Gym tonic
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This city's indoor health facilities want to pump you up
by GEORGE MADDUX
Dreaming about buttoning your shirt over a perfect ramrod posture with meaty pecs and biceps ready for moving day? No better way to get fit than doing so in one of the city's finer gyms, surrounded by a pleasant assortment of like-minded, perspiration-drenched babes. Here, without further tribute to sweaty six-packs and bulging calves, is a compendium, or perhaps a random sampling, of some of our local muscle making institutions.
l'apogée Since last October this 10,500-square-foot gym has been offering Plateau types a magnificent southerly workout view. Impeccable ventilation averts the possibility of breathing somebody else's sweat while the qualified personnel pamper and guide members with personalized fitness programs. Popular classes include the trendy new power yoga. "You're never left alone here, there's always somebody to help you," says the boss. Open 6 a.m.-midnight weekdays, 8 a.m.-10 p.m. Saturdays, 8 a.m.-8 p.m. Sundays. Fee: $430/year, payable by the month. 4200 St-Laurent, 908-2797.
Ben Weider Gym Named after the legendary Montreal bodybuilding pioneer after he donated a bunch of equipment 20 years back. A pool and regular workout centre in a room the size of a high school gym are available to members. Open: 6 a.m.-10:30 p.m. weekdays, 8:30 a.m.-6 p.m. weekends. Fee: $7/day, $45/month or $295/year. 4265 Papineau (corner Rachel), 527-1256.
Centre Sport Sport Plus This second-floor 5,000-square-foot space is filled with fitness machines and offers personal trainers at your beck and call. Open: 5:30 a.m.-10:30 p.m. weekdays, 9 a.m.-7 p.m. Saturdays, 9 a.m.-6 p.m. Sundays. Fee: three-month special, $99. $209/year. 1565 Mont-Royal E., 529-7643.
CEPSUM Don't be intimidated by the convoluted acronym, the Université de Montréal fitness facilities offer a macho punch in the heart of Côte-des-Neiges with an Olympic-sized pool, a rink, tennis courts, and soon a football field. They also have squash, badminton, tennis and something they mysteriously call "wally-ball." Open 6:15 a.m.-11:30 p.m. weekdays and 8:30 a.m.-9 p.m. weekends (weekend hours reduced in summer). Fee: $382/year, $175/four months and six-month memberships are 35 per cent off until April 16. 2100 Édouard-Montpetit, 343-6111.
Club la Cité Known for its trippy, triangular, 16-metre outdoor swimming pool heated year round, this trendy McGill ghetto hangout offers a pair of weight rooms, a cardiovascular room and an aerobics studio, as well as a little-known tennis court hidden somewhere behind the pool. A squash court and organized water polo are among its other features. Free parking after 5 p.m. Open 6:30 a.m.-10:30 p.m. weekdays, 8 a.m.-10 p.m. weekends. Fee: $529/year, limited-time offer. 3575 Parc, 288-8221.
Delta Sports CentrE Features two squash courts and a 20-metre, two-lane, four-foot-deep pool. Provincial government bureaucrats fill this usually quiet gym in the ground level of the Delta Hotel between 4-7 p.m. to enjoy facilities that also include a whole bunch of fitness machinery and free towel service. Indoor parking available for $2 a pop. Open 6 a.m.-10 p.m. weekdays, 8 a.m.-9 p.m. weekends. Fee: $600/year or $62 a month, less for corporate packages or for members who use fewer facilities. 475 President Kennedy, 284-4348.
Fitness Life This women's-only gym near Bleury occupies a 15,000-square-foot space filled with 150 machines and--like most other gyms--tends to get busy on Mondays when office workers burn off the proof of their weekend excesses. Lots of classes with bizarre names like "cardio pump" and "body shaking." Open 7 a.m.-9 p.m. weekdays, 10 a.m.-6 p.m. weekends. Fee: $99/year. 372 Ste-Catherine W. 871-1111.
Gym Zone Over 150 fitness machines fit into this 17,000-square-foot space on the second floor of a Décarie shopping centre near Blue Bonnets. Lots of parking for its 4,000 members and services include a load of aerobics classes. Open: 5 a.m.-
1 a.m. weekdays, 8 a.m.-10 p.m. weekends. Fee: $299. 6900 Décarie, 739 7376.
Monster Gym Monstrous in size, not attitude, the biggest gym on the West Island is open at both your convenience and inconvenience all day and night. As well as an impressive range of fitness machines and aerobics classes, this place offers trendy new "spinning" a sort of stationary, simulated bike race. Reputedly never empty, the gym offers more parking than you need and prides itself on its cleanliness. Open 24/7. Fee: $298/year. 61-D Brunswick, in Dollard, (corner Sources), 421-0014.
Montreal Athletic Association Open since 1881, this club has been in its current digs near Sherbrooke since 1905 and was renovated and redesigned by skater Toller Cranston in 1999. The club features an 18-metre pool, five squash courts, five badminton courts and a whole lot of aerobic and weight machines. Offers a free towel service, saunas, whirlpools, luxurious lounges and a slightly formal, upper-crust appeal. Open 6 a.m.-10 p.m. weekdays, 7 a.m.-7 p.m. Saturdays and 8 a.m.-7 p.m. Sundays. Fee: Varies but on average about $1,100/year. Letter of introduction no longer required. 2070 Peel, 845-2233.
Montreal Badminton and Squash Club Two good reasons to join the MBSC: to hang with our local anglo elite or to play some no-holds-barred, balls-to-the-wall squash. This woody old place, which turns 75 next year, houses six singles and two doubles squash courts, an indoor tennis court, along with the usual machinery. Privileges for those accepted by the committee include reciprocal membership at a web of patrician clubs around the world. Open: 6:30 a.m.-midnight weekdays, 8 a.m.-midnight Saturdays, 8 a.m.-10 p.m. Sundays. Fee: anywhere from $400 to $3,000/year (for a family membership). 3505 Atwater, 935-2431.
Olympic Park Sports CentrE Workout machines, aerobics and a 50-metre pool are among the attractions of this 17-year-old facility adjacent to where the Expos win ballgames. Open 6:30 a.m.-10 p.m. weekdays, 9 a.m.-4 p.m. weekends. Fee: $45/month, $94/3 months, $255/year. At the Olympic Stadium, 252-4622.
L'optimum Hooked up with an in-house centre that offers swimming and other facilities, this club has a cornucopia of Atlantis fitness machines in its first-floor 4,000-square-foot space. Open: 6 a.m.-10 p.m. Monday, Wednesday, Friday; 8 a.m.-10 p.m., Tuesdays and Thursdays, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. weekends. Fee: $309/year (current special $269 or $229 each if two join together). 4805 Christoph- Colomb (corner Gilford).
Pro Gym At 58,000-square-feet, this gym just south of the Big O claims to be Canada's biggest. Its 7,100 members include Alouettes, their cheerleaders and the Junior Rocket, as well as many other well-known vedettes. Thriving for two decades, the gym has recently been renovated at a cost of $300,000 and offers aerobics, a tanning salon, hairdressers, massage, physio, wrestling and boxing, a clothing store, dining room and daycare as well as over 300 fitness machines and 400 parking spaces. Open 24 hours weekdays, 8 a.m.-9 p.m. on weekends. Current deal: $260/year. 4500 Hochelaga, 252-8704.
Rock Gym As one staffer comments, "This is not a chat gym, everybody's here to get in shape." Those seeking a high level of competition for buffness might appreciate this uniquely designed gym, which offers one floor devoted to cardio, another for legs and a third dedicated to the upper body. There's a tanning room and a bar with all nature of health supplements. A youngish crowd trains here, including "a lot of bouncers and people who work in clubs or do late shifts." Open 24 hours on weekdays, 8 a.m.-11 p.m. Saturdays, 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Sundays. Fee: $99/4 months, $200/year. 680 Ste-Catherine W., 875-2766.
West-End Gym Fifty-five aerobics and strength machines await in this spacious 31,000-square-foot gym in the basement of the CSL shopping centre. Thriving for 30 years, this one-time Vic Tanny's boasts loads of free parking, tanning beds and dry sauna among other stuff. Open: 6:30 a.m.-11 p.m. weekdays, 8 a.m.-8 p.m. weekends. Fee: $220/year, three-month special, $99. 7025 Côte St-Luc, 489-6879.
YMCA, Downtown Amid much fanfare, the downtown Y has recently moved next door to the spruced up old Concordia Norris campus without missing a beat. Among its new jewels are a chlorine-free, 25-metre salt-water pool, the only of its kind in the city. Its 5,300 members pass under a beautiful new cathedral ceiling to get to 15,000 ft2 of cardio and weight training on the third floor, which is rounded by a 125-metre jogging track. Five squash courts await as does a futuristic and unique techno gym with Italian fitness equipment that automatically adjusts to your preferences and records your activities, thanks to a microchip-embedded key. Open weekdays 6 a.m.-10:45 p.m., weekends 7:15 a.m.-7:45 p.m. Fee: $35/month for students, $50/month for adults. 1440 Drummond, 849-5331.
YMCA, Guy Favreau Federal bureaucrats burn off their Chinatown buffet lunches in the 20-metre pool, as others hit birdies on three rubber-floored badminton courts or enjoy the many modern athletic conveniences. Open 6:15 a.m.-10 p.m. weekdays, 7:30 a.m.-8 p.m. Saturdays, 9 a.m.-6 p.m. Sundays. Fee: $43.50/month. 200 René-Lévesque W., 845-4277.
YMCA, Mile End The oldest of the 11 local Ys was renovated in '94 and features a four-lane, 25-metre pool as well as 80 popular classes a week. A staffer notes in what's probably either gibberish or gym speak: "We're recognized for our fitness classes--name it we have it: aerobox, aeromix, studio cycle, aerointerval, gentle toning and relaxation and we're one of the pioneers of aerobox." Open: 7 a.m.-11 p.m. weekdays, 8:30 a.m.-8 p.m. weekends. Fee: $31.50/month or $43.50 for a membership that lets you use any Y in the known universe. 5550 Parc, 271-9622.
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