Spending as much time in commercial gyms as I have over the last few years you see an awful lot of strange behaviour. Monday's are always my favourite with the bench press. Normally you'll find a bunch of guys spending 25 minutes watching MTV on the monitors then getting in two sets of 10 bench presses, grunting and heaving more weight than they can handle. The strange part of this is that it happens EVERY monday, without fail! There must be at least 6 guys on the one bench press spending a massive amount of time simply waiting to get on the machine...

I also find January, April and May an interesting time of year. The gym is full to bursting with people queuing to get on the cross trainers, treadmills and exercise bikes. Normally you'll have girls (and guys) milling about, maybe doing a set of crunches from time to time whilst they are waiting.

If you spend 90 minutes in the gym 3 times a week, but spend half of that hanging about waiting for "your" machine, just imagine what you could acomplish if you spent that waiting time doing some productive exercises.

Why does this happen?

Is it a lack of imagination?

Or a lack of knowledge?

I feel the gym "culture" has become less about what you are doing or achieving, but what you are SEEN to be doing or achieving. Don't get me wrong, all credit to you guys who go to the guy in the first place, but would it not make sense to educate yourself a little more to get the maximum from your time there, rather than following what everyone else is doing. Admit it, you don't really want to be in the gym any longer than absolutely necessary!

There is not really a lack of knowledge out there. You'll find there are more books, magazines, training programs, exercise manuals than you could read in a lifetime!

The real secret is picking up on one thing and give it a go. And I don't mean swap from one program to another on a weekly basis, really give the program you are on a proper go. Most of the books, manuals etc actually have a good grounding and do work very well but only if you follow through the whole program.

You'll also find that most of the programs have a more diverse range of exercises than bench pressing and spending hours on a treadmill!

I think that lack of imagination is not the issue here, it is the lack of a plan. We have been forced to believe that we must do certain things in the gym. Most of what we do is without a method or a plan.

So the solution is not so difficult, it does require an investment in time to do some reading, and even a little money to explore some of the books and online programs that are out there to get you going. Even a bad plan is better than no plan at all, within a few weeks you'll discover what is working for you.

Just a little hint though when you come across a plan that starts Monday morning with Bench Presses, steer well clear of these! Also if the plan requires you to spend hours on the treadmill or cross trainer, you may be better served spending a little more time investigating a better program.

They are out there!