Recent guidelines for post-lockdown spacing in gyms have been produced by UK Active of 3mx3m, or 9m2. But is that enough for a CrossFit gym?
In short, no.
Let’s use the CrossFit WOD “Jack”, as an example. Jack is AMRAP in 20 minutes of push press, kettlebell swings and box jumps.
Push press uses a barbell. IWF guidelines for barbell training areas are 3×2.5m, or 7.5m2.
Next we have a kettlebell. Spacing needed for the swing of the kettlebell is the maximum distance of the trajectory, plus the British Standard of 50cm clearance between this and other equipment. So that’s 50cm each side of the athlete (assuming they stay in the spot for these swings and don’t lose balance or stagger at all). Call this a 1.5m width once the athlete themselves are added to the width.
Now the swing. Arm length is roughly 75-90cm. Kettlebells are about 30cm high. Allowances for grip reducing arm length by 5cm or so are then made, needing a forward space of approx 1.3m. This therefore needs an area of 1.95-2m2 to accommodate this movement. Maximum figures have to be used, with a little more added as you simply don’t know the dimensions of the people who will be training in each area.
We already have 7.5m2 plus 2m2. This is 9.5m2 and exceeds spacing guidelines. And we still have box jumps AND social distancing to consider…….The standard footprint of a 24” side of a wooden box is 0.45m2. This could be slightly more or less depending on whether the 20” side is being used, or soft boxes, which can have a significantly larger footprint at around 1m2. Add in the space required to actually jump, (the 50cm required free spacing should suffice) and this is an additional 0.7-1.3m2 for this movement. Erring on the side of caution, this gives a total area needed of 10.8m2. This is 1.8m2 MORE than UK Active’s guidelines without even considering post lockdown social distancing.
Now there is some room for space overlap within these movements due to only one piece of equipment being in use at any one time. But to mitigate against slip, trips and falls, especially as athletes become tired, this is not a great reduction of space. An area of 10-11m2 is the only realistic possibility to still ensure WOD safety. And this is still 1-2m2 over UK Active guidelines. And this is during a normal CrossFit WOD, not even with extra considerations being made. There is also an assumption that everyone will follow a set system of logistics for the positioning of the movements and not deviate from this even slightly.
So let’s now look at the extra considerations – keep people social distanced. The nature of an AMRAP WOD is that everyone works at a different pace. So you could have one person on box jumps, another on swings, and another on push press, in completely different parts of their dedicated areas. So there needs to be the minimum social distancing requirements between ALL parts of workout areas at all times to allow for these variations in workout speed. Current social distancing is 2m. This could add another 6-13m2 to each workout space depending on area positioning, taking the running total to 16-23m2.
If you want coaches to be able to coach in these areas to keep members moving safely, you have an additional legal duty of care to ensure their safety, meaning that if social distancing stays at 2m, any walkways used by coaches need to be 4m wide minimum (more accurately 4.5m to allow for body room to keep 2m clearance either side). This would mean an additional area requirement consideration of 13.5-29.25m2 depending on set up.
If social distancing is reduced to 1m, and coaches didn’t walk between athletes, this would still require an area of 13-16.5m2 per athlete, depending on layout.
This is a little different from the 9m2 guidance from UK Active.
There are ways to reduce the floor space needed, but you will need very careful programming, use of space, equipment selection and coach positioning.
But in general, a 9m2 area per athlete is simply insufficient for a safe CrossFit class, running under normal conditions with coaches moving around to see and correct, let alone reopening after lockdown.
Unless it’s 100 burpees for time.
If you need help with this, get in touch. Riskmanagement@crossfitellipsis.com
