You’ve invested a lot in both free weights and cardiovascular equipment in your fitness facility. Obviously, it’s in your best interest to protect this equipment as best as you can. Surprisingly, proper flooring for these two areas is necessary to help you do this.
But let’s first identify the problems. In weight rooms, you need a stable surface with proper traction that provides some resilience. That’s because weights are going to be dropped on the floor, no matter how you try to prevent that, and hexagonal dumbbells will particularly manage to damage almost anything they are dropped on. You also want to make sure that when heavy-duty weight lifters are taking huge stacks off the weight stand, that their footing is absolutely precise.
With cardiovascular equipment, you have a lot of moving parts. Often with carpet, you’ll find that small carpet fibers will find their way into many electronic parts and can cause some major damage to the machine. You also want a surface that will not absorb sweat or the oil and grease that might drip from the machine.
Flooring Solution
For about the last five years, rubber flooring has been the solution for both of these situations. It’s heavy duty, adds resilience to dropped weights, is easy to maintain, and is now closer to the cost of carpet than in the past, with a life span that is typically much longer.
Most of this rubber is recycled and contains reground black rubber with colored flecks sprinkled in amongst it. The amount of color mixed into the black rubber is usually about 10 percent to 30 percent of the total mixture. The percentage can be higher than that, up to 50 percent, but most floors do not benefit visually from the higher percentages.
Flooring Options
Rubber flooring comes in a number of different configurations and manufacturing techniques but they are all similar in appearance. It can come in square cut tiles, interlocking tiles or in rolls; but no matter how it is made, one of the great things about it, since it has a random pattern and a black background, is that the floor usually appears to be seamless. Thickness varies, usually ranging from 1/4″ up to 1/2″, with 3/8″ being the most commonly found thickness. This is because the manufacturers suggest that you glue down any flooring that is less than 3/8″. The 3/8″ and above can often be installed simply by securing the edges of the rubber with double-sided carpet tape.
So, if they can add all these colored speckles into the mixture, why can’t they do a solid colored flooring roll? Well, the speckles are actually a different material than the black rubber background – a material referred to as EPDM (Ethylene Propylene Diene Monomer). This material binds well into recycled rubber, but does not bind as well to itself. It’s great for inlaying logos to rubber, but when it makes up an entire surface, it seldom holds together as well as when mixed with the reground black. Cosmetically, the black background also does a much better job of hiding stains and dirt than a solid color would.
But, if you’re set on having a solid color floor in these spaces, there is a rubber flooring product that comes pretty close. There are at least two manufacturers that make a tile that has a marbleized surface with solid colors on the face. There are still black or other colored streaks through the faces of these tiles, but they come as close to a solid color surface as you can get in rubber. This formulation is a little different, with the colored part of the tile actually being a “wear surface” on top of the tile that is about 1/8″ thick.
One other type of tile worth mentioning are those known as “pavers” and they are especially good for free weight areas. These are also made of reground rubber that comes in a multitude of colors. They are the most durable type of rubber flooring that you can buy and will certainly be the best defense against the dropping of hexagonal dumbbells, because the material is up to an inch thick. They do not require glue, but rather they are held together with dowels that connect every tile in the floor to the adjoining tiles. Another advantage to this system is that the tiles are easy to take up and reconfigure or replace. Of course, with added thickness comes an additional price.
If you already have carpet down, in the cardiovascular room it is important to get equipment mats under all of the machines with moving parts to ensure no carpet fibers get into the gears. These mats are made of rubber and are very thin, typically 1/4″ or less and can be obtained from your commercial equipment dealer for a very low price.
Regardless of what you select, keep in mind that these areas are highly abused and require a very durable material that will last. With the cost of reground rubber so comparable to carpet now, it just makes sense to give this durable material a try.
Steve Chase is the General Manager of Exerflex. He can contacted at 800.428.5306, or by email at exerflex@exerflex.com.
