Wednesday, March 11, 2015

most gyms... eliminated

I should have realized this from the ads hanging all over my neighborhood: after visiting several gyms today, I came away severely disappointed because every single gym was devoted to personal training. Personal training is great if you have the money, but for me, plunking down $1100 for twenty-four sessions (3 per week, 8 weeks) just isn't a justifiable expense, especially not on my limited budget.

So I've been poring over personal-training apps that specialize in no-equipment fitness routines, with a triple focus on strength, cardio, and weight loss. In the meantime, I'm going to stick to the formula that got me this far: good old walking. I gained back a lot of weight in February, but I can lose it again through the simple investment of time and effort.

This doesn't mean I've stopped looking at gyms, however: I just need to broaden my search parameters to include places like taekwondojang and boxing studios. We have several of each in the neighborhood. I doubt that either of those fitness centers charges nearly as much as the local one-on-one gyms charge. I mean, seriously—$1100 for two months?


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4 comments:

Charles said...

What happened to the stuff you were going to be doing at home, like planking?

Kevin Kim said...

Never got off the ground with planking back when I was in my yeogwan. But with the download and installation of these new exercise apps—at least one of which includes planking as an exercise option—I'll be attempting to get into it.

What sucks is that none of the gyms in the area is just a regular old gym that you can sign up for and go to on your own schedule. They're all doing some variation of this "8 주 몸짱" program (some gyms are calling it "the 8-week miracle"), in which you do 24 personal-training sessions (3/week, 8 weeks, 1 hour/session) for over a thousand dollars. I just don't have that kind of money to burn. So it's back to walking and to the apps for me.

Charles said...

The special programs make sense from the gym's point-of-view, as that's where the real money is. Cheap three-month plans where any schlub can just walk in and use the machines probably don't bring home the bacon. Sucks for the poor schlubs, though.

Does the campus up there have a gym open for use to professors?

Kevin Kim said...

Charles,

Our campus barely qualifies as a campus: it's a collection of four buildings that are more or less attached to the main hospital building. It's nothing but labs and lecture halls, with very little else.

Some of my students have quietly told me they don't like the Ilsan campus very much. I can see why: it's sparkling clean, and empty to the point of being echo-y. One student said the place lacked "humor." I got his meaning: no effort has been made to create a relaxed, convivial, student-friendly atmosphere here; it's all very serious and clinical-looking, which might appeal to an old fart like me (I actually like this campus, in all its banality), but doesn't do much for youngsters craving for ambiance.

Upshot: no gym. There's a Holly's Coffee in one building, a nameless cafe in another building, and a bunch of drink machines scattered over the rest of the campus. Everything else is shiny tile, white drywall, neat wood paneling, chrome-tube or cheap-leather furniture, and a design aesthetic reminiscent of an airport lounge.

Oh, yeah: I heard there are fast-food restaurants inside the hospital, on the basement levels.