Scandinavia Gym Antigua

House Number 26A,  7a Calle Poniente, Antigua

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Opening times 6:00-22:00, Weekends 6:00-18:00

Cost: Q.35 for a day, Q.145 for 5 days, Q.195 for 8 days. My understanding was that the days must be consecutive, although given my level of Spanish, this may not be correct!

Location and Entry

Scandinavia Gym Antigua is located down an attractive street central to Antigua. It’s just a couple of blocks away from Antiguas gym, southwest of it. Reception were friendly and happy to show me around.

Facilities

This is a medium to large open-plan gym with a Spinning studio upstairs on one side and a regular studio on the other.

The gym was a comfortable temperature and it worth noting that Antigua is at significant altitude (1533m) making it a considerably more comfortable workout temperature than other parts of Guatemala. Gyms in Central America are not generally air-conditioned, yet this gym was an ideal temperature without it.

Note there are no lockers here, just cubbyholes – keep your valuables on you or leave them in your accommodation. And bring a towel, there are signs everywhere requesting you to use one.

The gym was pretty busy at 1830 on a Wed evening – no great surprise! But due to its size, it could certainly accommodate everyone comfortably and I had no problems getting on equipment.

Classes

Classes run from 700-1000 most weekday mornings and 1700-2000 for the first few weekday evenings. There are several different classes including Spinning, “DanceStar Party”, Functional Personal Training, Step, Aerodance, Taebo and Pilates and the studios are both sizeable.

I decided to do Step (a lifelong passion of mine!) on a Tuesday morning. The class was excellent – fast and furious and well taught and cued by an experienced teacher (Luis). Language was not an issue – he taught by gesturing and his routines followed a logical format. Whilst the choreography was basic to medium, it was great fun and a good workout.

Cardio

The gym has cardio equipment on one side, in the form of numerous treadmills, bikes and cross trainers and a huge number of resistance machines. These are neither cluttered nor spaced out – they’ve made very good use of the available space which is ample.

Weights

There’s also a large freeweights section with dumbbells up to 100lbs, numerous discs and some adjustable barbells. If you want to use the lat pulldown by the chin-up bars, be prepared to add more weight than normal – it seemed very light! Or perhaps all this travelling has toughened me up. 🙂

The only things I missed were an assisted chin-up machine and a standard (seated) lat pulldown.

Functional Training

The highlight of the gym for me was the functional training/circuits room. This was a similar size to the studios (large) with loads of floorspace and equipment, including two racks of fixed weight barbells, numerous kettlebells, mats, more chin-up bars, stepboards, a Swiss ball and a boxing bag. Yep, it’s playtime! And if you fancy knocking out some burpees, here’s your spot. No excuses for not stretching off either.

Summary

Overall Scandinavia Gym Antigua is very good value for one session, and the same price as Antiguas Gym up the road which is a bit smaller. Scandinavia Gym has more floor space, is easier to navigate and probably has a greater range of equipment. However Antiguas Gym is notably cheaper if you’re staying a week or so, at only Q.110 and had everything I needed. Personally I preferred it as it had a bit more character and a less clinical feel to it then Scandinavian. Both gyms are good and just a few minutes walk apart – worth asking to look around both before deciding if you’re planning to spend long in Antigua.

If you only intend to work out once I’d recommend coming here – it’s the same price at each for a one day pass. However I would say Antiguas Gym has more character to it and after I’d been to each of these two gyms once, it was Antiguas that I chose to join for the week.

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