Silverton residents desperate to lose those holiday pounds can now become members of the new gym in town.
Opened by the Silverton MOVE Team, lead by Operations Manager Kim Grant, the gym had its grand opening just before Thanksgiving and has already acquired a steady stream of new members.
Before opening the gym, the MOVE Team, also made up of Silverton residents Sarah Moore, Misti Anderson and Jessie Rowe, were encouraged by Jeremiah Kane to begin teaching yoga classes. Kane, a New York native, owns the historic Silverton Bottling Co. building and wanted the women to use the empty space as their studio.
“We started the yoga studio because a couple of us gals just wanted to be able to go to yoga once or twice a week because there isn’t anywhere to do that in Silverton,” Grant said. “We then realized we have this extra space in the backroom (of the Silverton Bottling Co. building), and we thought ‘Well, what should we do with it?’”
At the time, there was no communal space to work out in Silverton. Residents had used the Silverton School’s gym for years, but officials shut down its public access during 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic hit.
“COVID shut down the gym, and they didn’t open it back up to the public,” Grant said. “There was a real need in the community for a place for people to work out – all kinds of people, not just the athletes to get fit and strong, but also for seniors to have somewhere warm in the winter, where there’s a treadmill.”
She is also proud of what she and her team have managed to do with the 400 square feet of space in the back of the building.
“It’s kind of small, but it’s really beautiful,” Grant said. “We repainted and redecorated. We put in course mats all the way across the whole floor. We bought all of our weight equipment. It’s all brand new from Rogue and PRX. We have a really nice PRX squat rack with the all Rogue weights. We have bands for stretching and pull-ups. We have a three wave style jump box where you can jump on the different sides of it. We have foam rollers and balls for balance exercise.”
Grant and her team also managed to snag a couple of slightly used treadmills and elliptical machines for those gym goers interested in a cardio workout.
“This started with a bunch of us girls that basically broke our piggy banks on the floor, counted our pennies and were like, ‘OK, how much money do we have? Can we make this work?’” she said.
Grant and the MOVE time estimated the cost of keeping the gym open while being affordable for Silverton residents, and started rates at $59 for a one-month membership.
“Our mission statement is that we want the gym to be a place that’s open and welcoming to everybody in Silverton,” she said. “The whole community and visitors. An open, sacred little space that’s like a little sanctuary where everybody can feel comfortable. It doesn’t matter who you are; we just want everyone to have a place to do something healthy and good for their bodies.”
molsen@durangoherald.com
