10 Types of Gym Stereotypes

4 min read

The gym attracts all sorts of people; a lot of them interesting, weird, or completely something else. With these clusters of fitness enthusiasts, it’s always interesting to take a pause and consider the types of people around you (and, perhaps, even think of which kind you personally are).

Here are just ten of the types of people we see exercising around us.

The “Coach”

Who doesn’t want to be a coach? You’re a wealth of wisdom and knowledge, plus you have important information to bestow onto others. However, that doesn’t mean everyone wants to hear what you have to say.

When working out, typically you can recognize a “coach” when they interrupt your session unasked and start giving you tips and advice on how you can do the workout better.

The “Hype Man”

I’m personally conflicted about hype men, because I view them as an acceptable evil. On the one hand, they’re motivating someone to reach their full potential, but on the other hand they can be a distraction to other people. If you know yourself to be a hype man, or you have such a person by your corner, do everyone a favor and dial it down a level or two: hype men should hype the person in their immediate area, not the entire gym.

The “Grunter”

Every gym has one of these, and anyone who’s been frequenting a single gym for long enough know their grunter.

With that said, unlike hype men, who can be an acceptable presence when done in modesty, grunting never is. Unless you’re in the middle of a competition, I don’t care what your reason is, you don’t need to be exerting yourself so loudly that a person has to put on headphones to drown you out.

The “Newbie”

It’s not always easy to pick out a newbie. They won’t necessarily be the person who’s underweight/overweight and, similarly, they aren’t immediately the person who is executing an exercise wrong.

However, newbies tend to: loiter a lot, watch or mimic others, appear uneasy or hesitant, get intimidated, ask a lot of questions, or have a coach type around them. Any of these alone, or coupled together, can hint to a newbie.

The “Pro”

Unlike newbies, you can spot this person simply from the way s/he looks. This individual has spent years chiseling her/his body and it’s apparent.

These types of bodies don’t form overnight, and the accumulation of dedication and experience elevates them to the status of “pros”. Whether or not you agree with their methods and/or ways (or the obnoxious personality that might’ve developed from all the hard work), the effective years put into sculpting their bodies means they’re doing something right.

The “Fashionista”

This is the person who prioritizes their looks when going to the gym. They need to look a certain way and maintain the appearance throughout their session. Because of this they’re quite easy to pinpoint; just look for the person who’s dressed to impress.

The “Creep”

These guys (and they’re usually men, ladies are a lot more subtle!) create an uncomfortable environment for everyone. Creeps come in all sorts of forms, therefore it’s not necessarily easy to single them out. Sometimes the least suspecting person in the gym is a creep, and only a conversation with said person will reveal this.

The “Crew”

This is not one person but a group. These people never come to the gym alone, and range from anywhere between three to six people that turn up together. Inevitably, you get to learn their faces simply because they’re always together and their numbers make them stand out.

The “Crew” types go on to dominate machines and weights as they swap among themselves or do supersets. These people are the second most annoying types of people you’ll find at a gym on this list.

The “Fitness Junkie”

These guys are out there doing exercises that you’ve either never seen before, or ones no one else in the building is doing. Chances are, they might even have a device monitoring their heart rate.

CrossFitters, ya’ll fall into this category. Don’t @ me.

The “Equipment Hog”

I dislike this type of person with every fiber of my being. Other than creeps, I can’t imagine a more annoying group of people. I don’t know if it’s out of a depraved sense of entitlement or if they really do believe that the sun rises from their asses, but “hoggers” need to go.