Fitness First Balham

I’m a member of Fitness First, which means I can go to any of the branches. Handy, no?
This one is close to where I live, although I generally try and avoid using it if I can. It’s pretty grotty. The changing rooms always smell, a lot of the machinery is sub-​standard, and it’s always absolutely packed. Considering how much membership is, it should be a lot better.

Fitness First in Balham (it should really be called Tooting) is a demotivating place to work out. The gym is really cramped and at busy times i.e. after work there is always a queue for the treadmills and rowing machines. The weights area is slightly better but also suffers from a lack of space meaning that there is not a wide variety of machines and free weights area easily fills up. In hot weather the air conditioning seems ineffectual making it an awful place to be.
My membership means that I’m not tied to one gym therefore Clapham Junction is now my preferred destination on weekends as there is plenty of space and air conditioning there.

What a bad and silly comment by Natalie.
If you want a spacious gym and all machines to yourself, why not go and buy the machines and keep it in your house so that you can have all the time to yourself.
If you have goals to achieve you will not be looking at people, or referring people in the gym as being soulless!!!
There are several machines to work on, and if the exact one you want to exercise on is been use, you let the person know you are on wait after his/​her reps. And for the main time you go on another machine till the machine you want to work on is free.
People always look at achieving goals, not looking at the bustling of irrelevant issues.
People are having great result form the same gym, even extremely choosy people still go and achieve their goals.

Cramped, over-​subscribed, soulless… not what you want from a motivating exercising environment. I’d rather run around my handbag for an hour.
I made the fatal mistake of joining this gym last year, simply because of it’s location — only a 1 minute walk from my front door. I thought this convenience would mean I’d be there virtually every day, and wahey I’d be nice and fit and toned in a matter of months.
Great in theory, but when you can barely move because there is an actual queue to use a treadmill or a cross-​trainer, or you can’t breathe properly because the humidity and sweat filled air is getting to you, you start to wish you’d never even bothered. I forced myself to go for 3 months, at one point, even getting up at 5.30 in the mornings to fit it in before work, purely to avoid the rush hour crowds that would swarm in their hoards after work.
I stopped going, and paid the other 9 months in full, thanks to that thing called a contract.
If you’re thinking about joining this gym, or any gym for that matter, go and look around at around 6pm. This one fails that crucial test.