The new Unipol recreation centre, located next to the Forsyth Barr stadium, opened in late January and the facility has so far received a warm reception from students, with 4600 students going through the gym in a single day last week.
The facility boasts two weight rooms, a cardio room, three separate court areas for Badminton, Volleyball and Basketball, and four changing rooms. The vastly increased space addresses the overcrowding that plagued the old Unipol facility, which was especially problematic in the weights and cardio areas.
Students Critic spoke to noted that the standard of the new areas is uniformly high, although several complained that many users of the weights areas were still failing to put their weights away after they finished shiftting tin.
Attached to the sports area is the new Plaza Café, which offers a range of food and beverages, including a Subway-style sandwich service and a breakfast menu. Critic speculates that great quivering hordes will now be attracted to Unipol by the prospect of doing seven minutes of light walking on the treadmills, followed by hours of stuffing their faces with chocolate milkshakes and deep-fried bacon rolled in extra-creamy mayonnaise.
Our highly scientific investigations calculated that burning off each meal eaten at the café required far too much time on the treadmill to bother with, and that it was probably best to just skip the exercise and accept the inevitable ballooning of weight that accompanies tertiary education in Dunedin.
On a brighter note, the new facility’s location immediately in front of the stadium represents a marketing coup for the University of Otago. The large logo on the front of the facility makes it look like the entire stadium belongs to the University, a deception that will almost certainly be used to impress visitors to our campus from real universities who can actually afford to build nice things on their campuses and don’t have to put up with extended practical jokes like the Archway lecture theatres or the Burns building.
The gym remains free for students who present a current student ID.
New Unipol offers Freshers false hope over inevitable 'Five'
