Nobody puts baby in the corner

Edited by Sophie Roddy, Operations Associate at The Well HQ

My love affair with the gym began 10 years ago. Prior to that I was an avid swimmer but once I switched to weights I haven’t ever looked back.

I attend a gym in North London (a major chain but I best not say which) where a recent initiative to create a women-only space was met with a collective meh from 7/8s of the membership and a why wasn’t I consulted? from the other lot.

Somewhere in the middle a mild-mannered Sophie got slightly volcanic.

Off-the-bat I have no issue with the concept, but Great Neptune’s Pitchfork you want to check the nick of this space. Seriously. It’s dark, dingy and tucked away in a corner with no windows. Equipment? Some mats, a kettle and six glutes machines.

‘Cos that’s all us chicks wanna do, right?

I’m normally quite measured and calm but this situation has been like giving Popeye spinach or Obelix the magic potion. It has scratched something in my soul and a hidden resource has awoken. Is this my latent superpower? Maybe ..

The manifold irony

Women-only spaces can be wonderful things to (re)present the gym as an inviting, welcoming space that’s for you (yes, you) too. A feeling of safety and community; of bringing together groups of people who enjoy the same thing. Such is their value, newer gyms actually bake women-only spaces into their planning from the off.

My issue isn’t the idea but the lazy tokenism of this execution from a major high street player. I have since learned this is one of nearly a dozen such initiatives at venues up and down the UK in a project that is laced with such insidious sexism you’d never believe it’s a Diversity & Inclusion play.

It feels like we’re being put there. At the back. In the dark. Where no-one can see us.

In a twofold slice of irony, any sales this women-only section generates are likely to be neutralised once female newstarts see the space. The 14-day-no-quibble-get-out clause will be so exercised it’ll grow muscles. Plus without women in the shop window any female footfall taking a gander won’t see themselves in the picture.

The reverse comparison

I don’t want to make this an us versus them thing because it isn’t. Since I began my journey at The Well HQ, and back through my own career, I know how essential it is to have men on the journey and I’m thankful they are in growing numbers.

But I find it frustrating that we fairly often have to pull a dirty trick before the point lands. Before folks, men and women, get it.

• What if men were forced into women’s kit?
• What if men wore mandatory hotpants?
• What if men’s boots were designed by default to female measurements?
• What if men’s risk of concussion or ACL injury was sixfold that of women?

When I accosted a nice male PT, later an advocate, it eventually came to this:

• What if this crap space was for men and us women got the rest of the joint?

Uh-hu. The whole fiasco has revealed to me all again what we’re up against and that’s de-programming centuries’ worth of coding where the default paradigm is to demand women take the hit and say thank you for the graciousness.

This girl’s can

The Well HQ work with most of the major high street gyms and, give or take, all are seeking change from the right place. Most are prepared to make a material investment in change instead of tarting things up for the sake of a few empty sales.

Our pioneering work with The Gym Group to genuinely embed a women-first approach continues to bear fruit on the gym floor and the bottom line. It’s early doors, at David Lloyd but a second training cohort has just begun, and there’s more to come from a couple of fresh new partnerships that we’ll report to you in due course.

Roll back ten years and a fitness CEO might have opted for being seen as a female-friendly gym over actually being a female-friendly gym. Costs a lot less, see. But for many and dare I say most, now, the tide is turning. Meaningful change is afoot.

Hence when we encounter lazy / cynical window-dressing it’s like my kryptonite. I become that middle aged woman on a mission to point out the hypocrisy, the injustice and how it just wouldn’t fly if the shoe was on the other foot.

Anyway. That’s enough from me. I’m heading back to my dark corner of North London to glute myself silly and keep my superhero instincts under wraps.