From our workplaces and lunch break cafes to the chat shows we follow on radio and television, many of the conversations we couldn’t help but overhear over the last fortnight often shared one common prevailing theme.
Wear a baggy T-shirt during your first few visits to avoid attracting unnecessary attention to yourself during this crucial phase- Matthew Muscat Inglott
Every year, when Malta’s favourite musical spectacle airs on national TV, love it or hate it, we are stricken by Eurovision fever. Whether it’s the songs themselves, the brave artistes who sing them, or the clothes worn by everyone who steps on the stage at one point or other, we cannot help but discuss the infamous song festival and its local qualification event down to every last detail.
In a wider sense it seems the festival serves to betray a common trait we all share: the need to analyse and assess each other. The derogatory remarks many females recently made about the appearance of some of the obviously beautiful women who appeared on screen that fateful weekend forces me to ask: are us men just as judgmental of our fellow males?
Most of us have heard about that wonderful hormone we call testosterone that flows through our veins in abundance and makes us the men we are. Despite a solid biological foundation to the male psyche, however, the rules have become somewhat hazy in this desk-riding, touchy-feely world we find ourselves living in today.
Unless we man up soon, the noble art of manliness might very well get lost forever. As we began using our hands less and our brains more, it wasn’t just our skin that got soft.
All is not lost however, because at least three days a week we get to ditch the hand cream and assume a tight grasp on the cold abrasive surface of a heavy barbell. Fortunately the gym environment is one of our last surviving bastions, the final out-post of machismo deep in a lost territory of sissiness.
The gym is a special place where men can be men, testosterone can flow freely without prejudice, jokes can be as bland and language as course as is desired, and we can indulge to our heart’s content in foolish competitive pursuit of our all-important bragging rights.
Where manliness abounds however, there’s a set of behavioural rules you won’t find scribbled on any wall charts. While a woman’s beauty tends to trigger hyper-critical analysis from her fellow females, strangers turning up at any free weights area in any gym across the world are subject to the same cross-examination from their fellow iron-wielding males.
Please note that if you’re a new trainee accompanied by an instructor, then you are basically exempt from scrutiny, so no worries there. If, on the other hand, you already train and are simply switching gyms, then your assessment will begin the moment you set foot on the reinforced floor.
Men, if you get this right you will enjoy respect and lasting friendships at your new gym. Get it wrong, however, and you’d better start packing up your handbag and looking for another gym.
Whatever the gym, be it hardcore basement or spandex emporium, here I will play the devil’s advocate from the point of view of your hostile reception committee. Let’s start with the most important rule of all: don’t walk in like you’re the big-shot main man, as you are almost guaranteed to be branded a jerk.
This absolutely rules out swaggering and giving the evil eye to everyone in the room. Be humble and let us discover how manly you are ourselves. Real tough guys don’t shout it from the rooftops; they have nothing to prove and go about their business quietly avoiding needless confrontation, lest someone gets seriously hurt.
I recommend wearing a baggy T-shirt during your first few visits to avoid attracting unnecessary attention to yourself during this crucial phase. There will be plenty of time to show off your sculpted physique later on when we’re more used to you.
Also, don’t try and lift super-heavy weights right off the bat however strong you are, you’ll need to get used to the new environment and equipment gradually anyway, so don’t risk committing an epic fail we’ll always remember you by.
Show us you’re serious about your training by just getting on with it; real men act with conviction and a sense of purpose. Don’t force yourself upon anyone too soon, let your first interactions happen naturally and when they do occur be polite and friendly, but not too friendly of course, we’re men remember. For more on how to talk to your new gym buddies once you’ve built a basic and naturally occurring rapport, I recommend proceeding cautiously with Clint Eastwood’s wise advice in the film Gran Torino, specifically that imparted during the barber shop scene.
And finally, exercising in good form and technique will not only turbo charge your results and cut down on injury risks, but will guarantee we have nothing to criticise. If you bench press, take the bar all the way down to your chest and not just half way; if you squat go deep; if you curl for your biceps, don’t swing the weight up with violent full-body jerks.
So good luck and remember that real men are the most honest and loyal friends you’ll ever have, so making the right impression is well worth the effort. We might be more fashion conscious and better groomed than our forefathers, but that doesn’t mean we’re ready to start wearing little shiny handbags just yet.
info@noble-gym.com