Russia Bizarrely Promotes Upcoming Olympics by Making People Exercise for Train Tickets [VIDEO]

The Olympics are a showcase of the world's greatest athletes, but pretty soon they may also be a showcase for the world's fittest fans.

To help get people psyched for the upcoming Winter Games in Sochi, Russia, a specially-rigged ticket machine was set up at a train station in Moscow, in which people could only get tickets by doing 30 crunches.

That's right -- they had to physically exert themselves. We don't know if that got people fired up for the Olympics as much as it got them pumped for Gatorade, but, considering all the bad press Russia has gotten leading up to the Games over its anti-homosexual policy, we say it's a victory just by virtue of the fact people are focusing on a non-controversial issue.

We can't imagine a scenario where this would work in the US, where obesity is our national pastime and the most physical exercise we get is surfing the web looking for the latest pictures of Miley Cyrus sticking out her tongue. About the only thing we'd do 30 crunches for is a cronut and we'd probably quit halfway through and enjoy a cigarette.

[ViralViralVideos]