How To Invade The Free Weights Room, Part I

[rydra_wong]

It is a truth universally acknowledged that if you're not a cis guy -- and sometimes even if you are -- the free weights room can be intimidating and alienating as hell. It's a separate zone, apart from the rest of the gym, a Secret Clubhouse with its own arcane rules.

It's the domain of very large men doing things with huge iron weights and a lot of grunting, and if you go in there they will all STARE at you and you will do something WRONG and then you will die.

Okay, it just feels that way.

I promised over in exercise_every_day that I'd write up a sort of Guide to Free Weight Rooms for the Clueless and Terrified, and thereby prove just how little you need to know in order to be okay in there *g*.

So, somewhat belatedly, here's Part I.



The first rule of free weight rooms: You don't talk about PUT YOUR SHIT AWAY.

Once you've finished using equipment, put it back where you got it. Put the dumbells back on their rack. Take the weight plates and collars off the barbell and hang them up.

Individual gyms will have further rules, but that's the big one to follow if you want to keep everyone happy. However awkward or out of place you feel, if you're keeping that rule, you've got the crucial thing down.

Things you will see in a well-equipped free weights room: dumbells. Barbells. Weight plates. Benches. Various kinds of racks and cages. Miscellaneous chair-type things looking like instruments of torture or kink.

But fear not! The truth is that you can get away with having no clue what half of these things are, until you're ready to learn. I am living proof of just how clueless you can be in the free weights room and still live.

(I spent five minutes studying one machine-thingy last time and still couldn't hazard a guess as to what it was for.)

There also might be antiseptic spray and paper towels; if so, they're for wiping down equipment if you've dripped sweat on it. This is a kind and considerate thing to do.

Something else you will see in the free weights room: many guys with extremely large muscles. Depending on the gym, it's possible that, if you're female, you may be the only woman in the free weights room at a given time. Try not to let this freak you out.

You ARE allowed to be in there; you are NOT out of place. Practice acting like you belong. Practice taking up space,.

Note: I have sometimes had the impression that someone's done a double-take when I amble in. But apart from that, I've had the sense that guys generally recognize that I'm there to do my thing, and get on with doing their thing.

From what I've read, the greatest hazard for a woman in the weights room is unsolicited advice; I haven't even had that.

(Not even on the first day when I visited the gym I go to, when, since the weight room rules are cunningly hidden behind the door, I managed to inadvertently break half of them.)

It's helped me to check my own stereotypes and recognize that the fact that many of these dudes are built like brick shithouses is not an indication that they are scary, aggressive or violent; it just means that bodybuilding or powerlifting or another form of lifting heavy things happens to be their hobby.

Just like it's now yours.

On that note, if you're not built like a brick shithouse, it can also be psychologically useful to do what many serious lifters do, namely to start thinking of what you lift in terms of bodyweight ratio (e.g. can you deadlift your bodyweight? can you bench half your bodyweight?). Gubernatrix demonstrates how this applies with regards to women's strength standards.

What you are lifting may be more than respectable in terms of the percentage of your bodyweight it represents, even if it seems pathetically small compared to what Huge McDude over there is lifting.

N.B. If knowing your weight or thinking about it too much does bad things to your mental health, this is obviously not a good tactic.

Further note: you will make mistakes. You will fuck up stupidly and in public. You will drop the bar on your foot. You will get stuck under the bar. You will drop something with a loud crash that makes everyone else turn round to look.

THIS IS BECAUSE THIS HAPPENS TO EVERYONE.

Or maybe it's just me.

Okay, no, it really does happen to everyone. It's not desirable, it's not fun if you're socially anxious, but it does happen. So don't panic and decide it means you don't belong there; similar things will have happened to everyone else in there.

Also, dropping things with a loud crash just means you're macho. Apparently.

First off: the dumbells.

If you're new to strength training, start with the dumbells. You can do lots with them, they're not complicated to use, they're generally pretty safe (for example, you can bench-press dumbells without worrying about dropping the bar on your chest), you may already have used some at home or in other parts of the gym, etc. etc..

Most importantly, they give you something to get on with when the sheer terror of being in the free weights room has driven all other information from your brain.

Some things to do with dumbells:

Bicep curls.

Now, my entirely biased opinion is that long-term, bicep curls are not a great exercise if your interest is in functional strength rather than bodybuilding, because they isolate one muscle instead of working the whole body. But they're a very simple movement that produces obvious improvements in strength fast, and allows you to wrap your brain round this strength training thing and get the hang of progressive resistance, sets and reps in a fairly non-stressful way.

Just don't do them standing in the squat rack or other piece of equipment. Then people who were hoping to use that equipment will hate you.

Bench press
Squat
Shoulder press
Row

Stumptuous has an All dumbells! All the time! workout.

You can also use dumbells to do a windmill or a Turkish get-up; this will get you stares from people who have no idea what you're doing, but people who do know what you're doing will stare with respect.

Also, you will look badass and like you must be doing esoteric ninja training, which can be very morale-boosting.

To come in Part II, which will be written as and when my brain permits: Fucking Barbells, How Do They Work?

ETA: Part II is here.

Comments

[willful_zephyr]

Thank you! My wife took a weight training class. She liked it so much, we have been trying to clear time for me to go, too.

[rydra_wong]

Dooooo iiiiiit! Especially if they'll teach you how to do barbell lifts; that's the one thing I wouldn't feel comfortable learning entirely from the internet, because form is so important there.

[cryptolect]

What a great idea this is, thankyou!

[rydra_wong]

*bounces*

I hope people will feel free to add their own advice and experiences!

[jest]

Really good post!

[rydra_wong]

Thanks!

[gchick]

Turkish Get-Ups are the answer to everything.

[rydra_wong]

This is a deep truth.

[laurashapiro]

♥

[rydra_wong]

I can be a Cluelessness Role Model! *g*

[resolute]

The easiest thing in the world to do in the free weights room is walk over to the bench with the rack and the empty bar sitting on it, and see if you can move the bar. That was my first step.

I could lift it off the rack. Excellent. Could I put it back on the rack? Yes! Okay, could I curl it? Umm. A couple of times.

So then I laid down on the bench. Could I lift the empty bar off the rack? Yes! Could I put it back on the rack? yes! Could I press it?

Umm. Once or twice.

The bar is 45 pounds. When I started, I could not shoulder press the bar. So, I knew I had to start with less weight. I started with the 15 pound dumbbells, and that worked.

[rydra_wong]

Oh yes. My notes for Part II already include a section on how the bar is damn heavy on its own, and how it's perfectly fine and acceptable to do lifts with just the bar when that's appropriate for you.

Some places will have a lighter bar too, but even that's 15kg (33lb).

[opusculus]

Thank you for this. Lately I've been feeling limited by my home set up and contemplating checking out gyms to find someplace comfortable. This makes it feel a lot less intimidating.

[rydra_wong]

\o/

[supermouse]

I think this one single post has increased the chances that I will ever go to a free weight room by a factor of five. The chance is still low, since my health is terrible, but you've managed to make the actual place itself be not scary.

[rydra_wong]

\o/

[ciaan]

I go to the gym at my work, and the free weights are just in a section in the middle of all the machines, so less scary than a separate room. And plus we have lovely lovely trainers to show us how to do things.

But I'm looking forward to the post on barbells, since I've never used one because there aren't any (that I have seen yet?) at the workplace gym.

[rydra_wong]

*nods* I think some places really favour weight machines and dumbells, because they're easier to use, more convenient, and harder to injure yourself with.

Barbells are kind of SRS BISNS, but they're unequalled when it comes to moving a LOT of weight.

The first gym I went to had one barbell in the whole (huge, multi-storied, well-equipped) place, and an ancient squat rack with no safety bars. And when I tried asking the staff, I got "What's a deadlift?"

[nicolakgreen]

This is great, just what I need to help motivate me to get back into the gym. Thanks so much. Looking forward to part 2.

[rydra_wong]

Yay, glad I could be encouraging! And thanks for inspiring me to write it in the first place!

[randomreader]

One good thing about my gym - there is no separate free weights room (the whole gym is just one big open warehouse-like space), so the intimidation factor is smaller! Now if only everyone would play by the put back the dumbbells rule, life would be easier.

[rydra_wong]

That's definitely helpful! Though maybe a bit of intimidation is needed to make people put their stuff away. *g*