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Illuminati
New member
I posted this on the PL forum, but thought that mabye some of you guys here would enjoy reading it....
Ok, so I just moved across country (from Maine to Oregon) and I was looking for a gym. Right across the street from where I live is a place called 24hr Fitness. It was the only place that I could find in the area, so I decided to go and check it out to see what the place was all about. I go in, tell the girl behind the counter that I am interested in a membership, and that I would like to take a look at the gym. She pages some guy, and tells me to have a seat, and he will be right there. So I wait for about 15 minutes. My frustration is steadily growing. I go back to the counter, and ask her again. She pages the guy again, and assures me that he is going to be there soon to show me the gym, and tell me about it. 10 more minutes go by, and I am getting pissed, but he finally shows up. So I figure, what the hell, lets talk to this guy. He starts giving me the low down on the gym. I tell him I really dont care about how many treadmills they have, or how many eliptical machines they have, or the fact that they have 1 Billion nautilus equipment machines. I tell him all that I am interested in is the free weight room, and that is what I want to look at. so he takes me upstairs, up 30 steps to be exact to the free weight room, thinking to myself "this ought to be great after a serious ME squat/deadlift day."
He shows me the free weight section. Let me take a second to describe it...on one side of the room there are 3 flat benches, 1 incline bench, and 1 decline bench, 1 Power Rack, another squat rack, and maybe, I say maybe, 2000lbs of weights. in the middle of the room, there is located there 1million nautilus machines, he even points out to me that they have "color coded the equipment so that I will know what equipment works what. the chest machines are black, the shoulder stuff it pink...." All the way on the other side of the room from the benches and power rack (about 50ft. away) are all the db's. granted the db's were decent set (from 5-125lb db's).
he shows me the rest of the gym (the locker room, pool, sauna, hot tub, steam room...) and they sits me down to discuss the membership price. i should back up and tell you that this guy explains to me that his job is the equivalent of a car salesman, only he sells memberships.
So I thinking to myself, this place could be alright, I wonder what is is gonna cost. So he is giving me his pitch, flips the page in his little book, and shows me the membership price....$1700 FOR A YEAR! I shit my pants when he showed me that, and I could tell he knew it, because of the foul look on my face.
I said to him "are you serious?"
He says "well it comes with 20 free visits with a Personal Trainer."
I tell him "I'm not interested in speaking with a trainer, because 99% of them aren't gonna tell me anything that I dont already know."
"well, all of the trainers hold at least 3 certifications....blah,blah, blah."
"I really dont care."
"well, if that is too much for you, we have another plan." He flips the page in his little book, and shows it to me.
Again, I shit my pants. "You mean to tell me, that you want $350 for an enrollment fee, $70 for (I can't remember now what the $70 was for) and then $40 a month?!?"
"yeah. that is our only other plan."
"so what you are telling me, is that in order to get a membership on a monthly basis, I have to give you $460 up front?"
"hold on, let me add this all up," he says to me. He grabs his calculator, adds all the numbers up, and then says "it will come to around $506."
by this time there is a mound of shit on the floor because I shit my pants again. "where do you get $506?"
"Oh, you have to pay for your first and last months membership."
in bewilderment, i tell him "sorry. I could build my own gym for what you guys want to charge. this is outrageous. I think i will find somewhere else to go."
"how bout i give you free 3 day membership, you check the gym out, and if you like it, we can get you signed up?"
"sure whatever," i figure i could at least get 3 days of lifting for free.
So i get my membership, and decide to go back that night. that day, being monday, i was doing a ME squat/deadlift day (i have modified my WSB). I walk in with my 15x15x15 inch box made out of plywood, my bands, belt, gym bag...the girl behind the counter looks at me, rolls her eyes and lets me in.
I go up to the squat rack, and start setting up. I get the green bands attached to the rack, set my box up, and start box squatting. 4 "trainers" come over to me. "what are you doing? dont you know that box squatting is bad for you back, it puts your spine...."
to avoid the arguement, i tell them "yeah, i know." shake my head at them, and then do anothe set. they are still standing there.
"its unsafe to attach those rubber bands to the bar like that, what if they break?"
"well that is the chance that I will take." i shake my head, get back under the bar, and do another set.
at this point, they start to back away. i think they realized that I wasn't going to listen to them, and they left, but watched me from afar.
after squatting, i set the bands up, and did speed pulls, with band tension.
i was feeling pretty spent, so i decided that i would do some curls, some weighted ab work, and get out of there. so I make my journey across the 50ft room to the db section of the gym. do my curls, and then on to my weighted ab work. i grab one of their little mats so that i wouldn't leave a huge sweat mark on the floor, put the mat down, and then go to move a bench out of the way so that i would have a little more space. but the Fing bench won't budge. so i pull on it a little harder, and it still doesn't move. I'm pissed, and thinking WTF! So i pull on the bench with all that i got, and finally, come to realize that the thing isn't gonna move. I look down at the thing, and notice that the bench is bolted to the ground! no wonder the thing wouldn't move. so i do my ab work, and get out of there.
I go back today, (Tuesday) and its my DE Bench day. so i start to get set up on the bench for band presses. I go to do some warm up sets w/o the bands. i get under the bar, and immediately notice 2 things wrong. the hooks on the bench weren't adjustable, and I had a hard time unracking the weight because the hooks were too high. the only other hooks on the bench were at just about chest level. second thing I notice, is that the bar isn't regulation. the rings on the bar were only about 28 inches apart. no point in trying to get my hands at 32inches apart, because the hooks holding the bar wouldn't allow me to. ( the hooks were about 38 inches apart, my hands are big, and I couldn't get a hold of the bar.) so i think to myself, at least this is a DE day, and I'm not maxing out. i thought about setting up in the power rack, and doing my bench in there. Great idea, minus the fact that all of the benches are bolted to the ground! there goes that idea. so i decide to make due. I get done my warm up sets, and start to get ready to add the bands. I recently broke my mini's while pulling them out of my pile of stuff, they were under my chain, they were old and worn, and one of them broke. so i had to use the lights (the purple jumpstretch bands.) so i walk through the maze of nautilus machines to the other side of the gym (50ft away) and grab the 85lb db's, thinking to myself, this is going to be fun. i pick them up, and then go over the river and through the woods, to the bench that i was working on. i drop the db's on the floor, and it echoed throughout the entire place. I got some angry stares. I can only imagine what it would be like when I deadlift, and do a controlled drop with 500+ lbs. i would probably have to pay to put a new floor in.
what a pain in the ass. i dont think that i could have had a worse experience at a gym. maybe i could have made it work if it hadn't been for the fact that the facility sucked ass, didn't accomodate serious lifters, didn't bolt all of their equipment to the ground, didn't have 1 million nautilus machines, didn't put the db's on the other side of the gym from the benches, didn't have only 1 power rack and most of all, DIDN'T CHARGE $1700 FOR A ONE YEAR MEMBERSHIP. well, i guess on the plus side, I would have gotten 20 free visit with a personal trainer, who wouldn't be able to tell me anything about powerlifting, WSB, or have a clue who Louie Simmons is.
Ok, so I just moved across country (from Maine to Oregon) and I was looking for a gym. Right across the street from where I live is a place called 24hr Fitness. It was the only place that I could find in the area, so I decided to go and check it out to see what the place was all about. I go in, tell the girl behind the counter that I am interested in a membership, and that I would like to take a look at the gym. She pages some guy, and tells me to have a seat, and he will be right there. So I wait for about 15 minutes. My frustration is steadily growing. I go back to the counter, and ask her again. She pages the guy again, and assures me that he is going to be there soon to show me the gym, and tell me about it. 10 more minutes go by, and I am getting pissed, but he finally shows up. So I figure, what the hell, lets talk to this guy. He starts giving me the low down on the gym. I tell him I really dont care about how many treadmills they have, or how many eliptical machines they have, or the fact that they have 1 Billion nautilus equipment machines. I tell him all that I am interested in is the free weight room, and that is what I want to look at. so he takes me upstairs, up 30 steps to be exact to the free weight room, thinking to myself "this ought to be great after a serious ME squat/deadlift day."
He shows me the free weight section. Let me take a second to describe it...on one side of the room there are 3 flat benches, 1 incline bench, and 1 decline bench, 1 Power Rack, another squat rack, and maybe, I say maybe, 2000lbs of weights. in the middle of the room, there is located there 1million nautilus machines, he even points out to me that they have "color coded the equipment so that I will know what equipment works what. the chest machines are black, the shoulder stuff it pink...." All the way on the other side of the room from the benches and power rack (about 50ft. away) are all the db's. granted the db's were decent set (from 5-125lb db's).
he shows me the rest of the gym (the locker room, pool, sauna, hot tub, steam room...) and they sits me down to discuss the membership price. i should back up and tell you that this guy explains to me that his job is the equivalent of a car salesman, only he sells memberships.
So I thinking to myself, this place could be alright, I wonder what is is gonna cost. So he is giving me his pitch, flips the page in his little book, and shows me the membership price....$1700 FOR A YEAR! I shit my pants when he showed me that, and I could tell he knew it, because of the foul look on my face.
I said to him "are you serious?"
He says "well it comes with 20 free visits with a Personal Trainer."
I tell him "I'm not interested in speaking with a trainer, because 99% of them aren't gonna tell me anything that I dont already know."
"well, all of the trainers hold at least 3 certifications....blah,blah, blah."
"I really dont care."
"well, if that is too much for you, we have another plan." He flips the page in his little book, and shows it to me.
Again, I shit my pants. "You mean to tell me, that you want $350 for an enrollment fee, $70 for (I can't remember now what the $70 was for) and then $40 a month?!?"
"yeah. that is our only other plan."
"so what you are telling me, is that in order to get a membership on a monthly basis, I have to give you $460 up front?"
"hold on, let me add this all up," he says to me. He grabs his calculator, adds all the numbers up, and then says "it will come to around $506."
by this time there is a mound of shit on the floor because I shit my pants again. "where do you get $506?"
"Oh, you have to pay for your first and last months membership."
in bewilderment, i tell him "sorry. I could build my own gym for what you guys want to charge. this is outrageous. I think i will find somewhere else to go."
"how bout i give you free 3 day membership, you check the gym out, and if you like it, we can get you signed up?"
"sure whatever," i figure i could at least get 3 days of lifting for free.
So i get my membership, and decide to go back that night. that day, being monday, i was doing a ME squat/deadlift day (i have modified my WSB). I walk in with my 15x15x15 inch box made out of plywood, my bands, belt, gym bag...the girl behind the counter looks at me, rolls her eyes and lets me in.
I go up to the squat rack, and start setting up. I get the green bands attached to the rack, set my box up, and start box squatting. 4 "trainers" come over to me. "what are you doing? dont you know that box squatting is bad for you back, it puts your spine...."
to avoid the arguement, i tell them "yeah, i know." shake my head at them, and then do anothe set. they are still standing there.
"its unsafe to attach those rubber bands to the bar like that, what if they break?"
"well that is the chance that I will take." i shake my head, get back under the bar, and do another set.
at this point, they start to back away. i think they realized that I wasn't going to listen to them, and they left, but watched me from afar.
after squatting, i set the bands up, and did speed pulls, with band tension.
i was feeling pretty spent, so i decided that i would do some curls, some weighted ab work, and get out of there. so I make my journey across the 50ft room to the db section of the gym. do my curls, and then on to my weighted ab work. i grab one of their little mats so that i wouldn't leave a huge sweat mark on the floor, put the mat down, and then go to move a bench out of the way so that i would have a little more space. but the Fing bench won't budge. so i pull on it a little harder, and it still doesn't move. I'm pissed, and thinking WTF! So i pull on the bench with all that i got, and finally, come to realize that the thing isn't gonna move. I look down at the thing, and notice that the bench is bolted to the ground! no wonder the thing wouldn't move. so i do my ab work, and get out of there.
I go back today, (Tuesday) and its my DE Bench day. so i start to get set up on the bench for band presses. I go to do some warm up sets w/o the bands. i get under the bar, and immediately notice 2 things wrong. the hooks on the bench weren't adjustable, and I had a hard time unracking the weight because the hooks were too high. the only other hooks on the bench were at just about chest level. second thing I notice, is that the bar isn't regulation. the rings on the bar were only about 28 inches apart. no point in trying to get my hands at 32inches apart, because the hooks holding the bar wouldn't allow me to. ( the hooks were about 38 inches apart, my hands are big, and I couldn't get a hold of the bar.) so i think to myself, at least this is a DE day, and I'm not maxing out. i thought about setting up in the power rack, and doing my bench in there. Great idea, minus the fact that all of the benches are bolted to the ground! there goes that idea. so i decide to make due. I get done my warm up sets, and start to get ready to add the bands. I recently broke my mini's while pulling them out of my pile of stuff, they were under my chain, they were old and worn, and one of them broke. so i had to use the lights (the purple jumpstretch bands.) so i walk through the maze of nautilus machines to the other side of the gym (50ft away) and grab the 85lb db's, thinking to myself, this is going to be fun. i pick them up, and then go over the river and through the woods, to the bench that i was working on. i drop the db's on the floor, and it echoed throughout the entire place. I got some angry stares. I can only imagine what it would be like when I deadlift, and do a controlled drop with 500+ lbs. i would probably have to pay to put a new floor in.
what a pain in the ass. i dont think that i could have had a worse experience at a gym. maybe i could have made it work if it hadn't been for the fact that the facility sucked ass, didn't accomodate serious lifters, didn't bolt all of their equipment to the ground, didn't have 1 million nautilus machines, didn't put the db's on the other side of the gym from the benches, didn't have only 1 power rack and most of all, DIDN'T CHARGE $1700 FOR A ONE YEAR MEMBERSHIP. well, i guess on the plus side, I would have gotten 20 free visit with a personal trainer, who wouldn't be able to tell me anything about powerlifting, WSB, or have a clue who Louie Simmons is.
