DEBRIS.COMgood for a laugh, or possibly an aneurysm

From my perch on the middle treadmill, I have a clear view of the lat pulldown machine at the gym. This is the most popular strength-training machine in the room, by a factor of about 2 to 1. I’m not sure why that is, but just about everyone does a set of lat pulldowns, whereas very few people approach the bench press, possibly because it’s a lot harder to choke yourself to death with the pulldown machine.

Sometimes it seems like half the residents of this town stop by the gym to do a single set of lat pulldowns (but nothing else). If all these people had good form, tourists would think the town was inhabited by aliens — for no matter what people’s native body type would be, thin, fat, athletic, pregnant, whether they’re toddlers or wheelchair bound, they’d all have bulging biceps, rhomboids, and latissimus dorsi.

But alas, good form is not in abundant supply. If each instance of someone using the lat pulldown machine were represented by a musical note, the gym would be a a cacophony of atonal noise. Which might be an improvement over the “lite jazz” muzak playing on the stereo actually. I’ve seen people twisting, hanging, bouncing, whipsawing their torsos back and forth in an effort to simply pull the bar down. The average set of 12 reps is completed in less than 8 seconds. I think that all these people could instead go eat a piece of pie for 8 seconds for all the good this is doing them.

Please don’t misunderstand — I have nothing against pie. I just don’t treat pie as a strength-training device. Pie is not a critical element in my fitness regimen. As a general statement, I can say there is no entry on my training chart for “pastry.”