Gym owners offer tips on keeping up the resolution
We all know at least one. They’re the folks who, after subsisting the past two months on holiday treats and leftover casseroles, stare down the final minutes of the year and pledge ad nauseum that next year, they will get in shape.
The New Year’s resolution to get in shape seems to reflect the American adage of being a selfmade success, an individual who amounts to worth.
These are the people who supplant their nightly post-work rituals of TV streams and delivery apps with regularly scheduled discomfort. They will now subsist on berries, bench presses and banana-flavored protein shakes. Until they won’t.
A 2019 poll by NPR and The Marist found that the year-end resolution to exercise more is the most common that people make, and one of the most common that people give up, usually within a few months. In short, The “new year, new me,” is a mantra that dies by March and is often rolled over by the same repeat offenders.
In the face of a Kern County winter, when it’s cold, dark by early evening, and the air quality is shabby at best, this commitment is made and broken at a gym.
If this is you, worry not: Several gyms in the Bakersfield area offered advice on how to follow through with your New Year’s cliche.
“Industry-wide, January is a crazy time,” said Blake Burnard, owner of Grindhäus Strength and Conditioning on Shellabarger Road. “The psychological aftereffect of turning a new leaf in a calendar year typically brings new bodies into the gym. We tell our members to be accepting, as it can be intimidating, especially for people who fell off the wagon for a couple years.”
Burnard said that when he opened his gym in 2020, it attracted a lot of people amid a lockdown that forced closure upon many independent spots. “We filled an obvious need,” he said.
What brings his clientele to the gym and keeps them there isn’t some cheap exercise fad or newfangled equipment. It is instead the grueling, toiling habit of consistency, something he advises interested parties to start well before they sign up.
“It’s all about habits, you know,” Burnard said. “Ultimately, the best workout program or gym or regimen for someone is consistency. Not some crazy bootcamp or starvation diet that will get momentary
results that will end in some unfavorable outcome.”
Either way, by spring, many gyms nationwide see a steady decline in memberships. Some studies see people quitting as early as January. While some people have a naturally positive mania for exercise, like those Burnard said often seek out his gym, others need a kick in the asanas to get motivated.
“It’s all about taking that first step,’’ said Dave Davis, a studio manager at YogaSix on Ming Avenue. “Then take the next step and keep doing that.”
Corey Brightwell, CEO and co-founder of the Chuze Fitness chain, is optimistic. He believes there are some “nice tailwinds” for an ailing fitness industry going into the new year.
Three years of mask mandates, social distancing and virus variants caused the $87 billion U.S. fitness industry to take major hits. Most of it affected small, independent shops who couldn’t wait out the pandemic.
“In March 2020, things became irregular, and going into 2021, there came a lot of restrictions like mask mandates and at the start of 2022, we had Omicron and that kept a lot of people out of the gyms,” Brightwell said. “This year will be the most return to normal that we’ve seen in a few years.”
With the onset of the pandemic came a renewed interest in achieving mental wellness. A sharp rise in meditation and mindfulness apps coincided with the reported symptoms of burnout and isolation that came with lockdown.
Whereas in the past fitness involved cajoling, guilt-tripping and science-splaining oneself into exercise, President Francesca Schuler of the California Fitness Alliance said a more contemporary approach, and ultimately more profitable one, focuses on achieving a sense of community and mental wellbeing.
“This year is going to be interesting,” Schuler said. “There’s no question that in the last couple years there has been an increased awareness of how physical activity helps your mental health. That will be a big shift we will see in the type of New Year’s resolutions.”
Schuler said that many businesses have since tweaked the messaging toward a focus on the holistic nature of exercise to bring about physical and mental wellbeing. And sure, better equipment, promotions and maybe a new sauna are all pluses to a gym. But Schuler insisted that a trending incentive is offering more group classes.
“We’ve already seen a lot of gyms leaning away from the traditional formula of strength and cardio equipment and features,” Schuler said. “There is now instead an increase in community classes — the social community element, like Zumba or group fitness. There is an increased need to work out with other people.”