Belts at the gym

Posted by: Borrek

Belts at the gym - 02/05/07 09:23 PM

A stupid trivial question, but one I'm going to ask nonetheless...

I work out at a Bally's. This is a recent thing for me and its a meet market for 50% of the people there. The other half who aren't there to check out the ladies are generally wayyy too chatty for my liking. My previous gym was at an air force base where folks were there to train and thats it. I'm also happy in the "leave me alone and let me train" school of thought.

Bally's has a great room with lots of mirrors that is perfect for doing kata. I, on the other hand, live in a 2 bedroom apartment with a baby (and babies have lots of crap) So, I'm going to suit up in my gi and go train at Bally's.

I dont want people to talk to me. I dont want them to ask me questions. I dont want them to ask if I know Grand Master Bujinga from across town. I know I'm going to stick out and I don't really care about that but I guess I'm sort of snobby and I dont want to look like I'm at Bally's trying to "show off" or wow people with a black belt.

If I instead wear an orange belt do you think it would help. Would people be more likely to ignore me? Or, would that actually be a pretentious thing and I should just say screw it and wear my black belt?

Alternately I could wear just sweats and do my kata, but after 20 years of training in a gi, that sort of feels like playing football in a tutu. Ill equipped.

Posted by: DaDoN_1

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/05/07 09:40 PM

I used to do the exact same thing at a local gym here with my bud. Don't care what they think, you know you are there doing what you are doing for a reason, be proud of your rank. People, even though they mightn't be Martial Artists themselves, would have a fair idea how skill should look eh? Orange belt? Atleast a blue

Have fun man. Train hard
Posted by: Saisho

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/05/07 10:09 PM

I usually wear my full gi and belt when I train anywhere, but if it concerns you to have people interupt, don't wear a belt. Wear your gi bottoms and a T-Shirt. If you wear the top, people are going to bother you regardless of color belt.
Posted by: Fletch1

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/05/07 10:19 PM

If you don't care what they think and you are not in a traditional environment, why wear the gi at all?
Posted by: clmibb

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/05/07 10:32 PM

Quote:

I usually wear my full gi and belt when I train anywhere, but if it concerns you to have people interupt, don't wear a belt. Wear your gi bottoms and a T-Shirt. If you wear the top, people are going to bother you regardless of color belt.



Agreed. Most people only know white is in the begining and black is at the "end". If you wear any other color people will ask how many more belts until you get to black. I train sometimes in just the pants and a t-shirt. People generally leave me alone. If anything they might ask me questions about what style I do or whatever but it's usually after I'm done working out. I understand about babies having TONS of stuff (I've had 2) so there isn't a lot of space at your place and Bally's seems like a perfect place. Eventually people will get to know you and won't ask as many questions especially if you go in at pretty consistant times and days. Anyway, don't let the questions bother you too much. Remember if you are affiliated with a school, then you become the school's speaking voice at least for that one person. If people are talking to you and you don't really want to just simply tell them that you are on a time constraint (your wife only let you out of the house for an hour and you really need to work on a couple of things) people will generally leave you alone and let you do your thing.

Casey
Posted by: Zombie Zero

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/05/07 10:43 PM

Consider the other side of the coin. Sooner or later, someone who knows about martial arts will be watching.

So now, you've got someone asking you why you're doing black belt kata, when you're wearing an orange belt.

If it were me, I'd just wear sweats to the gym.

But whatever you're most comfortable training in, wear that.
Posted by: ashe_higgs

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/06/07 01:20 AM

dude, you're in a bally's.

that's not the proper environment to be getting any kind of serious training done.

no matter what you're going to get looks for doing anything other than biceps curls.

i used to belong to bally's and i got wierd looks for doing sprints on the indoor track.

my suggestion; ditch bally's

if you need an indoor place to train your forms, look for a dance studio that will let you come in and train when they don't have a class going on. or even the y. at least people expect karate and gi's at the y.

on another note, if you're practicing your art in a public place, your basically representing that art to the public, and you should expect and welcome questions. they wouldn't ask if they weren't interested, and interested people are the ones you want to share the art with.

sure, they might ask "stupid" questions but everyone was new at one point and asked stupid questions.

bottom line, if you want privacy, don't train in a public place. (i.e. harmonize yourself with your environment).
Posted by: Ronin1966

Belts at the gym - 02/07/07 01:07 AM

Hello Borreck:

Ditch the uniform & the belt, unless you want the oggling crowd... Plain sweats attract less immediate attention... what you are doing, and where you are doing so will draw their attention soon enough...



Insist on the formal uniform then I vote white belt, won't stop the questions though "... owwwwwwww what/where do you study? My sister's nephew, cat, great grandmother studies..."


Jeff
Posted by: Ed_Morris

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/07/07 01:39 AM

here is what you can do: wear gi pants and a plain solid color Tshirt/sweatshirt with no belt. ...I call that 'Dojo Casual'. it's non-presumptuous, functional and removes all political nonsense that gets in the way of training.
Posted by: TeK9

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/07/07 01:49 AM

Lose the traditional uniform and wear sweats. Regardless of what you wear you will be doing something out of the ordinary and people will be curious. Questions will be asked, look on the bright side, you might be able to start a club. Even better make a little $$ of of it. And even better than that, meet the hunnies on the step master
Posted by: Ronin1966

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/07/07 11:57 AM

Hello Borreck:

Alternative B... [Copyrighted by me now]

Sweatpants, WHITE sweatshirt with either black/red 2" wide stipes across the arms (elbow height) ... or around the abdomen and which corresponds to your particular dan ranking

Hey, now there's a martial arts "line" that has not been done... yet! Hummmmmmngh

Jeff
Posted by: MattJ

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/07/07 01:40 PM

Quote:

If you don't care what they think and you are not in a traditional environment, why wear the gi at all?



Pfft. RANK-HATER!

Wear the gi and the black belt. Anyone gets snide, they get KTFO. REPRESENT!!!!!
Posted by: jonnyboxcutter

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/07/07 02:28 PM

Develop a look of utter contempt; use it in silence in exchange for actual conversation. Trust me people will leave you alone.

-JBC-

*Some applications may vary
Posted by: ShikataGaNai

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/07/07 02:35 PM

Yeah, don't wear anything but an ultra-serious bruce lee stare on your face (with the sweats, of course).
Is it me or does the Bally's corporation throw waaaaay too much money away on equipment that never gets used?
Posted by: jonnyboxcutter

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/07/07 02:41 PM

Like this one...


-JBC-
Posted by: ashe_higgs

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/07/07 08:16 PM

Quote:

Yeah, don't wear anything but an ultra-serious bruce lee stare on your face (with the sweats, of course).
Is it me or does the Bally's corporation throw waaaaay too much money away on equipment that never gets used?




bally's sucks period.

when i used to train there, the cleaning ladies would wipe down the equiptment while you were trying to use it. they'd have the power cord to the vacuum cleaner stretched out on the floor of the weight pit just waiting for some hapless guy to trip over, the roof leaked, half the stuff you wanted to use was always broken and the management was less than caring.

LONG LIVE CROSSFIT!
Posted by: iaibear

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/08/07 12:40 PM

The local Gold's Gym lets me practice in their aerobics room when there are no classes. Hard wood floor, high ceiling, mirrors on three walls for checking form and position, make the place like a palace.

Thing is, I practice Iaido kata complete with wide black iai obi and iaito. If I were being technically correct, I would wear a hakama and dark gi top. Talk about standing out like a sore thumb. Also the wear and tear on hakama knees is daunting. So I wear a good absorbent T-shirt, shorts and knee pads.

A serious face and a shiny 27" blade keep the questions at a minimum.

;-)
Posted by: brocksampson

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/09/07 01:33 PM

A trick I've used in the past goes like this.
Wear what you feel comfortable in.
Then wear headphones (MP3 player, small CD player, whatever)
This way you can litterally block out distractions and poeple may look, but they don't usually try to talk. It's not prcatical for every situation but sometimes a little background music for kata isn't too bad. It's funny how you can completely ignore someone and just having headphones in makes it OK.
Posted by: ShikataGaNai

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/09/07 01:52 PM

I'd say be careful who's watching you too -
Alot of guys who go to Bally's, Crunch etc. think they are getting tough by osmosis, just for hanging out there.
The last thing you want is some meathead trying to pick a fight with you because he thinks he can pwn you based on the amount of UFC he watches.
Posted by: Ronin1966

Re: Belts at the gym - 02/09/07 04:10 PM

Hello Brocksampson:

A smile when asked the questions/oggled might do the trick as well. Headphones, don't necessarily need turned on to have the identical effect I would think as well...

Jeff