Choose the Gym that's Right for You

(For my blind friends)

You don't need to join a gym to get in better shape. You can easily exercise using a bodyweight program or even purchase some equipment and get an excellent workout in the privacy of your own home

However, if you choose to go to a commercial fitness establishment I want to share some thoughts with you. First, bigger is rarely better when it comes to a fitness center. The big chain clubs are based on high volume sales and are just not geared towards any personal attention. . If you are lucky they will offer you a "free" session with a personal trainer which is designed to give you just enough information to get you confused and feeling like you need to hire them.

Secondly the workout areas are usually so large and open that they can be very hard to navigate. I trained at the same Gold’s Gym for close to 10 years and knew exactly where everything was. When they closed I followed the majority of the members to a new much larger facility. I hated it! I have been around commercial gyms for almost 40 years and owned my own for close to 20. I have always felt comfortable in any gym I ever used. The gym was my safe place, my comfort zone. No matter what else was going on in my life I always felt good when I was there. That is until I joined this huge chain club.

Try as I might I just could never get the layout of the equipment in my head. I use a guide dog and when I am in the gym she has her spot where I leave her and I feel my way around. Trying to use the dog to go from machine to machine would be just far too time consuming. Having to resettle her each time just makes it totally impractical.

I always train early in the morning. . It amazed me that even at 5:30AM there would be weights lying around on the floor, the dumbbell racks would be totally out of order and many of the machines and bars had been left loaded with weights. Obviously no one cleaned up the night before!

I can't express the frustration I experienced when trying to find a matching pair of dumbbells. The rack was never in order and rarely could I find two of the same weight side by side. Even when I would ask someone to help me find the other50 or 60 it would take them a few minutes to locate it and it was usually at the other end of the rack, Or the other end of the gym!

Please note that I am not talking about one situation but several months of the same situations. I did complain to management multiple times as had several others and nothing changed!

On the positive side there is always a huge selection of cardio and strength training machines to choose from. Maybe not so positive as you will have too many choices and will likely jump from machine to machine rather than focusing your efforts on building up your conditioning on one of them. You just don't need six different bicep machines. Grab some dumbbells or a bar and do some curls and get over it!

My suggestion is to try to find a privately owned neighborhood gym. There aren't as many as there used to be. Like so many other businesses the big guys come in and undercut the mom and pop operations and they just can't survive. You will probably pay as much or maybe even a little more for a privately owned gym And no there won't be a pool or racket ball courts or a whirlpool but how often will you really use them. You probably won't see 20 treadmills and 15 elliptical all lined up in a row either, but how many of them can you run on at once?

The place won't be as pretty--all the machines might not match. There is a good reason for that. The big clubs purchase entire lines from the same manufacturers so everything does match. It’s all about looking impressive when you come in to join. A small gym owner may pick and choose pieces he knows are worth having. He has likely bought them at different times when his budget allowed for an upgrade. His equipment may look well-worn but it will probably be better maintained than the stuff in the big corporate places. If you have ten chest machines and one is broken there is no urgency to get it fixed. If you have two or three you will get it taken care of.

The people who work in small gyms are there because they love the place its either theirs or they have been a part of it before working there. I don't think I ever hired an employee that hadn't been a member of my place before. It wasn't any kind of requirement it just worked out that way.
The people who work in the big clubs are there because they need a job and that place was hiring. They don't care about the place.

Working out in a small gym will be a more personal experience as you are dealing with less people and you get to know the regulars that show up at the same time you do. You never know you might end up with a training partner just cause you and that other guy just always happen to be doing legs every Monday morning.

If you are thinking about joining a gym and have any questions or want to share any of your experiences with me either positive or negative with chain clubs vs the little guys, please leave a comment.