It is always a welcome bonus to find that the hotel that you have just booked has its own gym because this obviously means that you can still keep fit and build muscle whilst you are on holiday or on a business trip, for example.
Indeed many people are so addicted to keeping fit that they will book a particular hotel purely because it has its own gym.
However in this article I want to discuss some of the possible drawbacks of these hotel gyms because apart from some of the 5-star hotels, you will often find that they are nowhere near as good as your local gym back home. Here are some of the reasons why:
Limited Choice Of Equipment
One of the main problems with a lot of hotel gyms is that they will have a limited choice of fitness machines and equipment for you to use. Whilst many of them will have a few of the basics, such as exercise bikes, treadmills and weight benches, they may not have things like a leg press machine or a squat rack, for example.
Similarly, you will often find that they will have a limited number of weights that you can add to dumbbells and barbells. Therefore they are not always good enough for the serious muscle builder.
Old Equipment
Another similar problem is that many of the exercise equipment will be quite old in a lot of cases. Supplying a gym with the latest exercise equipment is low down on the list of priorities for many hotels, so you may find that the machinery is quite a few years old, and may not necessarily work as well as it used to.
Unhygienic
I have stayed in hotels where it is patently obvious that the exercise machines are rarely cleaned, if indeed they are ever cleaned at all. This is something that can really put you off because you don’t want to be using exercise equipment that is covered in other people’s sweat.
Restricted Hours
You will often find that the hotel’s gym will only be available during certain times of the day, which can be inconvenient because it will often mean that there are many people in there occupying the machines when you yourself want to use them. Gyms in resort hotels will generally be busiest in the evenings, which can be annoying if this is the only time that you get the chance to use them.
Can Cost Extra
A lot of gyms will give you free access to their gym as part of your stay, but some hotels will charge you an extra fee to use their gym, particularly some of the top-end hotels who offer memberships to the general public. This is often something that you don’t necessarily find out until you arrive at your hotel, and it is another cost that you might not have budgeted for.
Final Thoughts
So these are some of the drawbacks of hotel gyms, but to be fair, a low quality hotel gym is still better than having no gym at all.
Whilst you may not have access to the same kind of equipment that you are used to in your local gym, you can still do plenty of cardio work, and you should be able to at least maintain your muscle mass, even if the gym does not have a lot of heavy weights for you to use.
Therefore it is hard to be too critical about hotel gyms because they do still provide a useful service, and in many cases are completely free for you to use.
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