Tallinn to keep outdoor gyms and sports fields closed for now

From Saturday, May 2, the government is allowing the municipalities to open their sports halls and sports fields. Tallinn City Government is still going to keep them closed until the end of the emergency situation because there is no workforce to ensure safety requirements.
People can train in outside gyms if its owner or holder ensures disinfection of the gym equipment after every use but not less often than after every four hours. Also, the 2+2 rule needs to be followed, according to which, people can visit the gyms alone or with another person, all the other people need to keep a distance of at least two meters. The restriction doesn´t apply to families.
Mayor of Tallinn, Mihhail Kõlvart (Center), said that the city is not able to ensure the disinfection of the sports fields and due to that the outdoor gyms and sports fields are not going to be opened yet.
"We have 55 outdoor gyms in Tallinn and we have to proceed from the arrangement that after every use, the exercise equipment needs to be disinfected. This means that an official needs to stand next to each of those gyms and ensure the cleaning process, this is not realistic," Kõlvart said.
Kõlvart added that the distance between people doing sports should be more than two meters because the capacity and intensity of their breathing is much higher. "We can´t talk about two meters. This is not adequate," Kõlvart noted.
Outdoor training is rather a cost than an income for the sports club
From May 2, sports clubs can arrange workouts in the outdoors. Even though it means an expense for the sports clubs, it is still seen as an opportunity to keep their client base.
MyFitness, for example, is moving most of their group trainings outside. Manager of Trainings in MyFitness, Eva Ottas said that it is mainly going to be charity.
"Firstly we have the trainer who needs to get his salary. On one hand, we can´t charge a lot from people but at the same time, the trainers don´t want to come out for such a small salary," Ottas said.
Member of the Board of the Audentes Sport Club, Priit Ilver, said that organizing the group trainings is more of an expense than an income.
"Even if we are doing the training for nine people, then what can we take from them - €3, this is €27 in total. This is the average salary per hour. And we also need to ensure all of these conditions. If the relaxing of the restrictions gives us a chance to earn revenue? The answer is definitely no," Ilver said.
Ilver said that the outdoor group trainings are considered to keep the clients in action, to keep them close and continue the cooperation in normal circumstances.
Ensuring the safety requirements is expensive on its own. You can train with a maximum of ten people at the same time and the people need to stay at least a couple of meters away from each other.
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Editor: Roberta Vaino