Fitness pass

  Photos by PRIYA SHARMA The John Wooden Center offers
several different fitness activities and classes, including indoor
rock climbing.

By Dharshani Dharmawardena
Daily Bruin Senior Staff

It’s five minutes past 9 a.m. on Sunday, and the lulling
drone of a treadmill permeates the momentarily unsaturated air of
the John Wooden Center.

Feisal Alibhai, a graduate student at The Anderson School at
UCLA, said he visits the Wooden Center early two days a week to
avoid the crowds packing the gym.

“It works off the beer from the night before,”
Alibhai said with a laugh. “Seriously, though, I think it
makes you feel good about yourself and you have more energy during
the day.”

Despite the apparent inundation of students and faculty at the
center, some people in the UCLA community don’t know about
Wooden, according to Dennis Koehne, assistant manager of the
Center.

“We just did some interviews to hire new staff and some
people didn’t even know it was here until the spring of last
year even though they’ve been here two or five quarters up
until then,” he said.

They also aren’t aware of the type of facilities and
fitness classes offered through the center. Before construction,
Koehne said just walking by the center attracted students who would
otherwise never have used the facilities, but now fewer such
students come by.

“It’s not always the simplest thing to get the word
out, especially with Bruin Walk closed off,” Koehne said.
“Students no longer naturally walk by here.”

According to Koehne, the center has a variety of programs fit
for a college campus and is different from other athletic
facilities.

“People who tend to end up at other gyms are people who
are looking for something that’s a more premium-type
service,” he said. “They’re aiming at a real
specific part of the population.”

The Wooden Center’s quarterly catalogue, Recreational
Quarterly, shows a variety of classes offered, including swimming,
horseback riding, yoga and step.

More recently, however, the Wooden Center-sponsored “Res
Fest” took place on Friday and targeted students living in
the residence halls who might not know of the activities offered by
the center.

  Photos by PRIYA SHARMA Azalea Park, a
first-year law student, exercises on a treadmill at the Wooden
Center. “We had, by our count, 2,300 people come in,”
Koehne said. “We looked at it as a cooperative venture that
gets the people in dorms aware that this place is even here and
they can climb a rock wall, play basketball, take Tae-bo and do
various things like that.”

The center ran “Res Fest” from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m.
through the sponsorship of various businesses and cost nothing to
attend.

“We turned Pardee Gym into a rave-type, disco
thing,” Koehne said. “We had martial arts
demonstrations, we had various individual and group activities
going on, and some dance classes.”

At the event, students received free food, water bottle samples
and coupons, all to promote the fitness options, old and new,
available through the center.

“In addition to the present classes we have ““ the
Tae-bo and those types ““ we’re offering many more
introductory classes, like how to use all the cardio
machines,” Koehne said. “Some are offered cooperatively
through the Recreation Class Program and the building, the informal
recreation, when people can come in and do the free-play kind of
thing.”

Another addition includes having a personal trainer in the
weight room.

“We do have personal trainers people could pay for,”
Koehne said. “Starting this quarter, we’re also having
a personal trainer for free who can run people through the programs
and give them basic sorts of instruction in addition to what our
weight room supervisors are able to provide.”

Dr. Jaime Villablanca, a professor in the department of
psychiatry and neurobiology, comes to the center at least two times
a week and said the new services, especially the new trainer, will
benefit most people going to work out.

“That’s an interesting idea, but I’ve been
doing this for 25 years, so maybe I don’t need a
trainer,” he said with a laugh. “But it is a very good
idea for people at the beginning.”

For most people who take fitness classes at the center, the
variety of times during which they are offered fit students’
busy schedules, according to Reena Patel, a fourth-year
biochemistry student.

“I usually go to the evening ones only because they cater
to my schedule,” she said. “They work-out every sort of
body muscle there is.”

For others, though, the center’s open hours still create
conflicts.

“I work some really long and odd hours and I’ll see
people try the lock and seem surprised that it’s
locked,” Koehne said.

He said the time issue will be addressed when the Men’s
Gym and Kaufmann Hall close for seismic renovation and people will
have one less gym to occupy.

But the center will not be open 24 hours a day. Since the
center’s opening, Koehne said it has added more hours.

Like Villablanca, many find that during the moments they can
spare for exercise, the center is too crowded.

“I like to come three times a week, but it has nothing to
do with the opening schedule here,” he said.

“I get a little upset sometimes when the room is taken by
groups because it is the only time I have during the week and then
I cannot use it.”

Although some people complain about the especially busy times,
like the evenings, Koehne said he is not worried about the amount
of people the new programs may attract.

“When you offer a program, people come in at a specific
time,” he said.

He also there is no student fee increase to pay for the added
classes, much of which take place because of contributions from
businesses.

“Part of what we’re here for is to keep everybody
healthy and the other part is to give everybody a chance to
play,” Koehne said.