Things I Miss About America, Part V: People Exercising in Excericse Clothes

When I got here, I joined a women's-only gym because it was the closest one to my house. Right away, I noticed that women there didn't really work out in what I would consider "workout clothes". Here's why-


My average workout-wear:

athletic shorts

t-shirt

sports bra (sometimes multiple)

socks

sporty tennis shoes


British woman's average workout-wear:

sweatpants

a shirt that I would wear to go clubbing in or, sometimes, a short-sleeved polo

normal bra (ouch!!)

socks

non-sporty tennis shoes (think bright-green pumas or the like)


The difference I noticed right away was the lack of sports bras. Not that I was looking, but its kind of hard not to notice when you're the only one running on a string of 10 treadmills in proper undergarments. Slowly, it became apparent that it wasn't just the sports bras that were missing. Why is the girl next to me on the elliptical in a sequin tube top?? At first, I thought it was just my women's-only gym. Maybe 40 year-old Bangladeshi women don't realize that you can buy sports bras? But girls my age in the gym were wearing odd clothing as well. Also, at lunch time in the park, I noticed people running in what appeared to be just slight alterations to their office-clothing.

After talking to bobby, I found that this odd-workout clothing phenomenon applies to men as well. I have no explanation for it. You can buy workout clothes here. Just like in the states, there are whole stores dedicated to that very subject, but people seem to ignore them.

*note, as in the majority of my blogs on cultural differences, this does not apply to all british women. I am, flagrantly, making generalizations about an entire culture. Some women do wear sports bras and work out in t-shirts instead of a see-through tank-top, but I would say it's about 50/50*