Hey Smart Fitness family!

Ontario is now entering phase 2 of re-opening, for the most part (minus Toronto, Peel and Windsor-Essex, as of June 16, 2020). This is great news for those who live in Ontario, as it means we are one step closer to being able to re-enter gyms- instead of having to work out from home: doing bodyweight work or training with minimal equipment.

As such I felt it would be imperative as a fitness enthusiast, trainer and general gym goer to assess the situation my friends, clients and myself are likely to return to. As a result, this blog post is going to be broken into 3 areas: what to expect from your gym (from what is happening elsewhere), what to expect from your body (from a physiological perspective) and what the good news is.

What to expect at the gym:

Sadly, the way you left the gym is without a doubt not going to be the way you return to it. The gym is still going to be hailed as a place where you can train and improve yourself, but with many potential stipulations. At the most basic level, we’re going to see a decrease in equipment availability. And, at the most complex level, we’re likely to have to stay away from others, have less time to train and potentially wear a mask!

In places around Canada, and the USA, I’ve found that people going back to the gym- especially commercial gyms, where the member numbers are high, social distancing is done for them. In California there is a gym where people are put inside a makeshift plastic-walled space, with all their equipment to train within this space. This is a pretty extreme example, but it illuminates the fact that gyms are going to be different. Smaller gyms, like the gym I train and work out of, will likely be able to tell people to stay 6 feet apart, practice good hygiene and wipe everything down after each use. At most, creating little squares for people to stay within while they train. The most logical thing to witness in any gym is that not all equipment: e.g. machines, racks, dumbbells and cardio equipment, will be available. Gyms have always asked people to clean up after themselves, such as wiping equipment. This is without a doubt going to be a mandatory aspect. I wouldn’t be surprised if gyms restrict membership on members if they do not clean up after themselves and are caught.

So what does this mean for your training? In the simplest of terms, it means you’re going to have to build your training programs and training days around what is available to you, instead of what you want to do. Obviously you’ll still be able to do the major movement patterns, like a squat and hinge, but accessory exercises, such as using machines like a lat pull-down machine may not be done on a weekly basis. At the same time, performing exercises like your squats may not be done on the day you want. If for example, you want to squat on a Monday but there is only one rack available and three people ahead of you, it doesn’t make sense to wait; you’d be better off changing your days. To that end, waiting for people instead of working in is definitely going to become a big change. For now, gone are the days of “can I work in, bro?” You probably won’t be allowed to, as per the rules of social distancing.

What is all but certain within all the ambiguity above is that people are likely going to have to book appointments to enter their gym. This is not really a huge deal, as personal trainers have their clients and group classes do this already. However, it is an inconvenience if you want to come earlier or start later, due to a little thing called life. Work may have you working over-time, you can’t just leave because of your scheduled appointment to the gains factory. But now, you may have to! To add to this, with booking appointments to train, you likely won’t be able to train for as long as you want, whenever you want. Facilities like GoodLife have suggested that they will be open for 60 minutes, then after that 60 minutes, they will close for 30 minutes to clean the entire facility. Doing this every day. This will play a massive role on rest periods and styles of training. A powerlifter for example, who takes 2-5 minutes between sets will likely not finish a training session in 60 minutes! You, as the athlete will have to be much more cognizant of your time constraints and program around this.

There is good news to this, however. Many of us thought that gyms were going to open and we would have to wear masks while we train. At first you probably thought, “this is cool, I’m basically an MMA fighter doing fake altitude training”. But as you thought about it more, I would assume you came to the realization that it would be a huge hindrance and annoyance during training! But, guess what? The WHO suggested that masks should not be worn while performing exercise because it is likely to lead to microorganism build up and bacterial infections. If health officials recommend against this, then masks won’t be worn, but social distancing will be in effect. This is something I can get down with, especially since it means I’d be back in a gym! A little loss for a big gain, if you ask me.

One side note before we move on. There is a very real and very likely potential that people might not come back to the gym at all. Gyms have been closed for such an extended period of time that many of us have started to buy our own equipment or make our own. I for one, built my own squat and bench rack out of wood. I have a client who built atlas stones to start strongman training, and has been making his own concrete weights to bench and squat with. Gyms may not see the same return of members. This is a logical pitfall that gym owners, trainers and larger facilities need to recognize. We likely aren’t going to see a massive influx of people returning to the gym, like in January, but we will see a return of those who had no equipment or are beyond motivated to train.

For those that have been fortunate enough to have a barbell with weights, and a rack, there is a fairly high likelihood that your training, much like my own, has not changed very much. Having access to a barbell and somewhere in the realm of 315 lbs provides any individual the opportunity to increase strength in different avenues of fitness and at the very least, maintain their strength. However, for those who are less fortunate, you probably won’t be as strong, and you may even be smaller with a decreased affinity for training. This brings us into the second area of this post: your body; what can you expect from it when you get to return?

And that my friends, that is going to be a post of its own. Be sure to check out next week’s blog post titled: “Post Quarantine Fitness Gains: what to expect #2”, when it goes live! I recognize this is a tough pill to swallow for some, as we are going from a reality of simply lifting when wanted to potentially having to overhaul our lives for it. But I want to leave you with this question: is it better to receive something than to not receive anything at all? In other words, are you not more pleased that you can go back to the gym, as opposed to not go back at all?

As always,

Stay strong ladies and gentleman,

David