Gym equipment or a fully-fledged gym is no longer an extra that hotels offer to their guests. Fitness is now a necessity – one that is looked at before reservation, not after check-in.
In fact, several gym equipment manufacturers are confident that in the next five to 10 years it will be expected of a luxury hotel to provide fitness – just as a guest expects that there be a mini-bar in hotel room and that someone put fresh towels each day, one would expect a mini gym.
Anecdotes at super luxury hotels have it that there have been instances of guests appreciating their equipment so much that they took it home! Senior Techonogym personnel tell Hotelier India that a high-powered guest who stayed at Abu Dhabi’s Emirates Palace liked the equipment in the hotel gym so much that he had it brought to his suite. Once he used it for a few days, he liked it so much that he took it home.
Abhishek Panshikar, rooms division manager, Trident, Bandra Kurla, Mumbai, says that the demand for fitness as an integral part of a hotel’s services and facilities has also emerged from the corporate segment, “For some companies it is a pre-requisite that the hotel in which their executives stay should have a full-fledged fitness centre, complete with cardio and strength equipment.”
And of course, as guests become increasingly health-conscious, gym equipment in the hotel needs to keep up with trends outside of the world of hospitality.
Manoj Chauhan, manager, Rejuve Spa, InterContinental The Lalit, Mumbai says, “There has been a significant shift in fitness trends over the last few years. Exercise-minded guests check out the fitness facility at a hotel before making reservations. Hotels have realised that fitness solutions occupy an important place in the bouquet of services they offer. Hotels are investing in developing and upgrading in-house gyms.”
Hotel gyms, which were once just added on as an afterthought, have now become an integral part of the facilities that the hotel offers its customers. And it’s not just any gym.
Dr Girish Baria, spa and recreation manager at The Westin Pune Koregaon Park, says, “The gymnasium at a hotel is a continuation of daily fitness activity back home. It is priceless for those who understand how difficult it is to be back once you’ve had a break or even a day’s gap in your fitness routine. The gym at the hotel is prized much more than the cost incurred for the hotel room.”
Technogym, a major gym equipment supplier developed equipment for Michael Schumacher that is used by Formula One drivers. While gym equipment manufacturers make equipment prototype based on international sports stars, five star hotels often have these guests testing their equipment. The gym at Delhi’s ITC Maurya, for instance, is a hot favourite with the various IPL teams who stayed at the hotel. And while the gym equipment is the best, it is the trainer that is said to be the differentiator.
Atull Bhalla, manager, ITC Maurya, Delhi, says, “We can confidently say that our fitness trainers are indeed some of the best. All gyms may have the exact same equipment, but what makes a difference is the trainer. They are the differentiators and hence our biggest USP.”
Destinations make a difference – depending on where the hotel is, the gym is equipped to cater to different types of guests. Resorts and city hotels have different requirements. At Le Meridien Jaipur, the Spa Manager, Dr Manoj Acharya, a holistic medicine expert, is in-charge of the gym.
Trainers and instructors are the value-addition. At hotels, fitness instructors learn to work with short-stay or regular guests to complement their already existing regime. Says Husnavaz Dastur, manager, Fitness Centre Oberoi, “The instructors ensure each guests adequately warms up prior to beginning their fitness routine; they devise personalised fitness regimes as per guest requirement and they recommend a healthy diet to complement the fitness programme, on request.”
Hotel gyms also work differently from other gyms in that they stay open at hours that are convenient to the guest. The gym at InterContinental The Lalit, for instance, is operational 24-hours, is manned by certified fitness trainers round-the-clock, offers newly upgraded cardio equipments and all cardio equipments are equipped with in-built LCD screen and iPod
docking station.
The one way in which hotel gyms score is the size, comfort and equipment. Says Anuj Prakash, VP and GM, The Resort, Mumbai, “Our gym is more than 2000 sq ft, and a part of the larger ‘Bodyscape’ spa. We have treadmills, cross trainers, exercycles – both upright and recumbent, and an entire variety of strength equipment, which are muscle specific.”
The Trident Fitness Centre at Nariman Point is approximately 2475 sq ft in size. It includes cardio equipment such as treadmills, bicycle, cross trainers, rowing machines, free weights, Swiss balls and other fitness essentials.
In terms of equipment too, each hotel strives to be the best. While Trident BKC has got its fitness centre equipment from Life fitness, USA, at Le Meridien Jaipur, Treadmills and cross trainers are procured from Italy and the remaining equipment is procured from India. At The Resort Mumbai, both the strength equipment and the cardio weight equipment are imported from the US, the former from Flex and the latter from Star Trac.
“The gym equipment in our hotel is from TechnoGym and is imported from Italy,” says Chauhan, Rejuve Spa, Manager.
Maintenance of a gym is crucial if excellent service has to be provided to the guests. Hotels understand that and make adequate arrangements. “There is a quarterly preventive maintenance schedule for each piece of equipment in the fitness centre. The upgrade changes are done as and when a new product is available in the market or if there is an increased request for a particular piece of equipment,” says Panshikar, Trident BKC.
Dastur of Oberoi adds, “The equipment at the fitness centre is cleaned with sanitizers twice every day and serviced every two and a half months by engineers from Life Fitness.”
Anuj Prakash of Resort is equally particular. He says, “We have a daily and monthly preventive maintenance schedule for the gym equipment. In the morning when the gym instructors open the gym they have to clean and wipe the equipment and check them for any maintenance as per the preventive maintenance check list. The monthly preventive maintenance as well as the yearly maintenance is outsourced to a renowned consultant certified by the manufacturers.”
Sushil Sharma, Manager, Westin Mumbai, says, “We have an AMC with supplier TechnoGym to maintain all the equipment on a routine basis. Considering that we are just in the second year of our opening we will only upgrade or change equipment on a need to basis.”
Dr Acharya of Le Merdien Jaipur, says, “The gym equipment is regularly inspected by our engineering department. For cardio equipments, an AMC has been made where the concerned company engineer comes every four months to inspect the instruments and rectify the problems, if any.”
While most five star hotel gyms and fitness centres are meant for hotel guests only, The Resort in Mumbai, InterContinental The Lalit, Mumbai and Westin Mumbai and Pune, offer membership to non-guests too.
Fitness first
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Gym equipment or a fully-fledged gym is no longer an extra that hotels offer to their guests. Fitness is now a necessity – one that is looked at before reservation, not after check-in.
In fact, several gym equipment manufacturers are confident that in the next five to 10 years it will be expected of a luxury hotel to provide fitness – just as a guest expects that there be a mini-bar in hotel room and that someone put fresh towels each day, one would expect a mini gym.
Anecdotes at super luxury hotels have it that there have been instances of guests appreciating their equipment so much that they took it home! Senior Techonogym personnel tell Hotelier India that a high-powered guest who stayed at Abu Dhabi’s Emirates Palace liked the equipment in the hotel gym so much that he had it brought to his suite. Once he used it for a few days, he liked it so much that he took it home.
Abhishek Panshikar, rooms division manager, Trident, Bandra Kurla, Mumbai, says that the demand for fitness as an integral part of a hotel’s services and facilities has also emerged from the corporate segment, “For some companies it is a pre-requisite that the hotel in which their executives stay should have a full-fledged fitness centre, complete with cardio and strength equipment.”
And of course, as guests become increasingly health-conscious, gym equipment in the hotel needs to keep up with trends outside of the world of hospitality.
Manoj Chauhan, manager, Rejuve Spa, InterContinental The Lalit, Mumbai says, “There has been a significant shift in fitness trends over the last few years. Exercise-minded guests check out the fitness facility at a hotel before making reservations. Hotels have realised that fitness solutions occupy an important place in the bouquet of services they offer. Hotels are investing in developing and upgrading in-house gyms.”
Hotel gyms, which were once just added on as an afterthought, have now become an integral part of the facilities that the hotel offers its customers. And it’s not just any gym.
Dr Girish Baria, spa and recreation manager at The Westin Pune Koregaon Park, says, “The gymnasium at a hotel is a continuation of daily fitness activity back home. It is priceless for those who understand how difficult it is to be back once you’ve had a break or even a day’s gap in your fitness routine. The gym at the hotel is prized much more than the cost incurred for the hotel room.”
Technogym, a major gym equipment supplier developed equipment for Michael Schumacher that is used by Formula One drivers. While gym equipment manufacturers make equipment prototype based on international sports stars, five star hotels often have these guests testing their equipment. The gym at Delhi’s ITC Maurya, for instance, is a hot favourite with the various IPL teams who stayed at the hotel. And while the gym equipment is the best, it is the trainer that is said to be the differentiator.
Atull Bhalla, manager, ITC Maurya, Delhi, says, “We can confidently say that our fitness trainers are indeed some of the best. All gyms may have the exact same equipment, but what makes a difference is the trainer. They are the differentiators and hence our biggest USP.”
Destinations make a difference – depending on where the hotel is, the gym is equipped to cater to different types of guests. Resorts and city hotels have different requirements. At Le Meridien Jaipur, the Spa Manager, Dr Manoj Acharya, a holistic medicine expert, is in-charge of the gym.
Trainers and instructors are the value-addition. At hotels, fitness instructors learn to work with short-stay or regular guests to complement their already existing regime. Says Husnavaz Dastur, manager, Fitness Centre Oberoi, “The instructors ensure each guests adequately warms up prior to beginning their fitness routine; they devise personalised fitness regimes as per guest requirement and they recommend a healthy diet to complement the fitness programme, on request.”
Hotel gyms also work differently from other gyms in that they stay open at hours that are convenient to the guest. The gym at InterContinental The Lalit, for instance, is operational 24-hours, is manned by certified fitness trainers round-the-clock, offers newly upgraded cardio equipments and all cardio equipments are equipped with in-built LCD screen and iPod
docking station.
The one way in which hotel gyms score is the size, comfort and equipment. Says Anuj Prakash, VP and GM, The Resort, Mumbai, “Our gym is more than 2000 sq ft, and a part of the larger ‘Bodyscape’ spa. We have treadmills, cross trainers, exercycles – both upright and recumbent, and an entire variety of strength equipment, which are muscle specific.”
The Trident Fitness Centre at Nariman Point is approximately 2475 sq ft in size. It includes cardio equipment such as treadmills, bicycle, cross trainers, rowing machines, free weights, Swiss balls and other fitness essentials.
In terms of equipment too, each hotel strives to be the best. While Trident BKC has got its fitness centre equipment from Life fitness, USA, at Le Meridien Jaipur, Treadmills and cross trainers are procured from Italy and the remaining equipment is procured from India. At The Resort Mumbai, both the strength equipment and the cardio weight equipment are imported from the US, the former from Flex and the latter from Star Trac.
“The gym equipment in our hotel is from TechnoGym and is imported from Italy,” says Chauhan, Rejuve Spa, Manager.
Maintenance of a gym is crucial if excellent service has to be provided to the guests. Hotels understand that and make adequate arrangements. “There is a quarterly preventive maintenance schedule for each piece of equipment in the fitness centre. The upgrade changes are done as and when a new product is available in the market or if there is an increased request for a particular piece of equipment,” says Panshikar, Trident BKC.
Dastur of Oberoi adds, “The equipment at the fitness centre is cleaned with sanitizers twice every day and serviced every two and a half months by engineers from Life Fitness.”
Anuj Prakash of Resort is equally particular. He says, “We have a daily and monthly preventive maintenance schedule for the gym equipment. In the morning when the gym instructors open the gym they have to clean and wipe the equipment and check them for any maintenance as per the preventive maintenance check list. The monthly preventive maintenance as well as the yearly maintenance is outsourced to a renowned consultant certified by the manufacturers.”
Sushil Sharma, Manager, Westin Mumbai, says, “We have an AMC with supplier TechnoGym to maintain all the equipment on a routine basis. Considering that we are just in the second year of our opening we will only upgrade or change equipment on a need to basis.”
Dr Acharya of Le Merdien Jaipur, says, “The gym equipment is regularly inspected by our engineering department. For cardio equipments, an AMC has been made where the concerned company engineer comes every four months to inspect the instruments and rectify the problems, if any.”
While most five star hotel gyms and fitness centres are meant for hotel guests only, The Resort in Mumbai, InterContinental The Lalit, Mumbai and Westin Mumbai and Pune, offer membership to non-guests too.
By Mini Ribeiro
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