Joe’s Fitness Gym, Cameron Highlands
Marigold Square, Tanah Rata, 39000
Opening Hours: 15:00 – 0:00 Mon – Sat. Sun: closed
Cost: RM 12 for men and RM 9 for women. (Ouch)
Location and Entry
There aren’t too many road names here, but Joe’s Fitness Gym is situated just off the main road, around ten minutes walk east of centre (or five from the bus station). You can clearly see it signposted from the street, two floors up and directly above Sleepbox Hostel, which I highly recommend. For a good price on accommodation, see below:
As you reach the correct floor, you’ll see prices displayed on a whiteboard outside. This is the first time that I’ve seen different rates advertised for men and women – a bit of surprise as Malaysia is one of the more developed Asian countries I’ve travelled in and this sort of discrimination seems backward. When I arrived, the gym wasn’t staffed and nor did any turn up for the 40 minutes I was in there. So the bonus here is regardless of gender, you could potentially get away with a free workout!
Facilities
This fairly small gym is the only one I found in Tanah Rata. The equipment is not modern but it’s all in good condition and it’s quite an attractive little gym. There’s no aircon, free water or other frills, but it’s clean and well-maintained.
Note the strange opening times above – unusually, this gym is not open at all in the mornings.
Joe’s Fitness Gym mostly focusses on weight training, though you’ll find a few cardio machines and couple of functional training machines.
I couldn’t see any aircon here, but bear in mind Tanah Rata is at an altitude of 1440m, so it’s much colder than the rest of Malaysia! When I attended in November, temperatures didn’t exceed 24 degrees at the height of the afternoon. Some fans wouldn’t go amiss though.
Weights
Overall, the gym has a very good range of free weights and resistance equipment, given its size. You’ll find a full rack of dumbbells up to 35kg and barbells from 10 – 50kg. All were neatly racked when I attended on a weekday afternoon.
You’ll also find three bench presses (flat, inclined and declined), a Smith machine, inclined leg press, cable crossovers and a preacher curl station here.
For your lats you’ll find a set of pull up bars, assisted pull ups machine and a lat pull down cable. I also saw numerous different attachments here for the cables.
Other resistance machines here include a leg extension, leg curl and pec fly / rear delt.
Cardio
You’ll find four treadmills and two Spin bikes here. All looked reasonably modern and in good condition.
Functional Equipment
I found little in terms of functional equipment here, but I saw a couple of Swiss balls, an abs roller, skipping rope and several decent mats. Although there was no dedicated floor space as such, the gym was well spaced out and quiet when I attended mid-afternoon, so you could easily find somewhere to do mat work.
Studio and Classes
The club clearly advertises Zumba and Salsation classes here. However, the studio was locked when I went to investigate and no timetable was on display.
Summary
All in all, Joe’s Fitness Gym a great little gym which makes good use of its space. I was particularly impressed to see an assisted pull ups machine here. As the only gym I could find in the Cameron Highlands, it’s not unreasonably priced given that this is a touristy area, though it would be fairer if the price was the same for men and women.
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