The Exclusive Fitness Chiang Rai
Phaholyothin Road, Wiang, Mueang Chiang Rai District, Chiang Rai 57000, Thailand
Opening Times: 8:30 – 2200, seven days a week
Cost: 200 baht per day or 1800 baht per month. (There is no standard weekly rate but negotiate)
Location / Entry
The Exclusive Fitness Chiang Rai is perfectly located in the centre, just a couple of minutes walk from both the main Bus Terminal (1) and the Clock Tower.
It is located inside Chiang Rai Mall (helpfully with a big sign “CR Mall” on it). Go through the main entrance to the mall and head up the escalator which is roughly straight in front of you, close to the entrance. Don’t walk to the back of the shop looking for it like I did, in my extended warm-up. You need to ascend two floors and the gym is straight in front you.
Several friendly staff were there to greet me with a smile, at least one of whom spoke good English and was happy to show me around the club.
Facilities
This medium-sized attractive gym is well-kept with mostly modern equipment. The gym is well-equipped with a wide range of cardio equipment, resistance equipment and freeweights, all of which was in good condition. There is a small but sufficient floorspace area, very modern medium-sized studio and… a boxing ring!
The Exclusive Fitness Chiang Rai is partially air-conditioned with units in several places and there are additional fans. I found it to be a pleasant temperature to work out in when I attended at around midday. Then again, I had come straight here from a much hotter part of Thailand where the main gym had no aircon, so this felt like a treat to me! In any case, sweat levels should be manageable.
Note that the changing facilities and toilets are in different parts of the building, so don’t panic if it looks like there are no toilets at a glance! They are near the entrance, round to the left. Both facilities are very clean and in good condition. I can only speak for the Ladies, but there were two showers and even hairdryers! The toilets had toilet paper, not to be taken for granted in Thailand!
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Weights
Dumbbells go from 5-90lbs and barbells range from 10-50lbs, with barbells increasing in 10lb increments. There is a full set of both straight and curled bars. You’ll find that freeweights are mostly measured in pounds, whereas resistance machines are measured in kilograms. There are numerous benches – if anything too many. You’ll find flat, inclined and upright/adjustable benches all along the freeweights area – you might need to move them so you actually have somewhere to work!
Additionally there are numerous loadable resistance machines next to the freeweights, and plenty of discs to load them with. There is a separate room hosting most of the rest of the resistance machines, of which there are plenty.
You’ll find two sets of pull up bars, each combined with the usual lat pulldowns and cable crossovers etc. Note that the height of the pull-up bars near the entrance is a lot shorter than the other set. The quality of the lat pulldown is much better by the entrance though. There is no shortage of benches anywhere in this gym if you need something to stand on to get up! So, no excuses for not doing pull ups. 🙂 There’s even an assisted pull up machine too – work those lats!
Functional Training
You’ll also a reasonable range of functional training equipment, including BOSUs, medicine balls from 2 – 10kg, Swiss balls, boxing gloves and pads, a spiky foam roller, abs rollers and a couple of lightweight kettlebells, up to 6kg. And that’s before we even get to the boxing ring! In two years of travelling this is a first for me, but Thailand is of course known for its Muay Thai boxing. Not being much of a boxer, I have generally steered clear of the Muay Thai gyms in favour of more mainstream ones. But they are all over the place if you fancy something different!
Cardio
Cardio equipment is fairly modern and consists of numerous treadmills, a few crosstrainers and ellipticals, a couple of steppers an a couple of bikes – both upright and Spinning. Like many Asian gyms, it lacks rowing machines.
Studio
The studio was strikingly clean and modern and the current timetable has ten classes per week, at 18:00 and 19:00, Monday – Friday. Classes are a mix of Dance, Zumba, Body Strong and Boxing Exercise, taught by three different instructors. The studio contains step boards, yoga mats, lightweight adjustable barbells and disc weights for them.
Summary
The Exclusive Fitness Chiang Rai is a very good gym, with everything most people would need. Good quality of equipment, clean, attractive and pleasant to work out in.
I couldn’t see free drinking water, but you could definitely buy bottles of it as well as snacks.
Take a padlock for the lockers as they don’t provide them. As far as I could see, they don’t provide towels either, so take your own.
Want an Overview of Gyms in Chiang Rai?
I went to several different gyms here and I’ve summarised, compared and recommended my favourites for each budget level. Check out Gyms in Chiang Rai.
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