Please tell me I’m not the only one who has a few of these stories in my collection? I remember this one fondly every time I teach people how to foam roll. Specifically when I teach how to foam roll the quads. If you’re not familiar with this move, it looks a bit like this:

Now imagine rolling around on the floor like this, while wearing this shirt below, while training in a gym where all of the other trainees are teenage boys.

Yup.

Needless to say, I never wore that shirt to that gym after that.

Then there was that time at the YMCA. It was shortly after I learned how to do power cleans. They were far from perfect, but they weren’t awful either. After a set a guy dressed in construction boots, jeans, and a wife beater; came over and explained to me that what I was doing wrong. I don’t remember what his correction was, but my response was something like,

Thanks, I’ll be sure to ask my trainer about it, so I’m good.

Or at least that’s what I thought I said. Based on his reaction, it seems that what I actually said was,

Oh really, thanks for that. Please stick around and tell me more. Maybe even move me aside from the power rack so you can demonstrate several times. And then if I happens to mention that I’m doing power cleans instead of full cleans because I’m training for sports performance, please brush me aside again so that you can demonstrate some shuffles. Nothing says ‘this guy knows all’ like an annoying stranger demonstrating shuffles in construction boots.”

After that I rarely worked out at the Y without wearing headphones. In fact, one time I remembered to pack my headphones but not my mp3 player. I still put my headphones on and plugged them in to my pocket.

Anyone else have fun gym recollections to share?