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When I first walked into a gym 11 years ago, all 125 pounds of me clinging to a scrawny 5'6'' frame, I was bewildered. “Isolateral plate loaded row?” “Angled leg press?” “Kettle bell?”
Have you ever had one of those funny moments where everybody is speaking English, but you have no idea what they are saying?
Today, at a much more muscular 210 pounds (although, alas, still 5'6''...sigh), I can say that I now know my way around a gym, but the fact remains that they can be a little overwhelming. They need to serve a diverse population of people, each with a different goal. The result is a virtual carnival of pig iron and beeping machines that together looks vaguely UFO-esque.
When it comes to the bare essentials of gym equipment, IFBB Professional Bodybuilder Colette Nelson, with the titles of Miss World and Miss North America in her cornucopia of honors and certifications, narrows it down to just three apparatuses, the same three she has used since she first picked up a weight at age 14.
“You need to have a rack of dumbbells, squat rack, and bench press,” Nelson advises. “You basically can work every muscle – from squats, standing shoulder press, lunges and barbell curls – with the squat rack. With the bench press you can work your chest and your triceps and use the bench for crunches. [And] a set of dumbbells offers a wide array of exercises. I could get everything done if I had those three pieces of equipment.”
New York City-based professional trainer Louis Edward, ACE, NASM, agrees, and adds the chin-up bar for good measure. “These are all the fundamentals. We get too fancy with the machines these days.”
To look at Nelson, who favors dumbbells in her workouts, and Edward, who goes for the squat rack, is to see two entirely different kinds of “fit.” Edward is sweepingly aerodynamic in line and form; he looks permanently poised to fly. The titanic Nelson, conversely, could take down charging rhinos as a hobby. Yet, both use exactly the same equipment, often with exactly the same maneuvers. With a few tweaks.
With gym equipment, the secret is not what it is, but how it is used. “Squat, deadlift, bench press, shoulder press, clean-and-press. That’s it,” Edward says, rattling off what amounts to a royal flush of exercises. “You want to use as many big and large movements as you can, the multi-joint movements.”
The magic is in the maneuver. The general rule of thumb is as follows: A light weight lifted, curled, squatted or pressed, many times results in the lean musculature Edward displays. If the same equipment is used but at a much heavier weight and manipulated only a few times, the Olympian figure of Nelson emerges. Use it all correctly and you get whatever physique you aim for.
That’s all the magic there is.
There are a few supplementals, of course. Diet. Dedication. Doing what your trainer or regime tells you, and not buying the hype or insecurities a late-night infomercial sells you. Knowing from the get-go that no matter how simplified Nelson and Edward make it, getting the body of your dreams is never a walk in the park
But if, like me, you still get carded at bars at age 38, talk about a pay off.