Gym floor damaged within two weeks of Gym opening

The newly refurbished gym closed its strength and conditioning section just two weeks after opening when the weightlifting platform was damaged.

The platform broke when someone was deadlifting at around mid-afternoon on Thursday 21 February.
Jack Fairweather, second-year Engineering undergraduate, was a witness to the scene. He said: “They were performing the lift and then dropping the weight, which is a perfectly valid technique.”

According to Mr Fairweather, the floor did not crack but “walking over the sections where the floor is broken causes you to sink slightly.It is broken at the areas where the weights were dropped”.

He added: “The top surface was still intact the last time I was in there… I highly doubt it was broken beforehand as the gym had opened only a couple of days earlier.”

When asked what he would attribute the damage of the platform to, Jack replied: “I would probably say it was down to Warwick Sport cutting costs, buying equipment that outwardly appeared to do the job, but practically was not up to standard.

“The weightlifter is allowed to drop the weights, that is what a floor like that is designed for…[and] the weights that the guy was lifting were not excessive.”

He continued to suggest that the strength and conditioning equipment in the lifestyle gym had been downgraded from the previous strength and conditioning room.

“Weight plates that are designed to be dropped are designed slightly differently from weights that aren’t.

“Warwick Sport had these plates [for deadlifting] in the previous strength and conditioning room, but I didn’t see them in the new area of the gym.”

For the time being, the strength and conditioning section of the new lifestyle gym has been temporarily shut.

The Warwick Lifestyle Team emailed its members the following Tuesday: “The floor is not strong enough for lifting… We are extremely sorry for any inconvenience caused to our members and we will have a further update on the re-opening of the room this Thursday.” Gym members have told the _Boar_ that they are yet to receive a further email.