Kitting out a new gym

paul moran

After many years searching.....

we have just agreed terms to move our classes to a 3000 sq/ft warehouse in Deansgrange and I was hoping for some help from those who have already taken the plunge with their own gyms? We will be running our Kung Fu, Tai chi, weapons and San shou classes from here and hope to also rent out the space for any mma instructors interested in running their classes or moving their operation to our new academy.

I am going to floor part of the unit with wood for my Tai chi classes and for aerobics etc and the rest will be a 20mm foam jigsaw mat.

The best deal I have seen for the jigsaw mats so far has been from www.protecboxing.com. Has anyone had any dealing with these guys or any other contacts for this kind of matting?

I am also looking to put matting on one or two walls (or at least part of them) and am looking to do this with some old judo mats and perhaps buy a grapping cover to go over them and along the floor, which will also have judo mats on top of the jigsaw mats mentioned above! Can you guys suggest how I can fix these to walls without destroying the mats or can you advise me on a better way to do this rather than using the judo mats?

I hope to put up a load of bags and balls and want to put up a bunch of good solid brackets. Has anyone got a contact for these and also for someone to fit them correctly? I have so many brackets fall out of the wall and nearly kill kids training in my time boxing;-)

I would ideally like to put chin up bars and rings as well as some cardio and weights in the new place? What would you advise I invest in I was thinking of a rower, bike and elliptical trainer as well as a good solid bench and smith machine with the free weights and bars to go with them? What else would you invest in? Where would you advise I go for the weights, Cardio equipment and rings/chinny bars?

If my budget stretches far enough I might invest in a boxing ring? Any suggestions as to where I can pick one up?

General advise! If you have any suggestions or can advise me on pitfalls to avoid while moving, I would really appreciate any advise!

Cheers lads,

Paul

shoutman

The owner of http://irish-lifting.com is a member on here, you could PM him and ask.

His sn on here is mickk

David Jones

Sent you a PM Paul.

paul moran

Hey David.

I replied to your pm.

Cheers

Roper

I would suggest only getting what you need and then adding that later. Premises are expensive to upkeep and every penny you spend now is a penny off your bottom line as you pay it back. I got some kit early on that I thought would be deadly to have but it ended up just being expensive coat hanging space. I'd add as you go and assess demand.

If you can hang bags etc. from the ceiling or rafter/rsj do it that way. I've yet to see a wall bracket not come out of a wall after consistent use with a decent heavy bag. Failing that, it might be best to get someone to make a heavy bag frame for you. We're lucky enough in that in Informed Performance the Muay Thai gym is going in under our mezzanine which means plenty of steel to hang from. Right now I have the world's most precarious bolts holding up the bags!

I would contact MickK as he's a bit like Morgan Freeman's character in The Shawshank Redemption- he's a man who can get things. Even ask him about matting.