As the province emerges from lockdown, local fitness centre operators are busy making sure their facilities are prepared for the return of in-person training and exercise.
“Fitness is not just about banging weights around and gym rats, muscle heads,” said Paul Kunkel, co-owner of the Anytime Fitness location on Speedvale Avenue. “It’s about seniors wanting to stay healthy and keep their independence as long as possible … and we have a lot of people who come to the gym from a mental health standpoint.
“It’s extremely important for people’s mental health, especially in this day and age.”
Faced with rising COVID-19 cases, the provincial government declared a state of emergency and lockdown on Dec. 26. It ended Tuesday locally.
The lockdown – the province’s second since the pandemic began nearly a year ago – resulted in the closure of non-essential businesses, including gyms and other fitness centres.
In a Friday announcement, provincial officials said Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph will go into the red zone on Tuesday, meaning fitness centres can re-open under several conditions.
Among them is expanded physical distance to three metres between people in exercise classes or areas where weights and other exercise equipment are used. There’s also a 10-person limit for indoor activities and 25-person cap for outdoor classes.
Sanitation efforts ramped up at fitness centres at the onset of the pandemic, with increased sanitation, capacity limits and physical distancing, in addition to the requirement for face masks. Pre-screening was also put in place.
Prior to the latest lockdown, Anytime Fitness members had to wipe down their equipment after use. Now it’s before use as well.
The same applies to the Anytime Fitness location on Kortright Road.
“They have direct control of the cleanliness when they use equipment. If they don’t feel comfortable touching a dumbbell, they can wipe that dumbbell down using a medical-grade disinfectant wipe,” said Kunkel. “We want to make sure that we’re as safe as possible.”
For Nathan Skoufis, owner of Guelph Family Martial Arts (GFMA) on Woodlawn Road, student safety is paramount.
“We feel we’re ready to go,” he said. “People are very excited to be back. … Physical activity in general has not only physical benefits but mental benefits.
“It’s been a very anxious and uncertain time.”
Classes have been staggered to limit contact between students, and shortened to allow time for people to enter and leave one-by-one, he explained, with floor markers to help remind people to maintain physical distancing. Between classes the studio and equipment are cleaned, as well as the bathroom.
“We clean everything ourselves,” said Skoufis. “It’s easy for us to monitor. With open gyms it’s kind of hard because you’re leaving it up to the people to social distance and clean everything.”
Since the pandemic began, an air filtration system has been installed and the HVAC system upgraded, he noted.
Unlike many other fitness centres, GFMA didn’t completely shut down during the state of emergency. Rather, it shifted to online training and most students followed, said Skoufis.
“It didn’t really affect us a whole lot,” he said of the financial impact of the lockdown. “We’ve been pretty lucky.”
Noting it’s “all about comfort level”, Skoufis anticipates between 20 and 30 per cent of GFMA students will continue with online training despite in-person classes resuming.
For the most part, people want to comply with the rules, notes Kunkel, because they want to help stop the spread of the virus and don’t want to see fitness centres go back into lockdown.
“If we notice a member is not abiding by the rules, we reach out to them immediately. ...We take this extremely seriously,” he said. “We’ve had to talk to very few people because … they understand that they have to do their part in order to keep the gyms open.”
Gyms and other fitness facilities are all too often viewed as offering leisure activities, said Kerrie Lemieux, fellow co-owner of the Speedvale Avenue Anytime Fitness facility, and should be considered an essential service.
“Fitness is part of the solution. Someone who goes to the gym to work out is less likely to end up in the hospital from a heart attack, diabetes and all those other ailments,” she said, noting it helps keep people out of the healthcare system. “Working out is a cure to so many things and it’s not viewed that way."
