It’s not a gym in the conventional sense where the emphasis is on developing bulging biceps, six-pack abs and sculpted bodies like Mr. Universe’s contestants. But one where grey cells are used as much as brawn in building a flexible Tarzan-like physique.
Welcome to the newly-opened Reebok’s CrossFit Robust at Kotla Mubarakpur where one is greeted by the personal instructor-cum-proprietor and a well toned trainer. But what’s a gym without treadmills equipped with high velocity speed and attached with a mid-sized screen guaranteeing uninterrupted entertainment as one huffs, puffs and sweats on the modern man’s ultimate machine? Even the mandatory innovative machines for building an Arnold Schwarzenegger-like chest, equipment similar to the one Sylvester Stallone uses for squat training, triceps and biceps building, are strangely absent here. This gym has devised a series of exercises which, it is claimed, if done on a regular basis, will help develop a physique similar to the one Edward Rice Burroughs had imagined while introducing his iconic character in “Tarzan of the Apes”. So it has stretching exercises which are akin to what primates do while jumping from one branch to another.
The new methodology to sculpt one’s body with free weights is the philosophy practised here. Building strength, coordination from head to toe, speed and endurance is the mantra.
Instead of a gym with high workout machines and jazzy equipment which every bodybuilder aspires to have at home, this one is well-stocked with a range of dumbbells, weights in pounds all procured from the U.S.
Customers are, apparently, made to follow the imagined physical routine of the Palaeolithic men, who relied on their sheer brute strength and caveman’s instincts to track and hunt their prey. “High intensity action was followed only while the shikar was on. So here we make our clientele do high intensity workout, but only for a stipulated period. Instead of a monotonous routine as in normal gyms, here we make our clientele do new exercises which make them understand their body. And we recommend a high protein diet, including everything like beef, chicken, eggs with yolk and of course plenty of green veggies like broccoli and spinach. Grain has to be absent from one’s daily intake,” says Kamal Chhikara, co-founder of this gym, who earlier partnered Indian skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni in running a gym in Delhi.
