ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Governor DeSantis is planning to make an announcement around the reopening and management of gyms in Florida, Friday.
Gym owners and trainers are eager to hear the news, hopeful that will mean their inclusion in the list of businesses that have been able to reopen under Phase One of the governor's plan.
“If you are going to let people into the grocery store and you are going to let people into all these other spots, and take the right action, there is no need that, no reason that a gym can’t go above and beyond to do the same thing," personal trainer Kellie Grueninger said.
Allison Hiles was inside her Anytime Fitness in Pinellas Park, cleaning it in anticipation of being able to reopen, "we have been cleaning, repairing equipment, just sprucing everything up.”
Some gyms are roping off certain equipment and putting markings on the ground to help keep customers six feet apart. “We have a dedicated person that will make sure people are being policed outside, inside. On the gym floor. At sign up," Travis LaBazzo, co-owner of Amped Fitness said.
LaBazzo has caught attention for his protests to open up gyms and get his employees back to work. Now, he wants to make sure he does it right. “We have floaters that are just going to go around and clean.”
Only members will be allowed and time limits are being used to keep them spaced out. “With the situation that we are faced with now, we can’t do that. So we have an hour time limit for every member," Labazzo said.
Amber Clayton, at Central Cycling, is bringing back bikes loaned to health care workers and members.
"So we have 40 bikes total, we got 20 of those bikes back. And now we are waiting to see if we can open at half capacity," Clayton said.
Clayton is adjusting cycling classes for cleaning time, "longer time between classes so that we can detail and clean each bike that was used.” And preventing unnecessary touching of objects, "we'll have the doors open so there will be less hand touching of things. We will clean the lockers.”
While Phase One encourages scheduling the use of equipment, it also says indoor classes are prohibited. So Clayton is hoping for the best:
“It is a little bit of a contradiction. But I do hope again that he’s going to go with his latest response that he plans on opening gyms sooner than later."
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