Judgment Day at Siegel Center

College comes with many wonderful things-such as meal plans, friends over the age of 21 to buy you beer and a gym membership.

However, it seems that everyone gets caught up in the bliss of the first two items on the list and completely forgets about going to workout until the extra 20 pounds of “college weight” sets in.

I really enjoy going to the gym-sometimes. The days of the old Cary Street Gym are long gone and working out at the Siegel Center is like playing with the big kids on the playground-who play a lot harder and faster. I used to call Cary Street Gym “The People’s Gym.” While it was a little worse for the wear and the exercise room was small, there was no one lavishly making a big deal of lifting 800 pounds on the bench press or giving dirty looks because someone is lifting only 30 pounds.

In fact, there were usually only a few people working out at one time, so Cary Street was kind of like one’s own personal room full of treadmills, ellipticals and helpful VCU RecSports employees.

Siegel Center, or the “Pretty People Gym,” is home of the “bros.” The “bros” -when not drinking Heineken and listening to Jack Johnson-spend their time indirectly intimidating everyone else by being more fit and strong than the rest of us.

I go to the gym pretty often, or at least I did during the summer when I still had a life, and I was unnerved a couple of times. It is a vibe that cannot be directly explained, but it is just an uneasy feeling, like one doesn’t belong among all these Olympic athletes. Both girls and guys that I know have expressed this feeling, which is great, because I just thought I was going a little insane.

So, here is my solution: when you see somebody looking at you, walk up to them and politely ask if you can help and if they like what they see because they are blatantly staring. After this, walk away.

This way, people will not stare so much anymore-except for when they whisper about how weird you are as you walk away.

Or, if that doesn’t work, just go workout on the MCV campus.