What Commercial Gym Owners Know ...

A couple of weeks ago, I was walking into my local gym when the owner called my name.  I thought he wanted to tell me about a special so I would spread it around my organization or something.  Instead he asked if I wouldn't mind deadlifting inside one of the two racks from now on.  He said that it was dangerous for me to deadlift out in the open and he didn't want anyone getting hurt.  I had to stop and think for a moment how anyone could be injured from someone correctly performing deadlifts in an actual gym without having a school bus of preschool children running through the place.  Rather than resist I immediately agreed, but I did ask if there was an incident of some sort that prompted the request.  He stated that he would just rather have people deadlift in the racks due to safety.  I mentioned that by doing that he would delay people that might want to squat ( or in his gym's case, curl) in the squat racks.  He explained that he wasn't concerned about that and I let the conversation end.


I watched a young man deadlift today with about 225lbs and he dropped the bar from the top of the movement almost every rep.  I kept thinking that this would soon make this gym go the way of Planet FATness in that deadlifts are outlawed.  I came across one of the gym employees in the locker room a few hours later and mentioned the kid's interesting technique.  The gym employee informed me that the owner had heard a complaint from one particular woman who was walking around pecking at different machines with her son.  Apparently, it was on one of my deadlift days and my exercises "irritated her". 
He told me the woman continued to complain about other people and the noise in the gym which consisted of people lifting weights.  Finally, the employee told the woman that it was a gym and it was to be expected.  He said since the woman had called me out specifically, the owner saw it as his duty to rectify the situation by having me lift in the racks.

I understand a business owner taking care of his business, but I work at the largest corporation in the area.  Many of us frequent his gym.  I wield a little influence with the employees of my organization or at least more than the gym owner.  If all of my coworkers went somewhere else, it would have dire consequences for his business. So why would a business man risk this outcome? 

The answer lies in the common strength training misconceptions that have been perpetuated throughout the fitness world.  Because of the ignorance of most gym owners, it is logical that they see dangers where there are few and none where there are many.  Many gym owners buy relatively dangerous machines sight unseen simply because they believe they are safer than the free weight equivalents.  Some of these owners have lifted weights their entire lives and they believe they know what's what.  Unfortunately, most don't have a clue what some of the best equipment is for really getting strong.  They know what makes money.  Treadmills, stair climbing machines, weight machines, cable cross over machines, hot tubs, pools, and the like make the gym attractive to the average, magazine reading Joe.  Few owners bother to think of the cost to benefit ratios of any of these purchases or at least in any objective, realistic sense. 

In the end, we are all limited by the ignorance of the business people around us in that the only things that are available are the things that they THINK we want.  We vote from this pool with our dollars, but it's hard to pick an apple from a barrel of lemons.  This is why home gyms have become so popular in the last few years and that is why the next few post will be about building the most cost effective garage gym you can build.

Stay strong!