Free Willie
Not long ago, I read something that speculated jeans would soon be replaced by leggings or, “yoga pants” for men. This hasn’t happened. In fact, a quick search on the internet for men’s yoga pants returns shopping results filled with comfortable looking sweatpants. Personally, I’m glad to see that the industry has taken an apparent joke and steered it into a more realistic result.
Still, I wonder about the practicality of men in tights, so to speak. Personally, I believe men should wear tights only if; they are Olympic skiers; they scuba dive, surf in Winter; dance ballet; are Shakespearean actors, or ride horses in an English saddle.
For the sake of full disclosure, I have some experience riding horses in breeches. It’s a bit surreal, being outside in 90 degree weather, wearing a crisp white shirt, navy blue jacket and tie, and what feels like comfy pajamas between that and your boots.
I also have running tights for Winter running. They don’t get used very much because Winter running sucks. And when I do wear them I wear shorts over them. That is the proper way for men to wear tights, unless they fall into the categories listed above.
The topic comes up from time to time. It came up again at Flex Gym in VA Beach the other day. Now, Flex is one of the last black-iron gyms. Its membership consists of professional body builders, male and female, current and former pro football players, a myriad of other fit professionals, and me. They treat me just the same as everyone else and it’s like family. I can’t say enough good things about the place. I’m learning a lot. If you are close to Flex, join, if not, find the gym near you the pros use (if so inclined), because you will learn more than you can imagine.
The gym at 0530 is full of regulars. After our early morning workouts, we sit in the reception area and chat. The topic of tights came up again recently, and I realized I had forgotten to include football players in my list of acceptable tights wearers. The ladies (all IFBB Pros) said the tights are the only reason they watch football. We wondered if it was really appealing to watch a 330-pound linebacker from behind, but they assured us it was.
Another of our group pointed out that tights were more common on men in the 1970’s. This gentleman is old enough to remember and to have participated in what was arguably the decade with the gayest fashion for straight men.
He’s also lean enough to have gotten away with it. Overall, it was agreed that men can wear tights, providing they wear something over them that conceals any anatomical dimensions that should only be shared with close friends.
There is a wonderful degree of irony in what happened to me soon after.
I lift in the mornings and do my level best to get some sort of cardio after work. Most often I go to 9Round near my house because it’s the equivalent of running a vigorous 5K without having to run or even be outdoors. For this, I keep a gym bag in my truck with what I need for the workout. It contains some compression wear and loose technical shorts and shirt, wraps, socks, etc.
This day, I forgot my loose shorts. I hadn’t been to 9Round in a while, so I was looking forward to the workout. I started to get back into street clothes but stopped and debated the risks of just wearing my compression shorts. My loose shirt was long, but not long enough. I noticed the gym was full of younger women who wore yoga pants and, without sounding too creepy, they had every right to wear them. A 200+ pound middle aged man has no such right. But, I knew I wouldn’t come back if I went home to change so I decided to acknowledge my mistake to anyone who would listen and soldier on.
I told Jeff, the owner/trainer my dilemma after coming out and he only chuckled, as if it happens all the time. The good thing about 9Round is you are focused on your station, and have little time to notice what anyone else is wearing. Still, I wanted to make a point that I hadn’t dressed this way intentionally.
Of course, this day would be when new prospective members would come in to try the program. A couple of them decided to sit and watch for a while before joining in. I’ve never seen this happen. I’m not sure if they were waiting for me to finish and leave or if they were debating the dress code. I will say, most everyone left before me, but I think they had finished. It’s possible, I suppose, that I caused them to leave rather than stand about and chat, but I have no causal evidence to support my hypothesis, and I’m not going to it again just for the sake of science.
In the end no one seemed to treat me any differently and I had to make no excuses. I’m a bit proud that I weathered the embarrassment and did not let it affect my workout. I have longer and newer compression shorts in black, and I wish I had those instead of my ratty old gray ones, but it’s not like this was planned.
As for the physical feeling of wearing these for my workout, it was quite comfortable. There was less binding because the over shorts were not there, and my nethers stayed cooler than normal. If I were fit enough to get away with wearing only compression wear, and it was more socially acceptable, I’d do it. Not sure I’d go full-on yoga pants unless I frequented Starbucks, but overall these don’t have to always be under all.
