Breakdown of Lekarz zmusza mnie do treningu na siłowni.
do
to
na
at
lekarz
the doctor
siłownia
the gym
trening
the training
zmuszać
to force
mnie
me
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Questions & Answers about Lekarz zmusza mnie do treningu na siłowni.
Why is the object pronoun mnie used here instead of mi?
The verb zmuszać (“to force”) takes its direct object in the accusative case. mnie is the accusative form of ja (“I”). mi is the dative form and would be used with verbs that require a dative object (e.g. dać mi, “to give me”), but not with zmuszać.
What case is treningu and why?
treningu is the genitive singular of trening (“training, workout”). After the preposition do, Polish grammar requires the genitive case, so do treningu means “to (a) training.”
Why do we use do + genitive here, and can we say zmusza mnie trenować?
zmuszać kogoś do czegoś is the fixed government pattern: you force someone to something (a noun) with do + genitive. You cannot say zmusza mnie trenować, because zmuszać does not govern an infinitive. If you need an infinitive, choose a different verb (e.g. kazać mi trenować) or use the perfective gerund (see next question).
Could we use the perfective verb zmusić here? How would the sentence change?
Yes. Perfective zmusić (completed action) gives:
Lekarz zmusił mnie do treningu na siłowni.
This means “The doctor forced me to work out at the gym” as a single, completed event. The original imperfective zmusza implies an ongoing or repeated action: “The doctor keeps forcing me…”
Why is it na siłowni and not w siłowni? What case is siłowni?
Many fixed locations in Polish use na + locative to express “at” (e.g. na plaży, na basenie, na poczcie). Here siłownia takes locative singular, siłowni, after na to mean “at the gym.”
Can you reorder the words? For example, Mnie lekarz zmusza do treningu na siłowni?
Yes, Polish is fairly flexible. You could say Mnie lekarz zmusza do treningu na siłowni or Lekarz mnie do treningu na siłowni zmusza. Word order changes the emphasis: fronting mnie stresses “me,” fronting do treningu stresses “to the workout.”
What’s the difference between zmuszać and przymuszać?
They are near‐synonyms, but zmuszać is far more common. przymuszać exists and means “to coerce,” but you’ll rarely hear it in everyday speech.
How would you express “The doctor makes me work out” using an infinitive after kazać?
Use kazać + infinitive:
Lekarz każe mi trenować na siłowni.
Here mi is dative (because kazać takes a dative object) and trenować is the infinitive “to train.”