New York
DailyExpertNews
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Are you planning to hit the gym during rush hour? You’ll have much better luck finding an open elliptical cross trainer than you will with the 30-pound bench press, squat rack, or dumbbells.
Strength training — also known as weight training or resistance training — has exploded in popularity, driven by new research on its health benefits, the growth of high-intensity gyms like CrossFit, and more women breaking down stereotypes that bodybuilding is only for men. It’s just the latest in a series of radical shifts over decades in the way Americans train.
The pandemic has pushed more people into weight training, gym owners and industry experts say. After gyms reopened in late 2020 and early 2021 due to Covid-19 safety restrictions, more people rushed to lift weights and use equipment they couldn’t access at home.
After the pandemic, the surge in popularity of weight training has helped the gym industry recover. Gym memberships in the United States are up 3.6% in 2021 from pre-pandemic levels, according to the latest data from IHRSA, a trade association for the fitness industry.
Strength training is the most popular workout class booked in the last two years, according to ClassPass, a subscription-based fitness app. In 2022 there was a 94% increase in strength training classes over the previous year.
“Strength training has become so much more embraced and accepted for all sorts of outcomes — aesthetics, weight loss, bone health, and balance,” says Natalia Mehlman Petrzela, an associate professor of history at the New School and author of “Fit Nation: The Gains and Pains of America’s Exercise Obsession.”
At the same time, the use of stationary cardio equipment such as cross trainers and treadmills in gyms has declined.
‘There is [fewer] minutes spent on cardio [compared] to pre-Covid,” Planet Fitness CEO Chris Rondeau said on an earnings call on Thursday. Planet Fitness members are doing more strength training and functional exercises like pushups and squats, he said.
Planet Fitness (PLNT) is reducing the space available in some gyms for cardio and adding more space for functional training and kettlebell workouts. (Planet Fitness (PLNT) stock has fully recovered from a Covid-related slide, hitting an all-time high last year as Life Time rose 17%.)
Changes in the way people train have forced gyms to adapt, with new designs for gyms featuring more dumbbell and squat racks and open spaces for lunges, deadlifts and other weight exercises.
“In the past it was ‘let’s cram as much equipment into these rooms as possible,'” says Daniel Allen, an architect who has designed residential and commercial gyms across the country. “Now it’s ‘how much free space can we add?'”
“There are always people doing kettlebells,” he said. “We base a lot of our original layouts on keeping an open zone for those drills.”
The growth of strength training is a change from how Americans exercised for much of the last century.
During the early decades of the twentieth century, gyms were considered “sweaty dungeons,” and the men who lifted weights there were viewed as “unintelligent or exhausted,” writes Petrzela in “Fit Nation.”
“People thought I was a charlatan and a lunatic,” remembers Jack LaLanne, founder of the modern fitness movement, who first opened a club in Oakland, California, in 1938. would give people everything from heart attacks to hemorrhoids.”
There was also a suspicion of women exercising who feared it would affect fertility.
Women usually went to separate “slimming salons” or “slimming salons,” often adjacent to beauty parlors, to lose weight, Petrzela said.
An ad for a mid-century weight-loss machine told women they could do minimal physical activity to lose weight: “Relax in luxurious comfort… no jumping from one machine to another.”
In 1968 Dr. Kenneth Cooper “Aerobics,” a bestseller that encouraged running, jogging and swimming to improve health and reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease. Cooper’s book sparked a cardio revolution and was popularized by Jane Fonda’s VHS workout videos.
The advent of Nautilus and Universal weight training equipment in the 1970s and 1980s made weightlifting more attractive to a wider audience. These machines were approachable and had adjustable weight plates that were easy to use.
Nautilus machines helped bring strength training into the wider mix of exercises. Clubs with Nautilus to their name and the company’s gear inside started popping up all over the country.
But nowadays, free weights have become the more popular form of strength training. And weightlifting has grown in recent years, thanks in part to new research on its benefits.
The latest federal health guidelines recommend at least two sessions per week of moderate- or high-intensity muscle-strengthening activities that involve all major muscle groups.
The rise of CrossFit has also led to high-intensity squat rack workouts becoming more popular with the wider public, especially women.
“Before CrossFit, that kind of equipment was associated with bodybuilding,” Petrzela said. “Seeing a lot of people do that for functional fitness has demystified it.”
Gale Landers, CEO of Fitness Formula Clubs in Chicago, said his clubs have removed 10% to 15% of cardio equipment to make way for more free weights and benches. Fitness Formula has also added grassy areas where people can exercise functionally.
At Genesis Health Clubs, a chain of 61 gyms primarily in the Midwest, “you go in and see all the squat racks are full,” said CEO Rodney Steven.
Genesis clubs have added more squat and barbell racks to keep up with the demand for strength training and reduced cardio areas.
“Free weights are the biggest increase we’ve seen in any of our clubs,” said Steven. “Everyone uses dumbbells.”
