Describe your Gym and it's users

[holvoetn]

Plates: 6 x 25, 6 x 20, 4 x 15, 4 x 10, 6 x 5, other smaller plates
3 Olympic barbells

3 barbells and so little plates ?
I bet you need to wait from time to time for some weight to be freed ?

[saukkis]

:shock: That sounds frighteningly similar to the gym I go to. I don't suppose you're going to university in East-Finland?

Nope, I'm all the way up here in north.

Plates: 6 x 25, 6 x 20, 4 x 15, 4 x 10, 6 x 5, other smaller plates
3 Olympic barbells

3 barbells and so little plates ?
I bet you need to wait from time to time for some weight to be freed ?

Not really. There usually are maybe one or two people there in addition to me and they don't lift heavy. The 25 kg plates are almost always free.

[MikeD]

Gym has yoga/aerobic classes, shitload of machines on the main floor, there's an entire upstairs just for cardio.

But go to the back, there's tires, ropes, gymnast rings, 40 yard dash track, kettlebells, sleds....

Go in the back of THAT, there's a PL'ing area with 2 platforms, a bunch of bars, chains, bands, reverse hyper, a shitty GHR, power rack, chalk station, and personal bathroom. I could seriously live there.

[Sid]

University gym.

Upstairs is pretty much everything cardio-related + most of the machines.

Downstairs - 6 power racks, 3 platforms+half-racks with bumper plates, 5 benching stations, big DB section, some t-bars, stuff for the bodyweight exercises, tons of available chalk, a couple of cable things but pretty much all free weights. There are some amusing signs outlining the platform rules that contain a couple of quotes which after a couple months of training I recognized as being Rippetoe's: one is "gloves must match your purse." Part of the reason I even got into strength training was that the first time I stepped in there I thought "Wow I need to actually figure out what I'm doing so I can take advantage of all this stuff."

Most people in the gym are pretty serious about what they're doing regardless of what they're doing or whether they're doing it right But I see a lot of people in there doing the big barbell lifts and using really good form (I'd say about 70%), while the other 30% have cringeworthy technique - there's no in between.

[Sam277]

For PE today i went to the school/ leisure centre gym. Awful gym, full of machines and no olympic barbells. There are no 20kg plates, in fact, i think all of the weights put together would come to my bodyweight. They have some nice treadmills and rowing machines though. And a stupid amount of cycling orientated machines. And the one where you spin it with your arms.

I saw some personal trainer who had his client stand on an up-turned bosu ball and do lateral raises. I don't think he's going to look different any time soon.

I love working out at home.

[mgalli]

I use my college gym, which is rather limited ($25 a semester can't be wrong though). There are three flat benches, an incline bench, decline bench, two squat racks and a few portable benches. There's a ton of machines of various usefulness and price, a row of treadmills, bikes and ellipticals. My favourite part of the gym is the indoor track a room over.

The people are who you would assume would go to a college gym. There are a few hardcore lifters, a few profs who use the gym and the assortment of bros, douchebags and chatty girls.

[Anomander]

My Gym- One flat bench, one squat cage, 2 portable benches, 2 barbells, dumbells that go up to 30, one of those wire machines that everyone seems to do crosses on. A load of machines that seem to actually promote bad technique and the rest is just cardio. not idel and not as cheap as id like but only 2 mins away and has everything i need so wht you gna do

[Ray]

I must admit, my gym is pretty badass. I got to Oswego State University in NY. We have two fitness centers, but I only go to the one.

It's split into 4 parts, a small room with weight machines, on the other end a small room filled with cardio equipment (10 treadmills or so, some ellipticals, stairmaster), then a big open are with a wooden floor where they do spin classes, yoga classes and stuff like that, they have all the medicine balls and mats over there, jump ropes too. The weights section is just a little bit bigger than the yoga area, probably approximately 15 yards x 20-25 yards long. And the equipment is AWESOME....

2 squat racks
8 oly bars, 1 is only 35lbs., and one is 45lbs. but a fat grip bar
About 20 45lb. plates, and the same or more amount of all the others down to 2.5 lbs.
2 100lb. plates
5 standalone benches
3 benches for flat benchpress
2 incline benches with rack
1 decline bench
Dumbbells up to 120 lbs.
Cable machine with two sides
Smith machine
buncha other crap like a lat pulldown machine, preacher curl bench, back extension thing, seated cable row etc.

So it is pretty much decked out. We do have a lot of guys in there though. Obviously, everyone at my gym is college aged. For the most part, the guys in the weights section are classic "captain upper-body" toolsheds, a lot of them frat boys. There's a few kids in there who are cool, and one I like a lot. He's very quiet. Doesn't wear headphones or wear fancy gym clothes. Just keeps to himself, and deadlifts 560lbs, seen him OHP 225. He's a beast. And really nice.

[denhib]

My gym is Anytime Fitness in NPR. (I was a member of Gold's till it closed and took my prepaid membership and transferred it to Lifestyle Family Fitness across town. I never went, though.)

The gym is in a storefront. I like that it is 24/7 with key card access. I work overnight, so I workout before I go in, around 11pm. The place is almost empty then.

The front half is all Hammer Strength machines, with a couple of multi-station types. The back half is free weights, barell and dumbbells. with cardio stuff along the side wall. Although it only has one power rack and one dedicated bench press, it has a couple of adjustable benches that can also be used with the power rack. I would say that that both sides are used about the same.

The equipment is in good condition and for the most part everyone treats the gym with respect. John, the owner, takes a lot of pride in the place and I think that's what people respect most. So far no one has refused to let me work in with them. The only thing I haven't seen anyone use is chalk, for whatever reason.

My only complaint is the meat-heads that use the power rack to do curls.

Dennis

[RicF]

During termtime I train at my uni gym which recently had a 'slim down'. By this i mean every single machine (except lat pulldown and three cable machines) has been relocated to elsewhere in the building (don't know, don't really care). So now there is twice the space for freeweights which is GREAT.

3 oly bars
1 powerlifting bar/squat bar (not entirely sure but its thick)
2 power racks
1 oly platform
roughly 1000kgs in plates (recently some new Eleiko ones)
dumbells from 5kg to 60kg
many benches
oly bench press
some plate loading machines

Met a few people there that i have begun to train with, most are the typical biceps and chest idiots though, I don't mind, more powerrack and barbell for me!

oh and there is a huge cardio room, apparently :p

In the summer I plan to set up a gym in my shed, roughly 170kgs plus bar, and squat stands.

[gantengx]

My gym is at uni, it's way cheaper than commercial gyms..

It has 5 bars, plenty of plates, 1 squat rack, 1 cable machine with pull up bar, 1 pull up + roman chair lift, 3 type of bench press (standard, incl, decl), plenty of random machines (including cardio machines)

It also plays annoying random techno/dance very loudly (they have quite a few speakers, but one speaker is directly above squat bar so I had to use an earplug). If I'm lucky they'll play some nice hip-hop/r&b but those are rare..

As for the people.. Serious power lifter they are only a few... probably 6-8 including myself. The rest are skinny dudes trying to bulk up with machines and curls..

[Aidan]

My gym is a uni gym, but my uni is a sorry-ass money-grabbing excuse for a place of life-enrichment... unless you can pay for it...
I joined it early on in my first year because it was close, and hey, my bank balance had never been that big before.

It isn't too bad, mainly through the virtue of most people knowing what they are up to. Mix seems to be mainly big lads with big arms and broad chests, but little definition to speak of, and the impulsive and inexperienced joiners, that see a pain-free and guaranteed link between "join gym" and "be ripped". They look so lost as they aimlessly move between machines and dumbells, doing a few reps to "test" a weight (I can think of no other purpose? "yup, still heavy"). Couple of guys train together in there that I vaguely know through rugby, could almost be on the stronglifts program looking at their moves. 90% barbell and lots of squats and deadlifts! These guys were a godsend for my lifting form, providing loads of advice after one of them noticed I wasn't going low enough on my lifts.

The gym upstairs is cardio with a few... EZ bars I think we call them? the wriggly ones... and the downstairs is mostly machines unfortunately. I swear that nobody's arms could ever possibly track along the direction that the shoulder press machines forces you! (I admit I used it once recovering from injury, stopped sharpish though, was more likely to do harm than good.) The freeweights area has dumbells 2.5k-37.5k and one bench and one squat rack, maybe 180k of plates? I have never bothered to count.

In all, an all-right starter gym, but it wont keep me occupied for ever, I am changing in a few months to a no-nonsense breeze block affair, that doesn't rip you off to line the vice chancellor's pockets...

Wish me luck!

[Avenge]

Currently, I do have a home gym. Powerrack, enough weights, oly bar, etc.
However, before I found Stronglifts and started my homegym, I did train in a gym. Only machines, treadmills and rowing machines. Just an EZ-bar, and 35 KG of weights or so.

People there left me alone, and I did leave them alone.

[wgh]

The YMCA I lift at has really nice gear and layout compared to some of the other gyms being mentioned.

2 great power racks, a dip station, dumbbell corner, and of course various machines scattered around. Free weights are always plentiful, probably 1500+ lb up of York Barbell plates, even though half of that is in 100lb weights for the leg press (hohoho).

Not many lifters, and I'm generally the highest squatter (if anyone else squats at all) which is a great ego boost. Main machine and cardio areas are segregated off into a different areas, making lifting the only thing to concentrate on.

[nburge]

I have two gyms at the moment, one because it's opposite my work and I need somewhere to shower when I get in (I cycle to work), and one where I learn the Oly lifts. Unsurprisingly they are somewhat different:

Commercial gym:
Three floors - first floor has about 18 plasma TV's showing a range of shit from sports to news to pop songs. There are about 20 treadmills/seated cycles/eliptical things which are usually the busiest part of the gym. There's a side room "Powercentre" which is dark, with a big TV showing music videos and more of the same machines.
Next floor down has several rooms I've never been in. I believe they are for spinning lessons. There is also a series of nautilus style machines (I've never been close enough to them to find out who makes them) covering every sort of pulley-based exercise man could wish to engage in. There's a big rack of dumb-bells (up to 45kgs), several benches (mostly for lying down on as far as I can tell), one bench station, one smith machine and one squat rack. They have about 4 or 5 barbells although only two "proper" sized 20kg plates that allow deadlifting without the need to raise the weights from the floor. I haven't counted but the total weight in the gym is probably about 350kgs. Then there are two powerplates, a dozen swiss balls and mats as well as a curious contraption that is a revolving climbing wall.
On the basement level there's two changing rooms, an 18m swimming pool and sauna/steam room.

Olympic gym:
4 Olympic platforms, 3 powerlifting platforms, 2 squat racks, several bench stations plus an assortment of contraptions (most of which look home-made) for working out other bits of your body (loads of things like Roman Chairs). There are probably 10 - 15 Olympic bars, and several thousand kgs of weight here and there around the room. They also have a large chrome bowl with chalk in. To my mind this is what separates a gym from a "health club".