Dear Couples, Stop Going to The Gym Together. Sincerely, All Average Joe's

After decades of light beer, fried food, meat sweats, and minimal ambulatory movement I, a middle-aged, slightly overweight male, decided to start going to the gym. The doctors, nutritionists, and other personnel who do more than stare at spreadsheets for forty hours a week, have continuously reiterated the benefits of physical activity. These brainy people publish countless articles about how physical activity provides for mental stimulation and the secretion of serotonin. Upon exiting the gym, I do believe I was secreting serotonin but not from my physical activity, but rather from watching couples working out together.

Now before this blog goes too far, The Cornercube wants to recognize that this blog, may, and will, offend many of its readers. Please do not stop reading our content based off one middle aged man’s experience at the gym. I’m sure you and your partner are the best dynamic duo to ever lift iron together. What we are trying to say is, take a joke.

There are two types of gym couples. The first is what I’ll call the “AC-130” type. “What is this?” you might ask. Well, during my pre-workout days I played lots of online first-person shooters.  One in particular was called, Call of Duty: 4 Modern Warfare. In the story there is a mission in which one player is a gunner in an AC-130 gunship, while the other player is a soldier on the ground trying to make his way deep behind enemy lines. The gunship watches over and eliminates any threats so that the ground player can escape.

Each person in an “AC-130” couple assumes either the role of the gunner or the soldier. Typically, the gunner is always the female and the soldier is the male. After they give each other a pre-workout hug/kiss, each person will go to his/her respective “machines” to assume their positions. The male will go to the bench – naturally he is there because he wants to “get big” and satisfy his primal instincts – “get swol, so I may defend and attract the opposite sex.” The female will start off on the treadmill/stairs. This is her “perch”. From either of these locations she can oversee where her man is and whether any threats (i.e. other females) are encroaching upon her man’s exercise routine. In an ideal situation she would like her man to not to talk to anyone but herself, and simply lift his weights while intermittently drinking his kale, soy and broccoli protein shake out of his $45-dollar water bottle that she purchased for him at Dick’s the previous Christmas.

What is interesting to observe is when a female encroaches upon the male’s “fitness zone.” The “gunner” who typically starts off on the treadmill will then, if needing a better vantage point to take her shot, move to the stairs machine. Here, she can see, process, and determine if such a female is a threat to her man. How does the gunner judge if such a female is a threat? Based off two objects – the female’s backside and her soldier’s reaction. First, with the advent of the Kardashians, belfie, and social media women have been ever more regarding their backside as their greatest asset (pun intended). If the gunner assesses the threat (the other female) as either having a more attractive or equally attractive backside, the gunner will maneuver to closer proximity within the lifting soldier's location because, “it’s time for her to start her squat exercises.” She’ll immediately interrupt any conversation to make it known that the female is talking to her man, thereby eliminating the threat. This same process will be used if the soldier and the threat look to be enjoying their conversation (soldier is laughing, asking questions, being a nice human).  The gunner will go to DEFCON-5 if either her man or the threat pull out their phones (exchange of numbers? Following each other on Instagram? Snapchat friends? Sharing protein shake recipes??). If the phones are pulled out, on the car ride home the gunner will have to undergo an internal investigation to determine whether her man has been compromised

The other type of couple is the “stick to me like glue” couple. This name comes from the famous line in the 1969 film, Battle of Britain, when one of senior fighter pilots instructs a new recruit to “stick to him like glue” when they are flying together.

The same thing happens at the gym. The couple will either do each exercise together or oscillate. For instance, the male might do the leg press for a certain amount of reps. The female will stand, wait, watch, and even provide her man with praise as he accomplishes his “lift.” The female will then adjust her weight, do her leg press and the male will stand, wait, watch and even provide praise for his lady. It’s interesting to see how the couple decides who leads the workout (what machines they do first, for how long, etc.). “First in” is based off two determining factors: desire and experience. The person who leads is typically the one who wanted to go to the gym in the first place. This is usually the person with the gym pass, or the person who convinced the other to apply for a gym pass. The other is experience in which the person who has the gym pass might not be the leader but rather, the person who has more experience lifting (i.e. the man who still goes around talking about his high school days).  There have been a few times in which the leader starts to determine what exercise another should do, which is always amusing. For instance, one time the male instructed his significant other that she should work on her “butt, while he works on his hamies.” In this scenario the female obliged.

Most people, and even the internet, support couples working out together. Simply Google “couples working out together” and the first three hits are a list of its benefits. Some of these benefits are: (1) increase happiness with your relationship; (2) increase emotional bond; (3) help achieve fitness goals and (4) make your partner fall in love with you. All of these are great, but the issue is they are all speaking to those who are already physically gifted. For example, I don’t want my wife near me when I’m doing a machine. My spouse doesn’t enjoy watching a hippo give birth and so probably won’t find it attractive when she sees the man with whom she bore children, wheezing in agony as he tries to lift seventy pounds on the bicep press. I also don’t think our happiness or emotional bond will increase when she sees her “knight in shining armor” dry heaving as he walks at 4 mph on the treadmill, using a towel to wipe away his brow sweat (mind you, all of this is happening as I am watching The Great British Bake Off. How do they make those chocolate crumpets so moist?) My fitness goal, unlike the Adonises I am surrounded by, is not to be able to lift my “honey” off her feet and parade her up the stairs to our bedroom for late night love making, but rather so that I can feel confident that I won’t have Type 2 Diabetes in a decade.

Both the couples and I are doing the same activities at the gym (albeit at different speeds, intensities, and weights), but for completely different reasons. The couples, who are almost all physically fit, workout to maintain their physiques which, most likely, were the root of their initial mutual attraction. However, even with their bulging muscles, slim waists, and sculpted figures, many seem to lack the basic sense of trust needed to maintain a real relationship. I go to the gym so I don’t die in a decade. They go to the gym so their relationship won’t either.  

By: Stan Bemis, @stanbemis