What a photo shoot with three clients taught me about gym culture: the one thing you can’t buy, copy or fake.
The shoot: three different bodies, three different lives, one standard
Last week, we did a photo shoot with three of our clients.
None of them are bodybuilders in the sense that they want to compete.
They come from completely different walks of life: Dean is a software sales manager, Krishna is an MD, and Kebra is a musician.
But in another sense, they are bodybuilders.
They built and changed their bodies.
The idea: your best physique isn’t somebody else’s physique
One of the mistakes people make in fitness is trying to build someone else’s body.
Your structure is your structure.
The goal is to maximize what YOU have, not chase some imaginary physique you think you’re supposed to have.
Our job as coaches isn’t to turn Dean into Krishna or Krishna into Kebra.
It’s to figure out what your best looks like, and then build it.
The photo shoot reinforced that for me.
But something else happened that day that I enjoyed even more than the pictures.
The guys and I had a blast.
They encouraged each other, they goofed around. They helped each other with poses.
When one guy looked great, the other two were genuinely excited for him.
There was no competition about who had the biggest arms or who was the leanest. (It was me anyways)
It was simply three guys who had worked incredibly hard enjoying the results together.
The culture
We work, have responsibilities and deal with stress. Everything becomes serious.
Sometimes you need an afternoon where you work hard, laugh at yourself, take some ridiculous pictures and enjoy what you’ve accomplished.
And standing there watching them, I realized two things.
First, adult life gives us far too little time to play.
And second:
This is the gym we’ve been trying to build here all along.
Of course I want exceptional equipment and the best coaching.
And yes, results matter enormously to me.
But there’s something else we’ve built here that’s much harder to manufacture, and almost impossible to copy:
Culture.
People from completely different walks of life come through our doors: executives, doctors, musicians, entrepreneurs and professionals.
They have different personalities, different bodies and different goals.
But when they’re here, they’re part of the same environment.
They work hard. They support each other. They get results.
And when somebody succeeds, people notice.
Sure, you can buy the same machines we have. You can copy workouts. But you can’t copy culture.
Maik Wiedenbach
After nearly two decades of coaching in New York, I don’t know another gym in the city or anywhere that has quite what we’ve built here. (And yes, the machines are pretty special too.)
These photos show three impressive physiques, and that’s great.
But to me, they show something bigger.
Three different guys.
Three different versions of what success looks like.
And one gym that helped bring them together.
Ready to find out what your best looks like?
Come train with us, and be part of a gym culture built on hard work and real results.
— Maik
Maik Wiedenbach is a Hall of Fame swimmer turned bodybuilding champion and fitness model featured in Muscle & Fitness and Men’s Journal. An NYU adjunct professor and award-winning coach, he founded New York’s most sought-after personal training gym.