An open letter to “That Guy” from gym…

Attention “That Guy”

I profusely apologise for not bringing such a pertinent issue to the fore at a sooner date. My timing is tardy but like the anecdote prevails, I suppose it is better late than never.

I am going to go out on a limb here and make the judgment call that one of the reasons you spend 4 hours a day in the gym is not because say, you have been struggling to ascertain sponsorship funding so you can continue your doctoral thesis study in ‘The non-variations in the metabolic reproduction rate of single celled organisms in a controlled environment’. However I will also venture that my reference to ‘single-celled organisms’ brings me to the answer for your excessive gym time that you have the intellectual ability of aforementioned single-celled organism.

I admit referring to your cerebral capacity as akin to that of an amoeba is fairly harsh but as you will, or actually probably won’t, remember from our recent conversation at the Smith’s Machine I have good grounding for my argument.

It was with much astonishment that I received your well elucidated point about how (and I quote) ‘the best way to get guns like mine (yours) is through hard work and dedication’. The sly wink you threw in after your interesting and profound advice was somewhat badly received by my homophobic tendencies but my astonishment stems from, why are you giving me arm advice when I am squatting? Why are you giving me advice period? Why are you near me whilst I am squatting anyway?

Moving along to the content of your quote I would like to point out some skepticism and my own advice. Firstly does your idea of ‘hard work’ refer to the mission it is to clean the blade of USN shaker that you were holding in your hand after you have loaded it with powdered goodies from our friend Shaneen around the corner? Secondly, why does your acclaimed dedication only extend to your arm workouts? Because surely if you didn’t just allocate your 4 hours in gym training to your biceps, triceps, a vigorous session on the abs circuit and the mandatory 1 hour lean against the water dispenser hounding the innocent spinning class, you could maybe try work on the bottom half of your body.

I am sure you are proud of the fact that you are more ripped than Achilles in a Roman legionnaire’s breast plate and your ‘guns’ are so large you are forced to walk around the free weights section talking on your hands free kit, but the fact that your calves and quads are similar in size to an Olympic Ethiopian middle distances runner makes you look fairly disproportionate, and unfortunately those skin tight puma pants don't hide this. (The humpy-dumpy egg on legs heckle from behind the bench press wasn’t me but is testament to my point)

Please don’t be offended by my comments they are more like positive criticism than cynical ridicule. For instances, if you did work on your legs, you could probably pick up and walk with the 55s to do dumbbell press instead of foot rolling it like it was a skateboard but then again that means you would have to put down your cellphone.

I hope you haven’t taken offence to my points and will earnestly try think, if that is possible, about what I have said. However if the only thing you take from this is to stop approaching me with irrelevant advice whilst I am doing repetitions that is fine with me.

Sincerest Regards,
GH