Air quality in climbing gyms

Is air quality an issue in your gym?

At the one I go to, many surfaces are covered with a 1/4-1" of chalk dust/human skin flakes/fecal matter, etc

It's like high altitude training. Harder to breath inside = better breathing outside. IMO I love the grungier gyms. They seem to motivate me more than a nice clean one. 

the plus side is I never have to buy chalk.

Tim Lutz wrote: Is air quality an issue in your gym?

At the one I go to, many surfaces are covered with a 1/4-1" of chalk dust/human skin flakes/fecal matter, etc

Once the fecal matter gets deeper than 1/2", it's time to find a new gym.

Well, the gym I had started climbing in, the floor surface was shredded tire rubber in the bouldering pit, and pea gravel (the lowest quality) in the toprope wall section. the pea gravel was covered with tarps, that, at one point, had been stretched over the gravel and nailed to the walls and the barrier that kept the gravel in on the outside... but have gotten torn up long before I joined. Vacuuming any surface was obviously impossible, but the chalk dust was the least of it, given the floor surfaces.

I remember having black boogers coming out of my nose after each climbing session.

Pretty sure OSHA wouldn't allow conditions like that in a workplace.

So, compared that that, any gym with gymnastic mats for the floor surface, and vacuum-cleaner wielding employees who come by and vacuum and spilled chalk quickly... is a heaven of fresh air and wholesomeness. 

@TheSpot

it takes about 28 hours for the lungs to be able to dissolve a coating of magnesium carbonate.

rubber dust will give you cancer tho

Just get them to spring for one of these: ​Cam-fil​​​

Mitch Friedeman wrote: @TheSpot

That place is fucking disgusting in terms of air quality. I'm sure 1900's British coal miners wouldn't even go in there...."I got the white lung pop *cough*"

My home gym is in an old industrial building, peeling paint, degrading mats, previously used shredded rubber bit now gravel flooring, a welding shop and auto shop next door, and a dirt parking lot. And it's all by a heavily trafficked freeway. The amount of dust, which can't be healthy, is amazing sometimes. ​When I get home after a long day of climbing, my boogers are ash-black.

Most non-purpose built gyms - and I'm not talking about just climbing gyms but gyms in general (including climbing gyms) have poor air quality, as the building just wasn't made to hold large masses of sweating people.

You really need to architect a specific ventilation system to deal with that. Climbing gyms especially, since there's chalk everywhere.

https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/11/05/the-bad-air-in-our-gyms/

Some generally good signs: high ceilings, working fans, obvious filters. At the end of the night, are all ground surfaces vacuumed/mopped?

I think my gym ticks a lot of these boxes, but if you look over any wall to the other side, it's a pretty fucking gross accumulation of dirt and chalk dust. I mean, as long as it doesn't get agitated... should be OK...

Is it something I worry about? Naw. If you're feeling like crap after going to the gym though, perhaps it's the crap air you've been breathing...

 

Tim Lutz wrote: Is air quality an issue in your gym?

At the one I go to, many surfaces are covered with a 1/4-1" of chalk dust/human skin flakes/fecal matter, etc

I never figured you for such a snowflake.

Tony Bob wrote: My home gym is in an old industrial building, peeling paint, degrading mats, previously used shredded rubber bit now gravel flooring, a welding shop and auto shop next door, and a dirt parking lot. And it's all by a heavily trafficked freeway. The amount of dust, which can't be healthy, is amazing sometimes. When I get home after a long day of climbing, my boogers are ash-black.

That's gotta be Cleveland Rock Gym

......is very bad after Taco Tuesday. 

At one brand of climbing gyms I had an asthma attack after climbing for about 30 minutes. The chalk dust just got so bad. It was my first time climbing at that particular branch. Have climbed at another one of their gyms closer to me and the dust there is so thick, it's nasty.

Tony Bob wrote: My home gym is in an old industrial building, peeling paint, degrading mats, previously used shredded rubber bit now gravel flooring, a welding shop and auto shop next door, and a dirt parking lot. And it's all by a heavily trafficked freeway. The amount of dust, which can't be healthy, is amazing sometimes. When I get home after a long day of climbing, my boogers are ash-black.

How did junk recycler next door skipped your mind - when he starts burning/smelting metals you can feel your DNA curdle up due to heavy metal exposure.
As to CRG - you forgot about jumping/biting insects living in bouldering couches, critters dying behind walls, birds flying inside, and indoor rain during rainstorms.

Noah Betz wrote:

That's gotta be Cleveland Rock Gym

Yep

amarius wrote:

How did junk recycler next door skipped your mind - when he starts burning/smelting metals you can feel your DNA curdle up due to heavy metal exposure.
As to CRG - you forgot about jumping/biting insects living in bouldering couches, critters dying behind walls, birds flying inside, and indoor rain during rainstorms.

I don't remember dead critters behind the walls... must have been the inch-thick layer of dust that concealed them.

It's the bain of any gym manager and the only way to stop it is constant cleaning and constant filter training, like new filters once a week.

Most gyms leave it be behind the walls, it would take an army of Roomba to stay on top of it.

I banned loose chalk and that definitely helped!

amarius wrote:

How did junk recycler next door skipped your mind - when he starts burning/smelting metals you can feel your DNA curdle up due to heavy metal exposure.
As to CRG - you forgot about jumping/biting insects living in bouldering couches, critters dying behind walls, birds flying inside, and indoor rain during rainstorms.

I never knew what the guts of an MRI machine looked like until I started climbing there. 

As for the bugs, leaks, and dead animals, that's training for outside climbing.....at Whipps maybe?

The funny thing is during the summer when it's hotter than hell in there, the dust congeals on your skin to a nice slime

I tested the air quality of an indoor skate park in college for particulate matter. Skate parks have a similar issue with fine urethane dust coming off wheels but I found that the dust particles are too large to cause any damage to your lungs. Essentially the dust gets caught in your nose hairs and the mucous lining your esophagus before making it to your lungs. For a person with a healthy respiratory system there should be no issues other than some gross boogers.