Last year, students at Mercy College who decided to commit themselves to the gym had difficulties with its size, lack of equipment, and gym hours.

Yet this semester, Mercy College has displayed the new gym for students at Our Lady Of Victory High School. The newly acquired gym has students talking excitedly.

“It is definitely a big improvement from last year, considering that it was in a tiny classroom with very small room to work out,” says junior Chris Acquisto.

Many students who have visited the gym have seen a major equipment upgrade from more weights being added, many more treadmills, to recently a few more benches that have been bought by Mercy College for students to use. The former classroom that was turned into the gym had lots of space for all this equipment since it is larger than the previous location in Main Hall last year.

“It feels great to have a bigger gym on campus since I’m always working out now and it saves me the drive,” said sophomore Brad Simon.

Bigger and clearer televisions have been added above the treadmills so students could keep up with their sports teams as well as local and worldwide news. The hours last year were constantly a hassle for students since they never seemed to be set. Also the rule was that if there was not a student worker present, the gym would be closed for that period of time. Now, student workers are more regularly sitting at a desk checking for student ID cards so that the facility can stay open during its proper full day schedule.

Previous semesters, students complained that the gym barely had any air circulation except for a few windows being cracked open. But now the gym has more fully opened windows as well as air conditioning coming from the ceiling vents which is a must considering how many students are constantly  inside the facility working out on a daily basis. A new improvement to the gym that students have noticed its cleanliness the gym as compared to last year.

Students have some gripes, such as how dorm students now have more of a walk between their rooms to the gym and the lack of a water fountain in the new room. The floor mats were not brought over from last year’s gym and there is still a lack of a locker room to store valuables.

Yet many are happy about the new availability of machines and equipment.

Last year, athletes were often using up the gym time and there was sometimes no room for the non athletes. There was a lot of confusion about the free time.

“It was not fair for the athletic teams to have priority time over non athletic students when daily physical activity is important,” stated sophomore Ariel Costa.

While athletes are still often in the gym, however, non athletes still have plenty of room to complete their daily work out sessions, a relief to current students.

“It’s much more manageable now,” said Costa.