Editor’s Note: Each week in “Apparently This Matters,” CNN’s Jarrett Bellini applies his warped sensibilities to trending topics in social media and random items of interest on the Web.
Story highlights
In Moscow, metro riders can trade 30 squats for a free ticket
Machine registers their movements
If they don't do all 30, they have to pay up
The ticket would cost the equivalent of about 92 cents
Just did some power lunges. Quads getting huge. Can only speak in fragments. Because my quads are so huge.
Quads. Huge.
Admit it. Your favorite part of working out is actually telling people that you just worked out, especially when you can filter this information into a completely unrelated conversation.
“Dude, earlier today I swear I saw a pigeon eating a pigeon. It was insane. Happened right when I got out of the gym … that’s where I exercise. My muscles.”
Deep down, for some reason, you just want people to know that your morning was spent inside a weight room, sweating, as opposed to, say, inside a bathroom, thumbing through an old Garfield book.
Of course, some people don’t even try to be coy about their workout brags. Instead, they flat out share their stats and results with the world via social media. And it’s the worst.
“Just biked 70 miles. Time for a beer. LOL.”
This is unacceptable behavior, and it needs to stop. I would do something about it, myself, but I’ve got a big run coming up.
“Twenty miles. LOL.”
Just kidding. I don’t run. It requires pants.
However, in Moscow, there’s a perfectly good reason for working out in public and letting everyone know without having to be one of those people. Because at the Vystavochnaya subway station, riders can now perform 30 squats in exchange for a free metro ticket.
It’s all a part of a promotion for the upcoming Winter Olympics in Sochi, and the Russian Olympic Committee is hoping to “add elements of sport into daily life.”
Though, to be fair, this was accomplished many years ago when the two-piece track suit legally became the country’s official outfit for business casual.
To earn the free metro ticket, which costs about $0.92 American, commuters have two minutes to complete their squats in front of the ticket machine’s special counting camera. But you have to do all 30. No fewer.
Otherwise, a bear crawls out of the machine and mauls you. In Mother Russia, failure has consequences.
But, really, if you fail to do all 30, you just have to pay for your ticket. There’s no reward for participation.
And squats are no easy task.
Right now I’m in week four of the Insanity home workout program – see how I slipped that in there? – and it’s basically 40 minutes of squats, broken up by short moments of lashing out with profanities toward Shaun T and Tania.
I cry during the 30-second rest breaks, and check my e-mail during Level 1 drills. Because ain’t nobody got time for that.
The point is that squats are hard, and the following activities may prove to be far more satisfying:
1) Sleeping
2) Eating
3) Being trapped in a car fire
Regardless, the squat machine in Moscow will remain at the station until the beginning of December, and the Olympic Committee is planning more chances for people to get fit in public with exercise bikes that charge your phone and bus handles converted into stretchy exercise bands.
So, remember Russians, drink your recovery fluid and log onto Team BeachBody dot com.
And good luck with that bear.
Follow @JarrettBellini on Twitter.