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Going to the gym

Having a home gym is a very convenient. But there are some advantages to going to gyms outside your home. Like the experience I had today. I usually go to gym at my work place along with a few of my colleagues. You can recognize me from the tiny speck walking along with a bunch of huge guys. I say tiny not only because I am this short dude walking with 6' guys but also because they are huge, weighing in at 1.5 times my weight. So when I go with them I always have a spotter. Usually my bench press weight is like their ez-bar bicep curl :).

However today every one was busy so I had no choice but to go alone. And the main reason for me to quit home gym and go to gym at work is that I can have a spotter so I can lift much heavier weights without the fear of hurting myself. Today that was not the case. I went anyway hoping to do some light weights. The gym was pretty empty. Today is my shoulders and traps workout day. I wanted to start with shoulder press. There was one guy who was using the chair to do shoulder press ahead of me. After the initial greetings I asked if I could join. He was ok with it. I was not sure if I should ask him to spot me because today is a big day. I was planning to do shoulder press with 40 lb dumbbell in each hand. That may be a tiny weight for most people but for a skinny dude like me it is very scary.

I did do the first set without much problem although my hands were shivering under the weights as I moved them up and down. For my second set I was struggling mid rep on my 5th rep and this guy came quickly to my aid and helped me push through the rep. For the third set he stood behind me and spotted me through the whole set even encouraging me every rep. This is the fun part about working out in a gym. Random people who you barely know come to your aid and encourage you when you are struggling. Of course there are another set of people who would laugh when I try to bench press with a 25 lb on either side of the barbell. The point I am trying to drive home I guess is that there are 2 sides to a coin :).

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