I found the best place to meet women, and I'm so excited to share it with you today. If you're a man who's been struggling, fitness classes are by far the best way to meet women. And the best part while I'm sharing this: I literally met a woman today at a Hot Power Flow yoga class and have a date set up with her on Thursday that I'm really excited about. I don't see how I could be much more excited about her, and she seems to be very excited about me as well. I'll tell you exactly all the details of how to go to a fitness class and meet a woman, and I'll explain why a lot of these other places rank where they do: co-ed sports can certainly be good, run clubs can be nice, bars really suck, and dating apps are one of the worst places to actually meet a woman, especially considering how much time you put in.
The First Criteria: Would I Go There Anyway?
The first criteria I have for a place to go to meet women is: do I really want to go there, and is it good for me to go there even if I don't meet a woman? That's why the top ones are fitness classes, co-ed sports, and, to a degree, run clubs. It's good for me to go there without needing to meet a woman. That's the bottom line. You want to be in places that are good for you personally, where the right kind of woman is then likely to be there for you too.
Now, if you're a woman wondering where to meet guys, fitness classes and co-ed sports are certainly great places to do that as well. It can actually be pretty easy for women to meet guys on dating apps, but it's usually going to be a big waste of time and a lot of frustration. I'll talk more about that in a little bit.
What do I mean by fitness classes? Yoga, especially an active one. I go to these drenched-in-sweat, hard power flow yoga classes, and those are classes where you generally see people who are in shape and strong showing up.
The Sneaky Reason Fitness Classes Work So Well
Here's what's kind of sneaky about why fitness classes are a great place to meet women. Women have the chance, when I'm at a fitness class, to see how strong I am and to see what kind of capabilities I have as a man. That is often the thing that will really make it easy for a woman to feel that romantic spark and get turned on. Co-ed sports are also a good way to do that. Run clubs, not quite as much. Bars totally suck for it. And dating apps just promote total superficiality, with so many men on dating apps compared to women. What you really want, to get a woman to see that you're attractive, is to be able to show physical strength.
A lot of guys try to optimize for this by getting huge muscles. But there are a lot of different kinds of strength, and some women are very sensitive to all the different ways a man can be strong. A lot of guys just think in terms of pure bulk, but there are women I've met who think in terms of flexibility. They comment when they see me at a yoga class: "Wow, you are so flexible. Are you an athlete?" When women see a man who's fantastically flexible, who can do all these poses and has really open hips, that turns some women on a lot. It's like, wow, look how strong this man is. Whereas if I'm just on a dating app, it's hard to show that. I've done pictures at a yoga studio, and you can try to show it off that way, but a fitness class is the best way for a woman to actually see that this guy is strong.
This matters especially if you're more on the lean side like me. I have a lot of strength, especially in my legs — I can sprint all over the tennis courts — but in just normal everyday life, you're going to have a hard time seeing what a strong man I am physically, because I don't have a bunch of bulk. That's why fitness classes are one of the best places to meet women, and I consistently run into women there, especially when I bring the right attitude in, as I talked about in my recent video. That's very important: you can go to a ton of fitness classes and never meet a woman if you're coming in with the wrong attitude. But as I showed in my recent video about how I invite a woman to approach me without saying a word, having that running in the background and coming in with that kind of energy is extremely important to make this work — along with listening, paying attention, and being present.
Picking Your Position in the Room
Here's the basic method that makes an approach or a connection in a fitness class so successful. I walk into the fitness class and I pay very close attention to everybody — men and women. A fitness class where you're in a fixed position can be really nice, but the most important thing is to pick the right position to get in. If you put yourself off in the corner next to three dudes, it's going to be much more difficult and you're going to miss opportunities. So when I walk in, I'm looking around, calculating, and using my intuition — my psychic abilities, you could say — trying to figure out the best position for me to be in to connect with a woman.
When I was married, I just picked the same position in the room every time and put my mat there. Single, I walk in and try to feel out: is there a woman here who is single, who would be interested in me, who I can connect with? I put that energy out in my thinking and then see which position feels intuitive. If I see a woman where I feel like maybe this is the right spot, I try to feel out where in the room would be the best place to put my mat.
The catch is that in a yoga class, you are stuck in that one position for an hour. If you choose your mat position wisely, you can be set up for success. If you choose your mat position poorly, or there's no good place and you're stuck in one spot, then you've wasted your time in terms of making a connection with a woman, perhaps — but you have not wasted your time in terms of doing something that's really good for you. That's what's so great about fitness classes.
Why I Choose Fitness Classes Over Lifting Weights
I love fitness classes instead of working out at the gym because I've found fitness classes keep my body in balance, keep my body flexible, keep my body strong, and they don't over-strengthen muscles. What I notice with a lot of people who work out at the gym and lift weights — and my own experience lifting weights — is that I was putting myself in a position to get injured all the time. I would over-strengthen certain muscles while other muscles stayed ridiculously weak because they didn't get worked. My body would be imbalanced. That's how you put your body in a position where one really jacked-up muscle fires and the other muscles aren't in position to compensate.
I think of somebody I know who would lift weights, and then went to play basketball one day with this jacked-up form from weightlifting, and got a serious injury just from trying to dunk. Some of the muscles were really strong, there wasn't balance in the body, and something just ripped — a serious injury from nothing more than jumping. That's the thing: fitness classes tend to work your whole body better. There are some really small muscles that are important, and if you've got huge muscles, those small ones can be injured. Now, if you really know what you're doing lifting weights, can build your body out correctly, and then use it safely, that's a different story. But being an amateur lifting weights, trying to get swole because you've seen guys doing that online — that looks dangerous to me, in my experience. That's why, to me, fitness classes are ideal.
Fitness Classes Attract Single, Healthy Women
What kinds of fitness classes are there? A ton. There are things like pole dancing. I know a woman who's single and has a high alignment with me — maybe I'll go out with her this week; I also went out with her last week — and she's at so many fitness classes. She'll do like three fitness classes a day. What I've noticed is, yes, you do get a number of women at fitness classes who are married or in relationships. But it seems like there's a significantly higher percentage of single women at fitness classes, because often women who are single are trying to look their best to get into a relationship. When I was married, I tried to get my wife to go out to fitness classes with me all the time, but she didn't want to. Then we got divorced — and what do you think she's doing now? She's out at fucking fitness classes all the time. So fitness classes tend to attract more single women than you'll see in the general public.
They also tend to attract women who are healthy, which is what I'm looking for. That is an absolute non-negotiable for me. I want a woman who's healthy and can handle doing a hot power flow yoga class for an hour. I want a woman who has the strength to do a pole dancing class, to do a handstand class, or to do fitness classes at the gyms — those can be great too, the ones with interval training stations like Orange Theory. What's nice with those classes is they're more dynamic; you're moving around.
For example, one day a woman warm-approached me at one of these. She shook my hand, she asked my name, and she was very interested in me because she'd seen me at these hot power flow yoga classes for weeks. And then I blew it by telling her she was the most beautiful woman I'd seen at one of these classes before — and I've never seen her again since. That was coming on too hot and heavy, and I wouldn't do that again. But that woman was as beautiful as I could imagine a woman being, and it would be hard for me in another environment to get that kind of connection. It would be nearly impossible for me on a dating app to get that kind of connection — a woman as attractive as a woman can possibly be to me. In a fitness class, though, that can happen. And it happens in fitness classes.
Time Together Without Saying a Word
If you can have time together — and women really do generally need time to feel something, time in person with somebody — you don't even have to talk. Fitness classes where you move around are nice because you have a chance to see lots of different people, even if it's just in passing. To me, though, the best is a fitness class where you can be next to someone: a Pilates class or a yoga class where you can be next to someone for an hour. While I was married, there was another woman where we ended up developing a crush on each other just by going to the same yoga class at the gym. There was just this big energy between us. That's how powerful fitness classes are.
But what I love is that if I don't meet a woman in a fitness class, it doesn't matter. I don't go there like I need to meet a woman today. Today, honestly, I didn't want to go to this hot power flow yoga class, but I love feeling good and I love my body being in shape. And I know it's possible for me to meet a woman there, especially with the right attitude. So I go, and I do the class.
Have Fun While Everyone Else Is Suffering
During the class itself, I focus on having as much fun and being as playful as possible. If you really want to stand out to a woman, have fun during a fitness class, because a lot of the time people are just suffering through these classes. I'm always laughing, smiling, playing around, and that shows a really strong and confident energy to a woman. A lot of guys are gritting their teeth through these workout classes with their faces all screwed up. But when I'm over here smiling when the pose is difficult, laughing when we're in a long hold and it starts to get hard — and I don't know what else gets hard — I'm showing that I have such depth and capability and strength as a man that when things get difficult, I like it. I can handle it. It's funny to me when we're struggling in a pose; I'm smiling.
One way I got the most amazing woman I've ever seen at the studio, in terms of pure looks, to notice me was that I was performing. I was peacocking. I was doing little jumps during half moon on the mat. I was playing and having as much fun as I could without totally disrupting the class. Fitness classes give you a chance to have fun and be playful — you just have to work that in delicately. Don't be throwing the weights around or anything like that. But if you can smile, be happy to be there, and be having fun, that is really attractive to the women I've been running into in these fitness classes — especially when you combine it with a loving, open heart and gratitude for the women who are there.
The Approach That Made Me Break My Own Rule
You need to pay attention, though, because today I ended up approaching a woman because I was eavesdropping. I was listening to her conversation, and I saw a way, based on what she was talking about, that I could step in right away — and step in with maximum confidence — because I heard she was talking about content creation. You don't hear that often. So I stepped in and said, "Hey, I heard you're talking about video editing," and I asked, "Are you a content creator?"
Now, I know I just did a video saying that I would never ask a woman out again. I realize I did that video. I realize it has like a thousand views at this point, and thousands of people saw me say that. Okay, I get it. But I had to make an exception today. I just started talking with this woman and there was such insane chemistry with her — so much. I don't want to put out all her information; maybe we'll be on videos together one day. But there is such insane chemistry, so much in common in our lives. We had such a deep conversation. We talked for an hour after the class.
Why did it work? Well, I've also seen her at yoga classes a few times, and just me being there, having done the same class, shows her that I've got a strength to me — and she maybe has noticed me in class before. But I came up with maximum confidence because we were talking about content creation. And I'm Jerry Banfield, YouTube coach. Jerry Banfield, a billion views online since 2011. Jerry Banfield, who knows all about content creation. So I came up ready to talk, firing from the hip, talking from the heart about content creation. I immediately made every effort to show off what I know about content creation and make it clear how I could help her. I looked for an opportunity to help her — I advised her to get on YouTube instead of focusing on other platforms. And I was very authentic. I threw in a "fuck" here and there, I was very open with my emotions and my passion, I talked a little bit of shit in moderation, and I was fun. I was being myself, my normal self.
Then after talking with her for about twenty minutes, she dropped something into the conversation, and I thought, that's a sign to ask for your phone number. And since we were already there in person, I figured: let's not fuck around on the phone. Let me schedule something with you right now while I've got you here — what's the next day you're free? That's maximum confidence. And fitness classes put you in a really good position as a man for exactly this: you've just shown how strong you are, you're all hot and sweaty, and then you end up talking to a woman with all the dopamine fired off in your brain. You feel good naturally. It's a perfect time to be at your maximum confidence, which is a perfect way to get the maximum romantic spark going with a woman.
Try Every Kind of Fitness Class
While I've talked mostly about fitness classes, a lot of the same things apply to co-ed sports. The downside with co-ed sports is that it can be a bit more difficult — there aren't as many options. There are tons of fitness classes, at least in St. Pete, which is why fitness classes are S tier. One thing I intend to do is go to lots of different kinds of fitness classes. Some of y'all might go to one yoga class and be like, "Oh, come on, I didn't meet a woman there right away." No — ideally, you want to hit all the different fitness classes around town. Go to all the different studios, all the different kinds of classes. Ask Gemini what different kinds of fitness classes there are, because most dudes would probably not think to go to a pole dancing class. But if you want to meet some women, go to a pole dancing class. That's almost all women and gay guys.
I was doing a beginner pole dancing class, and pole dancing is hard — what else is hard on a pole? Pole dancing classes are hard. And the women who were in the advanced pole dancing class were so gorgeous, it was amazing. There was one gay guy in there with all these beautiful women. Fitness classes are the opposite of a dating app for men: dating apps are saturated with men, and fitness classes are often saturated with women.
Now, you've got to go to the right fitness classes. I'm not going to fitness classes where there are more dudes than women — I'm not putting the odds against me. If I'm going to be in an environment where I can meet a woman, there need to be significantly more women than men. So I go to those fitness classes. My ex actually turned me on to this. She said, "You need to go to reformer Pilates — it's all these amazing-looking women in their twenties and thirties at reformer Pilates." I still haven't done that yet, but it's on the to-do list.
Co-Ed Sports and Run Clubs
Co-ed sports are nice because they have a lot of the same dynamics as fitness classes, and playing a sport against somebody can be a really great way to meet them as well. The problem with co-ed sports is there's not as much selection, and a lot of the time co-ed sports are heavily men. Ultimate frisbee — I saw them playing outside my house here — mostly men. Basketball, mostly men. Volleyball, I've got to try. I also want to do sports that are really active and fun, so co-ed tennis, to me, is awesome, and I have a co-ed tennis league that I play in every week. The thing is, it's mostly dudes there too. Volleyball seems like it has a lot of women — it seems like there are a lot of fantastic women out there playing volleyball around my area — but I need to try it before I can give a better opinion.
Then there are run clubs — you've probably heard of run clubs. A run club, to me, is kind of a too-obvious pickup environment. It's a bit unnatural. Bars are totally unnatural, and the alcohol is a disaster — a woman who's going to be healthy is not one I'm likely to find in a bar. But run clubs: I went to a run club — a friend I paid for dating coaching took me to one — and it was definitely a good place to meet women. I saw women who were there specifically trying to meet a man. But run clubs definitely have a bit more of a hookup energy to them. The woman I ran into and talked with there was looking for guys to hook up with. And run clubs have too many dudes. There were a lot of dudes at the run club I went to — jacked dudes with their shirts off and everything.
See, I want the odds stacked heavily in my favor, because things are very relative in life. If there's a yoga studio with me and five other dudes, even if all four of the others are really hot, I still end up being an option in that environment, because there are twenty attractive women and — I'll count myself — five attractive men. Even if ten of the women are with somebody and have no interest in meeting a guy, you have ten women who are interested. And half the time, those dudes are there with a woman, so a lot of times there are only maybe one to three guys who are actually single. That's ten single women against one to three single guys.
When the Odds Are Completely in Your Favor
I've literally been in some of these classes where I'm the only man and there are twenty or thirty attractive women. That means I don't have to compete with anybody. If a woman in that room is interested in meeting a guy right now, it's literally me or nobody else. Run clubs, by contrast — the ratios I've seen tend to skew more men than women, although there's still a good number of women. And running itself is not as good for me. Running is boring, and running works a limited group of muscles. It's good, but I like fitness classes because they're more holistic: they hit the whole body and work out everything. Run clubs are cool, but I personally am not big into running.
What's also difficult at a run club is trying to talk to somebody — which I made sure to try. I was talking to a woman while I was running, and when you're trying to talk and run at the same time, you've got to have a lot of endurance. You have to be in great shape for running specifically to talk and run at the same time. If you're run-walking, this can work great. The challenge is you're around so many people that it can be a little difficult to strike something up. Run clubs are definitely a worthwhile place to try meeting women, for sure — they're just not as good as co-ed sports or fitness classes.
Bars and Dating Apps Totally Suck
Bars and dating apps totally suck, especially if you want to be healthy and you want something that's real. Bars put you in an artificial environment where alcohol has people acting in a way that's sometimes not authentic — you meet them after a few drinks and then have to try to square that with their sober personality, which you never got to see.
And dating apps for men are absolutely horrible. Never be on a dating app. It wastes your time and it puts the odds against you. For a woman to see how strong you are and to feel those romantic sparks on an app, you'd basically have to be playing a game. For example, I know a man who puts up pictures with his expensive car and pictures of himself on a boat. Unless you're playing that "I'm rich" game, or unless you're just ultra-jacked from going to the gym, the apps work against you, because dating apps skew to where the top men tend to get almost all the attention — too much attention — and then a lot of the time those men aren't treating the women very well either. Women often struggle to even find men who are realistic or authentic on these apps. So for a man, being on a dating app is, most of the time, just signaling that you're a low-value man. Dating apps suck because you're wasting your time, and I hate the time-wasting that happens on them. We'll rage about dating apps in another video. Fitness classes, to me, are the absolute best place to meet a woman.
Warm Approaches Only — Never Cold Approach
It's important to close the deal, but be very careful approaching at fitness classes. Ideally, you want a warm approach, where you hear something you can lock onto and have a great conversation about. What you do not want to do is cold approach at a fitness class, because you can get complaints, and women — especially at something like hot yoga — are often extremely sensitive to being approached. The only reason I approached this woman today is that she was talking about content creation. That's such a huge in — such a huge place where I can demonstrate value. As a man, if you're approaching, you should be looking to demonstrate value and give her value. I was essentially offering her free YouTube coaching right after the class. That's an unusual situation. Most of the time in a fitness class, I'm not going to approach unless a woman gives me warm signals first — smiles, significant eye contact. If there's no reason we should be talking to each other, I usually expect the woman to make the first move in a fitness class.
Let the Sparks Develop Over Time
I've hinted at this some, but to me, fitness classes are the right environment to just be around women, where sometimes something can happen more naturally. You do not want to be at fitness classes cold approaching — that's not going to make things good. You want to be at fitness classes naturally letting sparks develop over time. Some of the most serious sparks I've ever had were in a yoga studio: we saw each other six or seven times, we put our mats next to each other, we never talked or made eye contact, and both of us were in relationships — but there were huge sparks with this woman. It was crazy, the feelings both of us had. I eventually chose to break that off — I decided I wasn't coming to that class anymore because I needed to take more time with my family. Now I think I should have just explored that. But that's what you want: to let sparks build. That woman I told you about before, the one who was so beautiful — I saw her at five or six classes over a period of a month or two, and then I got a little overexcited too quickly. But that was a warm connection.
At fitness classes, you can afford to be patient, because you should be there anyway. If you want to be in a position to have more confidence and to date as a man, going to a fitness class every day, or playing sports every day, or — if you're not doing one of those — hitting a run club, doing one of these three things every single day is one of the best ways you can start to more naturally turn women on.
The Two Kinds of Attraction
We'll talk more about this in a future video, but I've come to believe there are two basic kinds of attraction for women. The first is physical strength, capability, and confidence — and you can show that either more physically or more socially. The second is being the kind of guy they'd want to marry, the kind of guy you'd be in a relationship with. But women are often only going to see that first kind of superficial confidence — strength, or social skills, or wealth — first, and it's going to be harder for them to see what a nice guy you'd actually be in a relationship. So fitness classes are perfect if you're a nice guy: you get to show off your strength, turn her on, and let her feel that spark. And then you're in a position where it's easy for a woman to date you.
Reading Her Interest — and Knowing When to Break It Off
How did I get into talking with this woman about dating? Well, she asked what kind of YouTube channels I have. And here's a rule: if you're at a class talking to a woman and she's not asking questions about you, break off that conversation as soon as possible. You might need to carry it for the first few minutes, but if you've been talking to a woman for a few minutes and she's not showing interested signs — if she seems like she wishes the conversation were over — break it off as soon as possible. You want to minimize having any bad interactions in these environments.
But this woman was starting to get very interested and ask me questions. I said I have a dating channel, so I started talking about some of the dating material, and I used examples. One of the best ways to transition — to see if a woman is potentially aligned with you — is to talk about dating. Express it: "Man, it's been a challenge for me dating lately." Me talking about dating, leading the way with my side of the conversation, encouraged this woman to open up about dating, and she shared exactly where she was at in her dating life. From there I'm thinking: okay, I know you're single, and I know you're struggling — me too. It's perfect. So I ought to ask you out right now, shouldn't I? Now, that was after about twenty minutes of conversation.
What you do not want to do at fitness classes — or sports, and probably less so at run clubs, where you could push it more — is just ask for phone numbers the first time you've met somebody, unless there's a lot of chemistry and you've talked for something like twenty minutes. For example, there was a woman I met at the yoga class before this last one, as I talked about in my video on how I help women approach me. She talked to me first. She initiated the conversation after I put my mat down next to her — she did everything else, and I talk about how I approach a woman without saying anything in that video. But I did not ask for her phone number. We talked for about five minutes, and that was an instance where, after five minutes, I could tell there wasn't the raw chemistry there. I'm not asking for a phone number when I'm not certain a woman is very enthusiastic to give it to me.
So in a fitness class, I'm very careful to respect boundaries. I actually prefer for her to give me her number first — that way she's so comfortable that there's never going to be an issue. I don't want to create an unsafe feeling in a fitness class. Even though I'm very interested in meeting a woman, I normally keep to myself and just say hi to the people I know.
Remember Names and Build Social Proof
You also really want to remember people's names. One of the best things you can do is get to know people in fitness classes and remember their names. Today, this woman saw a guy come by and say hi to me — and I couldn't even remember where I know this dude from — but he came by and said hi, and that's a little bit of social proof: look, this guy has friends here. If you want to make successful connections in fitness classes, it helps to get to know people's names whenever there's an organic conversation with anyone, and build little organic social connections. Then, when you see somebody you're interested in, they may have already casually talked with you one day, and something is going to be easier to happen.
I've given you some awesome information here — super valuable. Imagine actually talking with me every week. If you want support with your dating — if you're tired of being single, stuck, or starting over, man or woman, old or young, gay or straight — I can help you, because I go on principles that work for anyone: love, connection, taking care of yourself, being authentic, and focusing on communicating. You can talk with me every week when you join the Jerry Banfield Family. I will help you get ready to date and build a real-life dating plan, which is working fantastic for me right now — I have a date with a woman.
Do This With Me
I am really, really excited to go out with her in just a few days. And I literally had no dates on the calendar this morning — none. So this is what I'm doing in my own life, and I will support you in doing it in yours. I'll be very honest with you about what I think you need to do to get ready to date, which often is getting your mind and your body right. You don't need to look amazing, but get your mind right, get your body right, and get your heart open.
I'm great at turning dates into relationships that last, and I'm great at not wasting time on things that aren't going to work. When you join the Jerry Banfield Family, you can have a call with me every week for 25 minutes, and that can make a huge difference in your life. That is the best offer I've seen anyone on YouTube dating ever present, by far. You can talk with me once a week, you can direct message me, and you can post in the community throughout the week between calls. I'd love for you to be in there. And there's so much more you can learn in the family besides dating — YouTube, AI, crypto, all kinds of stuff. I hope to see you in the family and to talk with you on Zoom.
Thanks a lot for reading this. If you want more of my dating stories and everything I'm learning along the way, you can watch my Dating playlist for the whole journey.