No gym in UCD in May-January?

monkey90

Is this for real? Does anyone know of any good gyms that are within cycling distance that'll take you on for just the few months at a reasonable price for students?

Also, has it been confirmed what the membership situation will be for the new gym? i.e. are all students automatically members once they pay their registration fee (ala TCD) or what?

rebecca1988

"apparently" UCD might be taking over crunch when crunch staff etc leave!!! but i highly dout it!!!!

WeeBushy

There was an article about this in the observer a while ago:

http://www.universityobserver.ie/2011/03/29/crunch-fitness-to-close-in-june/

DL Saint

monkey90 wrote: »

Is this for real? Does anyone know of any good gyms that are within cycling distance that'll take you on for just the few months at a reasonable price for students?

Also, has it been confirmed what the membership situation will be for the new gym? i.e. are all students automatically members once they pay their registration fee (ala TCD) or what?

Hey, have a look at the following gyms:

http://www.rawcondition.com/ is situated in portobello, 10-15 minute cycle away from UCD and it is a high standard gym at reasonable rates.

http://www.simplyfitness.ie/ takes 5-10 minutes to cycle to from UCD, it's a standard gym that offers decent enough rates.

These two gyms both offer good rates for students. As well as this they are both no frills type of gyms. I recommend RAW if you are dedicated to your gym work.

WeeBushy

monkey90 wrote: »

Also, has it been confirmed what the membership situation will be for the new gym? i.e. are all students automatically members once they pay their registration fee (ala TCD) or what?

And just to answer this bit, it will be free for current students and there will be a discount price for alumni.

It hasn't been announced yet if it will be 'free' like in Trinity whereby ~€70 is added to the registration fee for everyone and its free that way, or if it will be genuinely free.

I reckon the student levy fee will go towards the cost of gym memberships for all students, but I'm just speculating.

Mardy Bum

WeeBushy wrote: »

And just to answer this bit, it will be free for current students and there will be a discount price for alumni.

This a bloody joke. There is no way UCD can come up with a legitimate reason for making alumni pay, who have paid hundreds of euro for the building whilst letting current students use it for free. I don't care if students have no money and deserve to use it for free, if they have no money they wouldn't pay for a gym membership in the first place.

There should be at least a years free membership for past students who have paid the fee in their registration.

themont85

Mardy Bum wrote: »

This a bloody joke. There is no way UCD can come up with a legitimate reason for making alumni pay, who have paid hundreds of euro for the building whilst letting current students use it for free. I don't care if students have no money and deserve to use it for free, if they have no money they wouldn't pay for a gym membership in the first place.

There should be at least a years free membership for past students who have paid the fee in their registration.

The first difficulty would be accomadating everybody for free, ie current students and alumni of maybe 5/6 years who have paid some form of levy. That's a lot of people when you add it all together. Such a situation would no doubt lead to the place being jammed all the time. They would find it very difficult to get anyone outside of these people to pay for a gym then where it is packed all the time. How would they fund the day to day operations?

Some form of discount should definately be brought in for 5 or 6 years for those who have paid though.

Mardy Bum

themont85 wrote: »

The first difficulty would be accomadating everybody for free, ie current students and alumni of maybe 5/6 years who have paid some form of levy. That's a lot of people when you add it all together. Such a situation would no doubt lead to the place being jammed all the time. They would find it very difficult to get anyone outside of these people to pay for a gym then where it is packed all the time. How would they fund the day to day operations?

Some form of discount should definately be brought in for 5 or 6 years for those who have paid though.

Well you would expect a decent size gym and not something that resembles Crunch in anyway. I would expect something more along the lines of an American College's Rec Centre and not just a few treadmills and machines. Obviously students will be paying off the centre for a number of years to come but I am sure some system could be put in place which is not discriminatory. Even a waiting list say for those alumni who want to use it for free and then those alumni who want to use it immediately could pay a discounted fee.

bnt

Back at the end of January, Crunch offered a discounted 5-month Feb-June package which I took - which implied at the time that it would be open till the end of June. The original plan was to close Crunch when the new Student Centre gym opened, but that has been delayed. It stands to reason that Crunch would want to delay their closure somehow, the question is whether it would be financially viable.

(Personally, I'll be OK if they close - the kind of training I'm doing doesn't really require a gym, it's not that technical.)

RandolphEsq

I find I don't miss a gym at all since I found out Crunch was closing so didn't renew. Running outdoors is fantastic (since I got proper shoes) and the exercises you can do with pull up bars and dip bars in Deer Park is definitely better than lifting weights in a gym. Makes me feel like Bear Grylls!

Blut2

If the new gym is going to be free for all students its going to be awfully packed / full of idiots with no idea what theyre doing wasting space I'd say, thats unfortunate. Hopefully theyll implement a token yearly fee at least to keep the worst wasters away, 50e or something.

WeeBushy

RandolphEsq wrote: »

I find I don't miss a gym at all since I found out Crunch was closing so didn't renew. Running outdoors is fantastic (since I got proper shoes) and the exercises you can do with pull up bars and dip bars in Deer Park is definitely better than lifting weights in a gym. Makes me feel like Bear Grylls!

Would always do cardio outside, nothing more soul destroying that running/cycling in a gym imo.

However, there is no outdoor substitution for heavy weights. You can do bodyweight exercises outside the gym but I've yet to find any naturally occuring dumbells that reach 30kg+, squat racks etc. It depends on what you are doing but there are certain things that just can't be done outside the gym.

On Topic - the article I refered to above does suggest that UCD might keep a gym open where Crunch is under their own mangement until the new gym is ready. I would be all for that, especially as the people who work in Crunch are generally rude and/or incompetant.

RandolphEsq

WeeBushy wrote: »

Would always do cardio outside, nothing more soul destroying that running/cycling in a gym imo.

However, there is no outdoor substitution for heavy weights. You can do bodyweight exercises outside the gym but I've yet to find any naturally occuring dumbells that reach 30kg+, squat racks etc. It depends on what you are doing but there are certain things that just can't be done outside the gym.

On Topic - the article I refered to above does suggest that UCD might keep a gym open where Crunch is under their own mangement until the new gym is ready. I would be all for that, especially as the people who work in Crunch are generally rude and/or incompetant.

For the reasons that the vast majority go to a gym (to look good), those exercises will get you ripped combined with diet and cardio and a lot of motivation. So people really shouldn't be concerned about there being no gym

WeeBushy

RandolphEsq wrote: »

For the reasons that the vast majority go to a gym (to look good), those exercises will get you ripped combined with diet and cardio and a lot of motivation. So people really shouldn't be concerned about there being no gym

I'm aware of this but I wasn't talking about most people, twas just talking about myself or others who lift heavy. For myself pullup bars in the park would be no good.

TimeToShine

WeeBushy wrote: »

Would always do cardio outside, nothing more soul destroying that running/cycling in a gym imo.

However, there is no outdoor substitution for heavy weights. You can do bodyweight exercises outside the gym but I've yet to find any naturally occuring dumbells that reach 30kg+, squat racks etc. It depends on what you are doing but there are certain things that just can't be done outside the gym.

On Topic - the article I refered to above does suggest that UCD might keep a gym open where Crunch is under their own mangement until the new gym is ready. I would be all for that, especially as the people who work in Crunch are generally rude and/or incompetant.

I've literally seen one person using the squat rack besides me all year.

DL Saint

RandolphEsq wrote: »

For the reasons that the vast majority go to a gym (to look good), those exercises will get you ripped combined with diet and cardio and a lot of motivation. So people really shouldn't be concerned about there being no gym

Ok, I am afraid I am going to have to disagree with you on this one. Many of the people in UCD Crunch (men especialy), go to put on muscle mass and then get shredded for the summer months. Now while I do agree with you that there are great bodyweight substitutes for weights, this can only go so far.

Pullups and Chinups are good exercises for back development, they widen the lats a fair amount, they also work the biceps as a secondary muscle. However they will not help the development of the lower back or rhomboids the same way that say deadlifting would. They also would not be very good for back thickness, more just width and tone. Dips are fine but they only work one head of the tricep of which there are three. Push-ups can only go so far to developing the chest.

Also their are many people who go to the gym, lift weights and would not be able to perform bodyweight exercises as they are to heavy/bulky. It's all fine doing cardio and playground workouts during the summer sunny months but this is Ireland, do you expect people to be out in the park running and swinging off bars when it is lashing rain out during the winter months? My final point is that gyms are in a closed enviroment. Alot of people like to use them to workout because they are too self-conscious to get all sweaty and exhausted looking out in public. It is for these resons that their is no substitute for the gym and it is unacceptable for UCD/Crunch to leave the students hanging if that is the case.

Regards,
DL Saint

errlloyd

So students would have free crunch for the summer?

WeeBushy

TimeToShine wrote: »

I've literally seen one person using the squat rack besides me all year.

Maybe it was me I know quite a lot of people who are serious athletes and use it regularly. But as i said in my post just above yours, i was talking about myself.

No ide where that cool face smiley came from or how to get rid of him on my phone...you can ignore him. Unwelcome b@stard.

Hanley

If you want to use a proper gym near UCD, this is probably the place to go - http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001346671931

WeeBushy

Hanley wrote: »

If you want to use a proper gym near UCD, this is probably the place to go - http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001346671931

+1 on that. I know one of the guys who part owns it, they have a seriously good set up there.

supernutrino

I'm not really going to miss Crunch. I didn't renew this year and workout at home.

It had many flaws:

• The weights room was TINY, you were elbow to elbow with people at busy times.
• I went in the am because if you went around 4-5 the weights room was like a sauna, really hot crowded and uncomfortable.
• Lads didn't put the weights back in the right order (or sometimes just left them on the floor in random places)
• It was painful to watch some guys who didn't quite know what they were doin competing with their mates for benchpress etc instead of actually working to their own goals and their own programme.

The only advantage it had over the Crunch Dun Laoghaire branch is the lack of naked old men (in DL they seem to hand around naked for an unnecessary amount of time, instead of just getting changed and moving on)


As for the poster wondering out loud if the new gym will be free, or "free" (with a hike in reg fee), given UCD's history I think we already know the answer to that, they're already starting to dick us about saying the pool will only be available to students "some of the time"...this is how the whole uni's facilities are going to go, govt starves them of funding so they have to pimp everything out for private dosh, to our detriment, they're making monopoly deals with Pepsi ffsake, course they're gonna limit the new gym access and charge up the hilt for it.


I agree on a token fee to keep wasters away though, but that won't get rid of the ones who don't know what they were doing, having to pay 185euro for Crunch didn't stop them going there :P

RandolphEsq

DL Saint wrote: »

Ok, I am afraid I am going to have to disagree with you on this one. Many of the people in UCD Crunch (men especialy), go to put on muscle mass and then get shredded for the summer months. Now while I do agree with you that there are great bodyweight substitutes for weights, this can only go so far.

Pullups and Chinups are good exercises for back development, they widen the lats a fair amount, they also work the biceps as a secondary muscle. However they will not help the development of the lower back or rhomboids the same way that say deadlifting would. They also would not be very good for back thickness, more just width and tone. Dips are fine but they only work one head of the tricep of which there are three. Push-ups can only go so far to developing the chest.

Also their are many people who go to the gym, lift weights and would not be able to perform bodyweight exercises as they are too heavy/bulky. It's all fine doing cardio and playground workouts during the summer sunny months but this is Ireland, do you expect people to be out in the park running and swinging off bars when it is lashing rain out during the winter months? My final point is that gyms are in a closed enviroment. Alot of people like to use them to workout because they are too self-conscious to get all sweaty and exhausted looking out in public. It is for these resons that their is no substitute for the gym and it is unacceptable for UCD/Crunch to leave the students hanging if that is the case.

Regards,
DL Saint

Getting ripped is possible without going to the gym. People buy into the whole 'you need to work all these specific muscles and can only do so in a gym'. That is blatantly not the case. Guys that only want to get a good-looking body do not need a gym for that. For specialised muscle development yes go to a gym, if you wanted to work for a sport or something particular. But your run-of-the-mill bloke does not need a gym. Do a few months of running training, dieting, bodyweight exercises and the gym will not be missed by the average person who uses it. Rain and cold should not stop people who are properly motivated about exercise.

exam88

Is the gym in UCD shut now or what?

WeeBushy

Nope. 16th of June is the closing date afaik.

coach22

the gym is remaining open until 2012 now folks

Mardy Bum

January 2012 or till the end of semester two next year?

coach22

Mardy Bum wrote: »

January 2012 or till the end of semester two next year?

not 100% sure to be honest but id presume just until january 2012. hopefully the new gym will be open by then

NotExactly

I'm hoping to go to UCD in September and i'm just wondering what the Gym there is like ATM and will the new GYM be open for September? Thanks.

WeeBushy

NotExactly wrote: »

I'm hoping to go to UCD in September and i'm just wondering what the Gym there is like ATM and will the new GYM be open for September? Thanks.

The current gym is grand. Everything is old and not everything works properly but its cheap. And the weights weigh the same as everywhere else even if they are old. It gets busy after lunch time and is always messy. Staff aren't the friendliest or most helpful but for c. €180 for a years subscription its fine.

The new gym is going to be very very good but won't be open until January of next year as a result of a few delays. It was originally supposed to open in September. The current gym was scheduled to close in mid-june but they texted members today to say it will stay open until 2012, so I'm presuming that is until the new one is finished.

WeeBushy

Bump.

Got a text from Crunch the other day:

CrunchUCD NEWS! Amazing renewal offer is coming this Monday! 10,5mth STUDENT m/ship (until end of April 2012) ONLY ac175 Don't miss out!

Leaving aside the shitness of the text, we definitely won't be without a gym at all. I wonder does that mean the new one has been postponed even longer than January, however.

NotExactly

WeeBushy wrote: »

The new gym is going to be very very good but won't be open until January of next year as a result of a few delays. It was originally supposed to open in September.

What would be the best thing to do between September and January,Could I get 3 months membership in a Gym nearby?