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My Athletic Club Defines Full-On Hysteria
I don’t know what your fitness club is like, whether they’re opening or still closed in your state. Without even a definite opening date for Phase 2, my club in downtown Seattle is laying down the law for all of us who thought we knew how to use the facility safely while working out and maintaining social distancing. My workout as a minimum consists of: changing; getting on a bike for 15-20 minutes; going to an empty squash court and hitting a ball for something like one-two hours; taking a shower and changing back into my street clothes. None of that will be possible under my club’s Phase 2 rules worked out with Gov. Inslee’s office and the CDC. Here are the rules for your amusement:
5/29/20 Dear Club Member,
While it is still uncertain as to exactly when King County will be able to enter into the next phase, we are happy to announce that Club will be able to open to a limited capacity in Phase 2 of Governor Inslee’s “Safe Start” plan.
This is very exciting news; however the partial reopening requires heavy restrictions and coming to the Clubs for your workout will look very different. In summation, we will be allowed to open to appointment-only, one-on-one Personal training, Pilates and Squash Instruction along with small Group Exercise classes (5 or less). Unfortunately, unsupervised General Club use will not be permitted during this stage.
Please read through the following points so you can better understand our new policies and the precautions we are taking to keep you safe during your return:
- Limited operating hours: First 2 days of Re-Opening: 9:00am-8:00pm │ Thereafter Weekdays: 7:00am-8:00pm │ Weekends: 9:00am-3:00pm
- What will be available: Group-X classes with a maximum of 5 participants and 1:1 Fitness and Pilates Personal Trainings. The Group-X schedule can be found on our website located here: https:
- What will be unavailable: Childcare, Pool, Café, Squash Courts, Gymnasium, Massage, locker rooms (*vanities and restrooms will remain open), showers, towel service, and Spa areas
- Members must have a pre-booked appointment time in a class or training session prior to entering the Club. You are able to do this via the Front Desk, your Member Portal, as well as the Club App (please refer to our website under “For Members” and the “Events” tab – Downtown: https: Keep in mind, due to class sizes being small and in high demand, we will have advance reservations of only 72 hours, spots must be reserved and there will be a waitlist available for up to 3 people.
- Upon entry/exit to/from the Club, everyone will need to either wash or sanitize their hands with facility provided hand sanitizer. A minimum of 6’ separation between all employees and customers in all interactions is required. Congregations of no more than 5 people will be allowed in common areas. Masks must be worn at ALL times. The Club will have disposable masks to offer, but please bring your own if possible.
- As part of initial check-in, every member will have their temperature taken and be required to sign a waiver of consent and commitment to the facility’s reopening policies. Individuals will not be permitted entry if they have been diagnosed with COVID-19 (have not recovered or are still within the required 14-day quarantine), had symptoms of COVID-19 (within the last 24 hours), or had contact with a person that has or is suspected to have COVID-19 (within the last 14 days).
- *Please note, high risk members are not permitted as part of Phase 2 reopening. High risk clients include people over the age of 65, people with serious underlying medical conditions like chronic lung disease, moderate to severe asthma and people who are immunocompromised.
- Members will be checked in/out to ensure a total headcount within the facility at any given time; allowing for contact tracing if needed and occupancy numbers in real time which may be located via the Club Website and App.
- Check-in at the Front Desk will consist of using either your barcode on the Club App, by showing us your membership card or by providing your first and last name
- Members will need to wear training attire to the facility. Yoga class equipment will not be provided, please bring your own mat, blocks, straps, and blanket to use. The Front Desk will have mats available to purchase. Towel service (other than the small cleaning towels) will not be available. Please bring with you your own water bottle as water fountain use will be restricted to the water bottle filling station only.
- Should the situation arise where a member/staff is identified as positive for COVID-19 and have been in the Club, we will implement contact tracing, members/staff in possible contact will be immediately notified, and areas of identified usage will be closed immediately and extensive hydrostatic spraying performed.
- Daily sanitization of the Club will consist of regular closing of spaces for spraying with the Hydrostatic Sanitization sprayer. All equipment will be sanitized after each use. Doors and windows will be kept open where possible to improve ventilation. Surfaces and high-touch areas will be disinfected throughout the day.
- For those who plan to remain home for a while, we will continue offering our virtual training options.
Suffice it to say, I’m becoming a lot more familiar with my bicycle after neglecting it for several years. But no squash ball hitting in the near future.
Published in Sports
It got recalled. Had holes in it😝
Two possible counters to that. First, the CDC recently put on their website that the virus is “not easily transmissible” on surfaces, which contradicts about three months worth of work done disinfecting surfaces around the World. Second, if you are properly soaped and showered, it shouldn’t matter who you drip on because the germs will have been washed away from your body, at least temporarily.
This leads me to another phenomenon. Most politicians make their decisions based on the oldest out-moded information they can find, and they clutch onto that whether rightly or wrongly. Most of the lockdown orders are based on info we had three months ago, and very few politicians are brave enough to adjust their policies based on new discoveries.
You can hardly find any equipment online via reputable channels.
The stores here are back open. Hope you can find what you need.
What you have to understand is the physics. A rubber squash ball (a squash softball for international softball squash is a hollow rubber ball; the old hardball game of squash played mostly in North America used a solid rubber ball and that game has been retired for about thirty years), with its thin walls and small volume behaves very differently when resting at room temperature than after it has been pelted repeatedly for five minutes, which is the amount of time allowed for a standard warm up of the ball by the players before the start of a match. The forces of friction and bending of the ball surface generate heat, which is absorbed by the contained air inside the ball, increasing the internal pressure and stiffening the walls of the ball against compression when bouncing off surfaces and floors. After a long session, the ball loses some of its surface texture and will feel noticeably warming and even give off a faint scent of heated or burning rubber. It also has a tendency within the space of two or three games to lose enough minute amount of surface thickness that will decrease both wall resistance to deflection as well as decrease its rotational momentum, making it easier to convert tangential contact into ball rotation, effectively making the ball ‘softer’ and able to sit down when hitting balls into the corners. This is the basis for players being permitted to request a ball change to start with a new ball after three games of a match. A squash match is usually best of five games to eleven points based on the point-a-rally system (previously referred to as the American scoring system).
I don’t remember if Robin ever said, “Holy toilet paper, Batman.”
Interesting. The last time I touched a squash ball was back in the early 80’s and I was singularly unimpressed. I appreciate your explanation.
You have not seen exciting sports until you have watched professional squash played. I suggest you go to YouTube and search on pro squash and watch a match or two. It is a far cry from pro tennis, which is similar only that they are both racquet sports. Tennis is so boring, no rally goes much beyond two volleys. Just watch a pro squash match.
Sounds exciting, but they really gotta change that name. “Squash” sounds too much like an icky verb or a vegetable. How about “Wallball?”
It’s almost as exciting as cricket! Or Croquet! :)
Just teasing!
I like Chess. It can be unbelievably exciting!
It’s been used. I used to play “wallyball”. it’s basically volleyball played on a racquetball court, with an oversized racquetball, and the walls are in play. Teams of 4 or 6, IIRC.
It was a hell of a workout!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wallyball