I'm a lunker

"Entering the 'No-Judgement' Zone"

I was in Connecticut visiting family and looking for a place to train. Right down the street from where I was staying was a "Planet Fitness". I wanted to train at Mike Katz's place (Mike Katz of "Pumping Iron" fame for you youngsters out there) since I was in the area and was told that he had been bought out and was running a chain of these places (instead of World Gym). So this is where I ended up.

When I saw the big sign on the wall declaring that I had entered a "No Judgement" Zone I should have known I was in "trouble". I told myself that hey this is Mike Katz's gym! I mean the guy competed against Arnold. He played for the Jets. He knew what it was like to move some iron. Apparently he knows how to make a buck too. There was a non-stop parade of people coming in and forking over cash to sign up during my visit. The next sign things were not kosher was when I learned about the free food giveaways.

Unfortunately I missed Monday "Pizza Night" and Tuesday was "Bagel Morning" and I missed that too. Wednesday was not devoted to any food group so I was outta luck. (There was a Dunkin Donuts down the street if I needed a fix...). This place was something else. I have read about places like this and heard about them but never had the "pleasure" of training in one. "Places like this" you ask? Places where the heaviest dumbbell weighs 80 pounds (EIGHTY pounds) and there was NO power rack. My garage was bigger than the free weight area. Which was fenced in by the way (to keep people out or to keep those that made their way into the area in, I dunno which). There were 3 Smith machines however. So I hung my sweat shirt on one (they are great coat racks) and went to work. I had to totally improvise as my original plan (ME Upper) went out the window due to lack of equipment. Based on what I had available I went with a "repetition method" ME day.

Warmups
DB benchpress: work up to 80 x24, rest 3 minutes then 80 x15
Incline Tate presses: 4x10-12/ 35, 40, 50, 50
Underhand barbell rows: 5x10/ 135, 155, 175, 195, 205 Supersetted with Pushdowns (straight bar): 3x15+/ 60, 75, 90
Face pulls: 3-4 x15/ 60, 70, 80, 90
DB side raises (one arm): 2x20/ 25

The only sign of life I saw in the place was the guy (sorry I forgot your name) doing face pulls(!) who directed me to the water fountain. I asked him if there were more DBs hiding somewhere (no). I said this place is "different". He said "yeah tell me about it. I only come here because it's close to work." Said he worked at MB Sports Training in Northford, Ct. (shameless plug).

Oh yeah the lunker thing. A lunker is a person "who grunts, yells or screams while lifting weight. Who uses chalk. Who drops the weights" (is there a gentle way to lower 400 odd pounds?!?). On the wall in the free weight area was a siren and a flashing red light (the lunker alarm). As much as I tried I could not set it off. I was sad.

I hope somewhere in Ct. there are real gyms. I would hate to think that this was all that was left. I did learn stuff (even if one learns 'bad' stuff you still have more knowledge). The girls were hot. (Matter of fact I did not see an ugly one during my whole stay.) So at least there was that...

Making lemonade from lemons,
Ed T.