« The fact that training is so expensive is not reasonable »
For the residents of the Stockholm district of Hägersten, they are a well -known element in the neighborhood. The neighbors are used to the lawn between the yellow three -storey skiers occasionally pops up a bunch of crawling around on all fours, jumping up and down or throwing around with iron balls in different colors. Viljan’s training club meets here at least an hour a week, all year round.
– Often I feel blown in my skull afterwards, says Hedda Svenblad.
– I live just nearby, so when I discovered that this was there it was absolutely perfect for me. I come here after work, never know what will happen except that I will be able to take in and get sweaty. It’s like I’m leaving the day behind me during training.
Every pass on the will is different from the last. The content of the training is determined by today’s instructor. Usually you practice a combination of strength and fitness. It will be versatile passports where you use the entire body during the hour. The exercises are simple and can always be adapted to the individual’s ability. So someone who has never trained can run the same workout as a real professional – and both will be tired afterwards.
Hedda Svenblad Have barely missed a single training since she started the will three years ago. Stina Johansson is a little newer in the group, but has long been used to the main tool Kettlebells:
– Finding this type of training groups has changed my life, she says.
– I think a lot of people feel it is a duty to train. They buy gym cards, but never use it. I was also a bit like that, before I found such contexts. It received to step into that machine, which a commercial gym can be.
In recent decades, exercise training as a phenomenon has undergone a radical change in Sweden. Anyone who lives in one of the big cities can see the difference with the naked eye. Today there is a gym in every two neighborhoods. The country’s largest gym chain, Nordic Wellness, will soon have 400 plants. The Norwegian competitor SATS set a new membership and results record in 2024. The new Fitness24Seven emerges everywhere. Demand for training seems insatiable.
– People thought we were crazy who did not choose to go on that train, says Marco Vega, on the phone from just a train, between Stockholm and Malmö.
It was he who together with a smaller group of friends started Viljan’s training club, in Malmö 2011.
– Then this with training had started to deal more and more about money. But we didn’t want to hook there. No one should be rich in the will. Instead, we wanted to invest in the social aspect of training. Create a place where you feel safe, gain knowledge of your body and your own ability to challenge.
The inspiration for it The new training club took Marco Vega from her background in the martial arts environment. There he had also started training with kettlebells, so the globular gear was from the start a central constituent of Viljans training. The pass would be hard. You would sweat, challenge yourself and feel that you have trained when you have been on the will. Get strong. That everyone would be welcome regardless of gender, gender identity, skin color, age and view of life was also obvious. But other things, especially some trends that the group experienced flourished around the training world, they wanted to skip.
– We saw that there were norms in training that we were critical of, says Marco Vega.
– There is a macho culture that can take over at the gym. Many have bad experiences from sports in school. Others feel that they have a body that does not belong in exercise environment. Or that you have to have a certain type of clothing to fit in. We wanted to look at what you can do to lower the bar.
Viljan’s training club in Malmö has been in several premises around the city since its inception. But the concept has been the same: an hour of training in a small group. If you are not so many, there is plenty of time for the instructor to see and pepper everyone. Most often kettlebells are in focus. But you have also tried yoga and dance, for example. The content is largely controlled by the members themselves.
Often, the members of the will start through some try-on-pass. But then many go on to become instructors and leaders themselves. Some members who moved have also taken the club with them. This was how the will also started in Gothenburg and Stockholm.
– Since we are not so many, it becomes natural that everyone has some kind of role in the association, says Hedda Svenblad, who is also a member of the board.
– In this way, it differs from a regular gym. But since the will is an association, the social part is also reinforced. For me, it has become a context that I did not know I needed. A bit like a gap in my other life.
Before the pass in Hägersten All helps to pick up the equipment. It can be a huge lift when the heaviest globe is to be packed up from the basement storage and out on the lawn. Afterwards everything will be back again.
– If you have paid expensive money to work out at a gym, you just want to get there and get your training done, says Stina Johansson.
– When exercising in a group like this one cannot be self -centered that way. Everyone helps and it characterizes the culture. I think I get more embarrassed to challenge myself on the pass. Everyone is seen and cheering on each other and it makes you can do more than you think.
The major price increases in recent years have of course also affected the training industry. Already in 2023, Statistics Sweden reported that services like gym that risen the fastest in price. By then, a gym card had been an average of about 9 percent more expensive than last year. Today, training at one of the larger chains in Stockholm, where prices are highest, can cost over SEK 9,000 per year. This at the same time as the Public Health Authority estimates that the Swedes’ sedentary costs SEK 16.5 billion per year.
– The fact that training is so expensive is not reasonable, says Hedda Svenblad.
– Running is obviously free. But if you are a single parent or unemployed, you may not be able to afford strength training. Especially not if you want some type of guidance to get started.
With simpler conditions and the members’ own commitment, prices can be kept down. In the countryside you have known it for a long time. In smaller towns, non -profit training initiatives are more or less norm. There, the gym chains do not invest the way they do in the big cities, so you want to move with others you have to chop in yourself.
But now begins The city residents also hook the trend. Pandemin got people out in light tracks and parks. Since then, non -profit running clubs have popped up around the neighborhood, friends gathered at sports venues or at outdoor gym, municipalities’ common premises are rented out to yoga enthusiasts. The scale is small. But some kind of popular movement is underway.
– I really want to encourage everyone to create meeting places, says Viljan founder Marco Varga.
– Start a little. Three to four people are enough. Decide what you want to do. Do you want to run on Thursdays, run on Thursdays and tell us about it. Then others will be curious and want to hook up. Let it grow naturally, so it becomes a safe place that you have created and owns together.
When the pass is over in Hägersten and all the balls are back in the basement store, Viljans Stockholm group is already charging for the next training. In two days it is time again, at a little smaller gym at Södermalm where they rent one evening a week. The future, as so often in non -profit activities, is quite open. One idea is to share even more on the leadership role in the future, so that you can reduce the term fee a little more. Stina Johansson says she may be eager to hold more passports.
– I want to train in a way that feels meaningful, which I get tired and strong. Finding these intimate, non -profit groups has given me a new view of my body. Being in an environment where you are seen for what you are not how you perform or look means a lot, says Stina Johansson.
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