Gold’s Gym

I have worked out in a lot of gyms over the last 35 years and I would say the Harrisburg Gold’s is a decent gym though not great. I only worked out here once as a visitor in July of 2015 but tried to get a feel for the place as if I belonged. Being very familiar with working out in hard core gyms I tend to not be shy in one.
First the positives. There is a massive number of machines and cardio equipment there. This made it easy to find an open machine at a fairly busy time. The machines I used all seem to work well too. I did not go into the locker room so cant comment on that. The music was decent and loud enough and there seemed to be enough free weight benches. The temperature was right too. The staff was friendly but did not seem to be around much (which is fine for me). The building is large and so you don’t feel too crowded. I felt like working out harder because there were a lot of in shape people here working out hard. This in turn motivated me more than usual. There are TVs all over, but I am not sure why. You really weren’t going to watch them while working out in the free weight area, where many were. They seemed have some kind of motivation ads running.
Here are the negatives. The open style gym can be a positive and negative. You tend to feel like you are being watched the entire time you are walking around when there are no walls to block views. I don’t like the totally open plan myself, but some may see that as a positive. Everyone feels gathered in some kind of banquet hall. All they would need is some free standing walls to break up areas slightly in a visual way. Another negative was the total lack of an organized way to store free weight plates. Most gyms have trees that you stack the plates on. There were none here, so random weights were still on machines or on the stems of the machines. So you weren’t sure where to get your weights from and much of the time people had left them on the machine so you had no idea if anyone was still using it. This was probably the worst part of this gym. Along with that there seemed to be a lot of guys doing giant sets and so would leave dumbbells sitting near benches for minutes at a time with no one present. I had no idea if the person was done or not. Then while contemplating if someone was done some dude would come from way on the other side of the place back to the bench and then you knew he was doing multiple exercises. But it would be minutes until they came back around. So it was kind of a cluster F it seemed. Many gyms do have this issue but for some reason it seemed worse here, maybe due to the long walk people were taking to complete their giant sets. I witnessed numerous people confused at the benches trying to figure out if someone was still using them. This gym also seemed to be lacking in 5 and 10 lbs plates. I saw very few of them. They needed way more plates over all really. Lastly, this place really could use more dumbbells in the lower weights too, but that is a minor issue. They have a lot but the little gym I work out at actually has more.

Pretty standard golds, but in a good way. Large, with all the equipment, classes, and other things you want in a gym. Staff seemed friendly. TVs on some of the treadmills. Overall the equipment is a mix between old and newer items but mostly works.

This is the place to be in order to get a great work out. Starting with the staff. They all are knowledgable and up to par with any fitness information. You know most places hire people, just to hire, but this gym definitely looks for the people’s skills. Second. Equipment. There is plenty of equipment to use and I never have to worry about waiting in line for a machine or bench unlike other gyms. It’s worth the money. You get what you pay for. Finally the location. It’s right along the major highway so it’s great for anyone who wants to work out before or after work. Go check it out!

Since moving to PA I seemed to have misplaced my motivation for staying fit. I recently decided to go back to work and although I love my job the majority of my «business wear» does not exactly fit properly anymore… and by fit properly I mean I’m too fat for my pants! sooo. I figured it’d be cheaper to pay $ 30 a month to get fit and relieve stress than to replace a closet full of pants that I paid anywhere from $ 45 to $ 100 for.
Anywho… about the place:
There is a workout room just for the ladies which I like alot. You can go to other Gold’s (except the Camp Hill) location. It is huge inside, they offer a ton of classes and the ladies at the Kid’s Club are amazingly nice! (My kiddos hate leaving!)
It is really nice to be able to workout some where that is clean, has all of the equipment, and you don’t have to worry about feeling like a whale. The staff are nice and very helpful.
Oh, and they have the fake n bake (tanning beds) if you want to use them I think its an extra $ 5 a month.