Outclassed at the Gym

Wait 'till he finds out this is just the pre-workout!

A usually comedic scene where an Athletically Challenged, unfit, or even just averagely fit person exercises alongside someone who is very in shape and is predictably outdone by a country mile. They can't lift as much weight, they can't run as far as fast, and their body isn't as toned. As a result, they feel Pathetically Weak or at least insecure about their fitness level and appearance and unfavorably compare themselves to the other character. If the other person is their rival, whether in love or some other conflict, these feelings of inadequacy might be heightened — fitness is just another way the other character is Always Someone Better.

Due to the association of physicality and musculature with masculinity, male-male examples might involve additional feelings of emasculation (i.e. they're not as strong/sculpted, and are thus less of a 'man'). However, it can also be applied to female characters, especially (due to Men Are Strong, Women Are Pretty) with exercises that show off the body like yoga or pole dancing.

Despite the name, this isn't restricted to gyms: it can take place anywhere people can improve their fitness, such as a lap pool, a hike, or a pilates class. It doesn't have to be one person feeling embarrassed next to another person, either: it can be The Runt at the End of an extremely fit group, or an entire group getting showed up by the Opposing Sports Team. What matters is the difference in apparent fitness and the feelings that arise as a result.

A subversion is for a buff character to think a less fit-looking character is a weakling, only to be proven totally wrong.

Might be part of a Comically Lopsided Rivalry, especially if the difference between the two is extremely pronounced (e.g. a jacked Fitness Nut vs. a skinny and unathletic Stereotypical Nerd); or Gym Class Hell. Regardless of fitness level, this scene might still be a source of Workout Fanservice.

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Examples:

Anime and Manga

• Mob Psycho 100: When Mob joins the body improvement club at his school, the members of the club are actually extremely supportive of Mob despite his lack of physical ability, since joining the club to improve ones self is the main point of the club. When Mob managed to do ten push ups, the entire group cheered for him. Overall it carries the Aesop that people who want to improve themselves physically shouldn't be mocked for where they start out, and should actively be encouraged by those around them, since wanting to improve ones self is never a bad thing.
• Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out!: One chapter/episode follows Uzaki's younger brother Kiri, who tries to invoke this when he goes to the gym where his dad works and sees it's full of old people and tries to show off in front of them. He ends up on the receiving end when he gets outclassed by a muscular older man doing bench press, and an old lady on the threadmill. The worst part comes when he tries to "challenge" Sakurai (who doesn't even notice) to a swimming race at the pool and gets overtaken him no less than six times.

Films — Live-Action

• Captain America: The Winter Soldier opens with Steve running laps around Sam during a morning jog. Sam is in good shape, but Steve "Captain America" Rogers is a hunky "specimen" in peak physical condition. At the end of it Sam is absolutely knackered while Steve is only a little out of breath, and the two banter about it.
• Father of the Bride (1991): When George Banks starts having a mid-life crisis over becoming a grandfather in Part II he goes to the gym to try and prove he's still young, whilst he's surrounded by buff men and women working out a gym assistant has to stop him using a rather small set of barbells with the suggestion of "You better take it easy there, Pops".
• I Want You Back: As part of his pact with Emma to sabotage their exes' new relationships, the schlubby everyman Peter signs up to exercise at the gym where Emma's ex Noah works as a trainer. Peter immediately notes how much hunkier and how much more handsome Noah is compared to him.
• Pitch Perfect: The acapella group's Training Montage includes cardio, which Fat Amy immediately tries to get out of. During the scene where the girls are running around the practice room, Aubrey notices that Fat Amy is hiding in the seats. The latter claims she's doing 'horizontal running'.

Literature

• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: In Big Shot, Greg goes to the gym with his father to get fit. When he can't figure out the normal exercise machines, he goes to the bodybuilding area and notices all the tough weightlifters. Believing this will speed up the process, Greg tries haplessly to lift some heavy weights. When trying to remove weights to make it easier, he takes everything off one side, resulting in a loud clang that disrupts everyone and gets him and his father kicked out of the gym.

Live-Action TV

• Beef: In the second episode, Danny strains trying to benchpress a certain weight. His more fuckboyish younger brother Paul gets under it and starts lifting it with no problem.
• In The Big Bang Theory (S6 E21) Leonard tries to impress a university administrator into getting tenure by going to the gym and working out with her. It is quickly apparent that he is unsuited to training and he is mocked by Barry◊, a rival for the job. Eventually Leonard collapses to the ground exhausted◊ while the others train calmly
• Crazy Ex-Girlfriend: In "Josh's Girlfriend is Really Cool!", Rebecca, an average woman, tries to suss out her ex's girlfriend Valencia at the latter's yoga class. As a newcomer to yoga, Rebecca feels insecure about how much better everyone in the class is and is intimidated by the flexible, toned, and conventionally beautiful Valencia. Played for Laughs when Rebecca extrapolates, thinking that Valencia is not only physically superior to her, but also superior in every other way, such as not sharing Rebecca's weird fear of clowns and trains.
• Friends (S1 E21): Monica goes to a dance class with Rachel and Phoebe to find the woman who stole her credit card. During the lesson Monica discovers that she is the most unsuitable◊.
• House of Anubis: Happens on a group scale when Anubis House is preparing for the dodgeball tournament. Their rival house, Isis House, is demonstrated to be not only incredibly unified but also far more athletically capable than Anubis House, who happens to rank last in every single sports tournament. Simply watching them do their group exercises demoralizes the Anubis students, while Willow acknowledges that when she lived there, their motto was "win or die trying". This inferiority gets worse when Ben notices Eddie's efforts to coach his team and attempts to offer advice, which Eddie stubbornly shoots down.
• Jane the Virgin: In "Chapter Forty-Nine", Rafael and Michael go to the gym together. Rafael is conspicuously more muscular than Michael, and wearing a far more revealing shirt, showing all his arms, shoulders, and much of his chest, in contrast with Michael's normal, modest t-shirt. Rafael also makes flirtatious eye contact with a woman while lifting weights. Michael thinks Rafael is vain and slutty. Rafael thinks Michael is judgey. At the end of the episode, though, the men reach out and make amends.
  Michael: And I'm sorry for getting insecure about your muscles.
  Rafael: [beat] I had cancer. That's why I'm so focused now. I like controlling my health.
• Physical: Sheila invites her Fat Best Friend Greta to her aerobics class. The beginner Greta finds it humiliating and difficult to follow along with the trim, experienced students and leaves on the verge of tears. Sheila picks up on this insecurity, and offers to teach Greta at home. This is the beginning of her plan to start a line of aerobics home videos, because she realizes that a lot of women can't or won't go to classes or the gym.
• The Wire: After the first batch of kids at Dennis' boxing gym start getting cocky about their abilities, he deliberately organizes a sparring bout for them with some younger, but well-trained boxers from another gym to knock them down a peg. But despite being outclassed, Justin shows commitment by standing for the full round.

Webcomics

• Kevin & Kell: In a January 1999 strip, the titular characters have gone to a fitness club where an alligator walks up to them to try and win Kell over, telling her to ditch "that weakling rabbit" and come with him... only to suddenly change his mind and run off. In the last panel, it's revealed he ran off because he realized he'd underestimated Kevin, who'd proven his strength by lifting a massive barbell with only his ears.
• Manly Guys Doing Manly Things: When Jared decides to work out for the first time, he goes straight to the Commander, a "300lb juggernaut" Super-Soldier, for tips. He gets some sound advice on setting reasonable expectations and avoiding Testosterone Poisoning, even though their weightlifting routines are a few orders of magnitude apart.
  Jared: How much do these weigh? I want a frame of reference for how feeble I am.
  Commander: Don' worry about what I'm doin', worry about what yer doin'.
• Mob Psycho 100 has a wholesome variation. Out of a desire to make something of himself the skinny introvert Mob joins the Body Improvement Club, a group of incredibly muscular jocks, and is initially the runt at the end of the litter in all their exercise routines. The Body Improvement Club adores Mob and is nothing but supportive of his attempts to improve his fitness.
• One-Punch Man: Subverted. The Hero Association application process includes multiple physical exams to test physical abilities. Saitama is ridiculed by the bigger and buffer other applicants for his relatively lean musculature. However, Saitama uses his insane strength to shatter every test record by insane margins. The other applicants quit on the spot.
• Sleepless Domain:
  • In a guest comic, magical girl and Fitness Nut Heartful Punch tries to star in a TV workout series, but her workout regimen proves to be too intense for her fellow magical girls to keep up with — by the end of the program, both of her co-stars have collapsed on the floor.
    Heartful Punch: Oh, sorry! I just assumed you two were, y'know, fit.
  • Later on, Undine attempts to join her at the Magical Girl Power Training Club but quickly grows frustrated with her lack of progress compared to the others. Still, Heartful Punch offers some encouragement and reminds Undine not to push herself too hard, especially since she's just starting out.

Western Animation

• Family Guy:
  • The show's first Cutaway Gag takes place in a German gym, with a scrawny Adolf Hitler struggling to lift small barbells, and then he notices a very muscular stereotypical Jewish man with A Lady on Each Arm, resulting in Hitler growling in envy.
  • In "Believe It or Not, Joe's Walking on Air", Joe recovers his mobility after a leg transplant and forces Peter, Cleveland, and Quagmire to partake in extreme exercises they cannot handle, such as rock climbing, karate and dancing to a Judy Garland song. He eventually grows annoyed by the gang's lack of fitness and abandons them for a new group of friends.
• The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy: In "Runaway Pants", the students at Billy's school are forced to take part in a fitness test. Irwin and Nergal Jr. excel at the exams; the former because he had gotten ridiculously ripped in preparation for the test, and the latter because he is a shapeshifter who can get hypertrophied muscles on demand. In contrast, Billy is in such poor shape he can't even perform a single sit-up. After being told he is the worst performing student so far, Billy tries to cheat during the race, by having Nergal Jr. transform into shorts that can do the running for him.
• Looney Tunes: In "Muscle Tussle", a bodybuilder runs away with Daffy Duck's girlfriend, and a Snake Oil Salesman fools him into taking a concoction named Atomcol (10% pure tap water, 90% hot mustard) that supposedly gives him super strength. Filled with fake confidence, Daffy dares the bodybuilder to a series of strength demonstrations, such as bending a pipe around a pole, smashing a rock with a hammer, or chewing an iron chain, all of which Daffy fails spectacularly. Daffy gets his, however, when he lifts the fake 5,000-pound weight (actually painted balloons) the salesman tricked him with. The bodybuilder tries to lift them, but lifts so hard he launches himself up in the air, landing so hard he ends up squashed down to half his height. ("Y'all can call me Shorty.")
• South Park: In "Up the Down Steroid", Cartman pretends to have a mental disability in order to participate in the Special Olympics. However, he is so out-of-shape that the other contestants effortlessly beat him in all competitions. He is infuriated to come in last place, though his mood improves when he is given a consolation award of 50 dollars.
• SpongeBob SquarePants:
  • In "Ripped Pants", Larry and Sandy perform impressive weightlifting feats, while SpongeBob struggles to lift a stick with two marshmallows on its sides. The strain causes him to accidentally rip his pants, and although he is mortified at first, he comes to embrace the crowd's laughter. For the rest of the episode, SpongeBob keeps purposefully ripping his pants while failing to keep up with Larry and Sandy's athletic achievements, eventually alienating observers due to the sheer saturation of the joke.
  • In "MuscleBob BuffPants", SpongeBob fails to keep up with Sandy's intense training routine and resorts to buying a pair of fake inflatable arms to make himself look buff. This backfires horribly when Sandy becomes so impressed by his new physique she registers him in an anchor tossing competition, where he fails to lift his anchor and is exposed as a fraud once his rubber arms pop.
• Teen Titans (2003): In "Overdrive", Cyborg works out by lifting lots of weights, and is frustrated to see that Starfire is lifting much more than him with only one arm.

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