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While the amount of so-called “third spaces” available to the public has diminished, people often forget that the oh-so-humble gym technically qualifies as one. However, at the same time, regular gym-goers know that, depending on where you are and even the time of day, one can run into a very interesting selection of people.
Someone asked “What's the strangest thing you have seen someone do at the gym?” and netizens share the unhinged encounters they’ve had. So get comfortable as you scroll through, upvote your favorites and be sure to add your own experiences in the comments below.
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#1
I had an older gentleman, late 60s, ESL, from the Phillipines, very thin, come up to me and ask me in broken English if he could watch me workout. So I let him. He followed me to every exercise and would take notes, smile, and say thank you after each set. At the end of my workout he came up to me and asked what days and times I go to the gym. This started getting more weirder by the moment. But I was truthful with him. Fast forward to the next day. There he was doing the exact workout I did the day before. He came up to me and said hello and asked to watch me again. He did this for a few days straight. Basically he had no idea what to do for workouts, or how to ask for help/assistance with them, so he wanted to use mine. Totally creeped out at first. But that dude still goes to the gym to this day and he always says hi to me. He even got the same headphones as me now. And always has a huge smile on his face. Weirdest but most sincere compliments I've ever had at the gym.
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#2
I was deadlifting 300 lbs once and this f*****g 3 year old child starts running around the place asking for my attention, I threw the weights down super hard and he started crying and was scared, a few minutes later his mom comes in and starts screeching at me like a banshee, I tell her to f**k off and she just turns away crying like a child, haven’t seen her ever since
F*****g Home gym problems, I swear….
#3
Dude at my gym (YMCA) comes in and does about 20 minutes of normal looking calisthenics before busting out into some extremely vigorous Irish dancing all around the gym. Everyone just stopped what they were doing and watched with their mouths open.
Turns out he works there.
#4
Saw an old man in china run 10k on a treadmill in the spa-offered flipflops.
#5
One of my first jobs was working in a gym daycare. Honestly a great job.
You could drop your child off for a maximum of 2 hours but we were really relaxed with that rule. Rarely did anyone go over that and if they did it wasn’t a big deal.
Until we got this one mom. She’d drop her baby off and literally leave the gym. She’d be gone for 4 hours sometimes and we had to get the manager involved.
Her husband showed up one day looking for her. Shocker, his baby was there but not his spouse. Turns out she was cheating on him. And I got to witness the confrontation first hand.
I literally just wanted to take care of the kids and babies and somehow got sucked into a love affair.
Say No to Downvoting 12 hours ago
I know this is not the point of the story, but how do people with small babies find time or energy to have affairs? I can understand the part where she leaves her kids a bit longer than she is supposed to but if that were me, you’d have probably found me in my car asleep or hurriedly responding to email/paying bills/doing taxes and all the other things I had no time or brain space with a baby with me.
#6
Older man in his 70’s, doing squats in slacks, long sleeve button-up, dress shoes and gardening gloves.
#7
I'm always amazed at the number who go to the gym but sit (often on an apparatus) looking at their phones instead of working out.
#8
My gym has a guy in his 50s who brings his VR headset and does (what I’d imagine) boxing classes. There’s also a guy who shows up in a full Wolverine cosplay outfit to workout in. He also has Deadpool and Captain America outfits but usually wears the Wolverine one. And no, he’s not jacked.
#9
Some guy came in dressed in his gym clothes, walked around with a steel bowl full of chicken and mayo. Ate it and then left.
#10
At my gym there was a guy who would blindfold himself with his beanie. He pulled it down over his eyes to concentrate. Good coordination but so funny to watch.
#11
Watched some guy crouched on the floor use the treadmill with just his arms.
#12
Some older dude next to a buddy and I would keep saying s**t to himself while working out. Stuff like:
“Im the lion, I’m not a sheep”.
“I’m a f*****g animal, you can’t stop this”.
Weird stuff like that. It was pretty funny because this dude was locked in and dead serious.
#13
I didn't see it happen, but I saw the video as my boy was the security at the gym.
Some women working out, and she goes up to get something. A guy runs over and either licks or puts his face in the seat she was in. She must have seen him do this, so she reported him. My friend had to escort him out when he put up a bit of a fight saying why, my boys like man, you know what you did to that women's workout equipment. Didn't even argue just got banned from all major gyms in the city. The same security company manager most gyms in the city.
#14
Well there was the dude who was working hard on his wrist strengthening exercises. but he was doing it in the shower room with the curtain half open, not in the weights section.
#15
I watched a guy running hard on the treadmill stop after about 5-10 minutes and then immediately go outside and rip a cigarette. Then he came back in and hopped back on the treadmill and repeated this for 2 more sets and left. Training lungs until failure I guess.
#16
Not particularly super strange, but I once watched a women use the elevator to beat the one flight of stairs, to then proceed to hop onto the Stair Master lmfao.
Dog Mom to Zoe 13 hours ago
I kind of get this. Stairs are great exercise but most of them are very isolated. As a woman, I understand this.
#17
Some dude that kept coming over between sets and taking weights off my bar instead of off the rack next to him, then acting annoyed when I asked him to stop.
liam newton-harding 7 hours ago
Some sort of idiotic, “assert dominance powerplay” he saw on a video, or listened to on a podcast, as he cried himself to sleep, at night.
#18
Worked at college as IT guy. Fixing a computer one day in the gym area and was watching the security monitors. Lady was trying to lift weights, guy posed in the mirror in front of her. She moved, he moved and posed again. This went on for 5 minutes before she left.
#19
There is an older dude I see sometimes that kinda interpretive dances with the elliptical machine. He never just gets on and uses it he hops on one side and does a couple pumps, then hops off and pushes a couple rotations with his hand, then hops on backwards, the hops off and kinda dances. He just keeps going at it for 30 mins or so randomly using the machine in every way except how it was intended to be used.
I have not seen him use another machine, just pace around. I once saw him in the parking lot and he was parked at a very odd angle to a planter bed that was not a parking spot.
Dude is definitely marching to the beat of his own drummer.
#20
This one guy on the treadmill was yelling and grunting like a anime character in their training arc 😭.
#21
I have known multiple guys who work out in dress shoes. Like full leather oxfords.
troufaki13 11 hours ago
I've seen some people run a full Marathon in dress shoes. And they're pretty fast too!
#22
I once watched a woman on the stationary bike ride for an hour. Except she had leopard print legging, matching top and leather jacket on while doing it. The piece do resistance to is all were the aviator sunglasses.
#23
Drink several things of tomato soup over the course of their work out.
#24
I saw bite marks on the pad of a machine right before i was about to start using it.. i picked up my things and went to a similar machine instead lol.
#25
An awkward gal that carried around a tripod with her phone mounted to it an had someone on FaceTime for all of her workouts. Never could figure out if she was talking to a remote trainer or just what. But she spoke to no one in the gym and acted like it was totally normal.
ScarletRos 11 hours ago
There is only one person I’ve seen using a tripod to film themselves at my gym and it’s an 80 year old woman who used to be a professional ballet dancer and is still very flexible (way more than me and I’m half her age).
#26
He was just doing a normal leg routine. The strange thing is, that must be all he does. Waste up he looked like a lanky 110 pound kid. Legs down he looked like an absolutely jacked professional hockey player.
Christos Arvanitis 5 hours ago
A lot of pro cyclists look like this. Upper body like an adolescent and legs like tree trunks.
#27
Writing an essay at my school gym hahaha. ripped a set then put his laptop on his chest and wrote.
#28
Once had a woman do squats literally less than 2 inches from me while I was on a yoga mat doing stretches. Had no clue if she didn’t see me, was coming on to me, or was some kind of dare, either way was odd.
#29
Saw a guy working out with a personal trainer and during his resting period, he would chug from a 2 liter bottle of coke.
#31
My wife saw an older lady light up two young girls for taking selfies in the locker room mirrors, that specifically stated “no selfies” on a sticker.
#32
High schooler using an old salsa jar as a water bottle.
Breadcrumb. 14 hours ago
Besides the fact glass in a gym sounds stupid. The reuse part I can get behind.
#33
I swim almost every weekday at my Gym. Every other day or so a dude comes into the pool area (its indoor) and goes and its on a box that contains pool tool for the maintenance team and just stares out the window for 5 or 10 minutes. Then hes goes and sits in the hottub.
#34
Two elderly women leaving the men’s room.
#35
An eccentric older lady in my neighborhood would regularly be doing the circuit at my gym wearing a fur hat and a short fur coat.
#36
Two girls were using a barbell as a microphone for makeshift karaoke, they were carrying the bar everywhere with them while annoyed gym goers wanted to use it.
#37
This really short dude was once walking around like a bada*s and arguing with multiple people. He would just walk up to you, eye you down, and start saying s**t mid set. What a dork.
liam newton-harding 7 hours ago
Napoleon, and his squeaky voice, read some poorly spelled tract about “alpha males”.
#38
Wear jeans.
Dog Mom to Zoe 13 hours ago
I had a friend that biked in jeans. I find that very uncomfortable.
#39
The fork on the ground in the toilet area. A metal a*s fork. Like which one of you nasty sumbi**hes are eating in the s***ter?
#40
Picking her nose and licking it to taste it then flicking it at the gym mirrors.
#41
The sushi master. This large older homeless man would sleep on one of the benches. He would snore loudly. When I walked by him, he would jump into reality and offered to move if I needed the bench. He would randomly pull out sushi and eat it in between sets on the bench press.
#42
2 bodybuilders in the changeroom checking each other's squat poses. Super jacked and checking each other's butt stances.
#43
I worked in a gym. Someone once s**t in the Sauna.
Chewie Baron 4 hours ago
I once worked in a gay sauna, we had people who would shít in the showers. Once had this person who took a dump in the chill out area. He got kicked out, but came back ten minutes later because he’d left his dentures behind!
#44
Actually sad, but we had this lady come in every few days,
she was clearly anorexic, literately skin and bones.
She'd come in, get on the treadmill and jog for 30-40 min and then leave.
#45
Theres some dude at my gym that gets on the elliptical and talks very very loudly, border line yelling just weird a*s random s**t for like an hour straight. I got on the machine next to him one time and f**k that was awkward. He was talking about Snoop dogg, homosexuals, the king of england, etc. Just all random and then every few seconds he just laughs real loud. I’m surprised they haven’t kicked him out.
Sea Squirrel 11 hours ago
They probably didn't kick him out, because he doesn't do this on purpose.
#47
We had a hatch blow out in a massive storm in the bay of biscay on my warship, our gym was in the well deck. So weirdest would be do some damage control and flood prevention techniques.
Not weird for that situation but a weird thing to do in a gym lol.
#48
Watching American Psycho on their ipad on the treadmill with no headphones.
Stephanie A Mutti 5 hours ago
My ex once was with our infant in the waiting room at the pediatricians office and she was watching Game of Thrones on her cell phone with headphones in. It took her far too long to realize the headphones weren't paired and everyone in the pediatrician's waiting room was now listening to Game of Thrones. Whoops
#49
Arrive at the same time, hour on the stairmaster, leave.
No deviance. Every. day.
#50
Using the assisted pull up machine... As a leg press.
#51
As a Veteran, I think we all have mental scars of the 80 year old retirees in the gym. Out on the floor, they are just talking and resting/napping on the machine you need. In the locker rooms, the horrors begin. They will walk up to you and talk, bare a*s naked. They'll dig around in the locker next to you, the whole time you are getting dressed, with their ancient wrinkled d**k facing you. When you finally leave, you'll see that the locker was empty the whole time. They hike a foot up on the counter and use the hair dryer to blow dry their crusty balls.
Nils Skirnir 8 hours ago
Ooh a veteran, with a capital v. Yeah - don’t believe any of it. Even the veteran part
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Jerry T 40 minutes ago
One night I went to the gym and there was an older guy, mid to late 60s, wearing jeans that were about 3 sizes too big and held up with a rope instead of a belt. He was wearing a tight red tanktop and what looked like brown Hush Puppy shoes. He was walking fast on a treadmill and he'd propped up a small radio on the machine that was blaring Hot Blooded by Foreigner. The song repeated over and over the entire time he was walking. I ran for about 45 minutes before leaving. (Thankfully I had noise cancelling headphones but I could still hear the song bleeding through most of the time.) He was still walking and listening to the exact same song when I left.
Jerry T 40 minutes ago
One night I went to the gym and there was an older guy, mid to late 60s, wearing jeans that were about 3 sizes too big and held up with a rope instead of a belt. He was wearing a tight red tanktop and what looked like brown Hush Puppy shoes. He was walking fast on a treadmill and he'd propped up a small radio on the machine that was blaring Hot Blooded by Foreigner. The song repeated over and over the entire time he was walking. I ran for about 45 minutes before leaving. (Thankfully I had noise cancelling headphones but I could still hear the song bleeding through most of the time.) He was still walking and listening to the exact same song when I left.
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