Does anyone have any experience crusading against injustice in the gym? 8 months ago I cancelled my gym membership as I was going to university 200 miles away. It was a good, no frills, half-hardcore gym, with nearly everything I needed: squat rack, bench press, parrallel bars for dips, pull-up bar etc. I was happy with it, the membership wasn’t expensive and I could get the job done.
I returned to to gym yesterday for the first time in 8 months to discover that they’ve removed the pull-up bar and parrallel dip bars (they were combined in one piece of equipent), and replaced it with a shitty lat pull down machine with a maximum weight of 70kg/150lbs. I can’t do any pull-ups, chins or dips. Disgusting. Can anyone think of a reason that they’ve replaced a very good piece of equipent like that and replaced it with a horrible heap of shit that takes up more space? There was already a lat pull-down before I left, that was rarely used, so why another one?
They’ve sold their souls to Satan. New acquisitions include: leg press up to 100kg, leg adduction/abduction machine, another peck deck, more running/cycling machines. The cardio equipment was rarely more that 50% in-use 8 months ago, and when I went in at 7pm (supposedly peak time) there were only about 5 people on a total of 18 cardio machines, including cross-trainers and rowers. So what’s the need for all the cardio equipment?
The free weights area has been reduced to fit in these new machines, and there is no very little space to do power cleans (or any other movement) as they’ve crammed unnecessary machines into the gym at the expense of anyone who wants to lift weights. I was completely livid when I saw this, and considered complaining immediately, but I’ve decided to ask the T-forum what I should do to get the manager to re-install a pull-up and dips bar? I know the guy reasonably well, so I think I could negotiate with him. I can’t change gyms as every other gym in my small town is even worse. I thought I found sactuary from the other shitty commercial gyms in the area (fitness first being the biggest evil) and I return to this tragedy.
So what should I do? I’ve thought about a polite letter, and aggressive letter, a petition, a brick through the window, a 1-man protest march and a completely hostile rant at the manager. I could make a pull-up/dips station out of scaffolding, it’s not difficult, i might suggest they build one outside or I’ll do it myself. Maybe someone else here had the same problem.
I’m going to stop the rot before they completely sell-out and install soda and chocolate dispensers like the scum down at fitness first. They’re already halfway there with Mars bars being sold on the front desk.
And to badly quote someone:
“Evil only suceeds because the good do nothing.”