NAked Warrior - ZANDERBILT

I R O N E S S A Y S
“The schedule says 220—NOT 225!” Ken is yelling and suddenly
with snake strike quickness, he grabs Mic by the hair and spins him
around like a rag doll into a neck-wrenching headlock. Mic whelps
in pain, protestation and embarrassment and with 60 gym members
watching, Ken wrangles Mic to the front door and flings him outside
into a snow bank. Ken walks back inside and locks the front door.
Mic ended up walking home that day in gym clothes.
Ken was “client selective” and refused to allow “normal people” to train at his facility.
“The Muscle Factory was more of a private club than a gym for civilians off the street. “All
I need is to rough up some vicious lawyer who causes me to go off. Then I get my ass sued
and lose the gym. All on account of way back when, in a moment of weakness, I took 300
bucks in cash.” He looked at me with a look that said this man knew that of which he
spoke. I shrugged my shoulders and said, “Well you weren’t weak-minded today.” As he
was about to respond, a weird sound started coming from the left rear section of the gym.
It sounded like someone was torturing a cat. Ken moaned. “Oh Jesus— this is all I need—
Brucie! Knock it off!” I turned and saw that the high pitched squealing was coming from
an oversized goon doing triceps pushdowns. He was wearing a cassette music player with
headphones and singing at the top of his lungs. Singing would be a stretch; it was more like
Neil Young being subjected to some hideous torture involving water, 220 volt raw electrical
power and a blowtorch.
He was oblivious, lost in the endorphin rush of the pushdowns. He couldn’t hear because
music was blasting through his headphones. Ken turned back to me, “So, anyway, I am
looking to enter the APF National Championships in July. I think I got a good shot at a 950
squat. My bench press training….” The singer/squealer cranked his vocal volume up a
notch, “Jeeeeezus God! Shut the hell up Bruce!” Fantano was standing up now and his face
had turned beet red.
“It’s the chorus from Hey Jude.” I said.
“WHAT?!” Ken yelled at me; he looked flustered.
“The chorus from Hey Jude—Naaah nah nah na na na nah! Nah na na nah! Hey Jude!”
“WHAT THE HELL!” Bruce was repping the entire stack with all his might and singing
with all his might at a volume that could only be matched by a Marshall amp stack set at
10. Ken spun around to the product shelf behind the counter, looking, looking, looking…until
he found what he was looking for. He wanted a throwing implement, a projectile.
For the first time I noted he was left handed. He ripped a two pound canister of pro-
For complete information on Marty Gallagher’s The Purposeful Primitive, or to
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