Basic Gym Etiquette -- Use It Or Move

Still motoring along, with nothing major to report, other than it's getting increasingly harder to get a workout in at the gym. It's that time of year now when the weather's warm and everyone starts thinking about summer, trying to get their beach body ready.

Mostly, though, it's folks just sitting on equipment, talking about working out, kinda getting in the way and taking up space. Don't get me wrong -- I think it's great to see folks working out. I actually enjoy seeing people who are either working hard to maintain their fitness, or people like me, trying to change and improve themselves. I don't mind in the least if the equipment's being used by people who are working out.

I just get irritated at folks who take up the equipment, but spend a half-hour talking and posing in the mirrors and playing on their phones, while getting maybe three sets done. And no, I'm not exaggerating -- I regularly see folks get three or four sets done in a half-hour, roughly the same time frame my son and I get do 12 to 15 sets each. The other night I was going to use a seated bench for a couple of exercises, and some guy steps over and says "I'm using that."

Okay, so I adjust, do some other lifts. I did my entire shoulder and triceps workout -- 10 different sets -- and he hadn't yet done a single lift. He sat on the bench flexing in the mirror, spent 10 minutes on his phone, flexed some more, moved a couple of dumbbells from the rack to the floor, played on his phone some more....

Oh, well, such is life in the gym, right? Maybe one day I'll do a top-ten list of my least favorite gym practices.

For now, though, let me give you the rundown on what I did yesterday (Thursday). It was an off-day for weight training, so I did a longer cardio workout (also getting more difficult since we have a single stationary bike in the entire gym, and suddenly everyone's wanting to use it).

My workout
Stationary bike
1 hour, 10 minutes (1 hour at level 5, the rest at level 4)
24 miles
765 calories burned.

Eating for the day
Breakfast
Oatmeal -- 1/3 cup when dry
1/2 banana

Lunch
Chicken sandwich (3 ounces boiled chicken breast, 1-1/2 teaspoon of homemade chipotle mayonnaise, 1.3 cup mozzarella, 3 chopped up olives, two slices of whole wheat bread)
Fat Free Greek Yogurt

Snack
Salad (mixed greens) with 4 ounces of boiled chicken breast, 3 olives, and 2 tablespoons of fat free Thousand Island dressing

Dinner
Two flat bread tacos (each taco had 1.25 ounces of homemade taco-flavored ground chicken, 1/8 cup cheese, 1 tablespoon salsa; and the flatbread was made from a mixture of whole wheat, quonia, millet, and other grains).

Snack
Taco-flavored ground chicken -- 3 ounces
Cheese -- quarter cup
Salsa
Chopped tomato

Totals for the day
Calories -- 1.525
Fat -- 50 grams
Protein -- 135 grams

Water -- 95 ounces
Diet soda -- 24 ounces

That's all folks! Thanks for stopping by.