 cup almond flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
2 tbsp raw honey
4 tbsp coconut milk
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 scoop LivingProtein
(water to make the right consistency)

Mix it all up and cook on a griddle with coconut better until browned on both sides. Use medium heat.

So week 4 of base training is done, only 34 weeks to go until Ironman Louisville.