Sizing Up Your Surface

Flooring a Multi-Use Fitness Center

Choosing the appropriate floor surface in a fitness center can be challenging because you'll have distinctly different needs within the same space. For example, you'll have a weight training area that might be directly adjacent to an indoor jogging track. For the weight area you would want a denser surface and for the jogging area a softer more resilient synthetic training surface. You can have two products of the same thickness, but one is hard for the abuse that it takes from free weights and fitness activities, while the track is softer so as to be a little bit friendlier to the end user.

Begin by telling the architect (or designer) what you are trying to accomplish in the space, and who is going to be using it. If it is a cardio room compared to a cardio/dance space, that's something owners need to communicate to make clear in order for the architect to deliver the correct floor that will function properly.

There are essentially two ways to approach the challenge of the multi-use space: One is to find a mid-range flooring surface that handles most, if not all of those activities and lay that floor down in the entire space. It could be all poured rubber. "Young people might not like that," McCausland said, "but they can put mats down and do their thing, like yoga. Basketball guys might not like poured rubber as opposed to a hardwood floor but they can play on it. That's one approach."

What is more common is to take a look at your space and, without being too specific about it, order flooring that is appropriate to each activity. "So, if I had a yoga studio or a fitness room that accommodates high-intensity training, you could do that on a vinyl floor, on a modular floor, even on a rubber floor," McCausland said. "There are some facilities that might do that room with wood. I think you have to be careful when looking at really high-end applications. If you have power lifters or football players doing weight training in your fitness center, you need to have surfaces, such as a really dense rubber, that will stand up to that."

Something that has become popular is a weight platform. The platform is 10 feet square and raised up maybe 4 to 6 inches above the ground and they are designed to take the pounding when a weight lifter drops a barbell. You can put that platform on top of your existing floor, making it portable. If you want to relocate it somewhere else in the facility's space, the move is easily accomplished.

A wood floor component can sometimes be appropriate for an aerobics room or group exercise room. In those spaces, you might hold a yoga class where students sit on mats, a spinning class where they roll out bikes, or a body sculpting class where it is more core training.