Peters Township man jumps into new business
Eleanor Bailey/The Almanac
Raj Jadhav of Peters Township is one of three investors in the new Highpoint Fitness center.
Raj Jadhav of Peters Township is one of the investors in the new Highpoint Fitness center.
Jessica Mancosh demonstrates a strength-building move during an aerobics water class workout.
Jessica Mancosh demonstrates some of the strength-building moves during an aerobics water class workout.
Dr. Marnie Oakley encourages her cyclists to give a little more effort during a spin class.
Peggy Gregor works her quad muscles on one of the machines in the functional training area of the Highpoint Fitness gym.
Kelli Snyder demonstrates a squat using a medicine ball.
Kelli Snyder uses the computer to check data on perspective new members.
Kelli Snyder works the computer at the entrance to Highpoint Fitness.
Raj Jadhav watches as Peggy Gregor demonstrates the use of ropes as part of training at Highpoint Fitness.
Raj Jadhav of Peters Township is an investor in the new Highpoint Fitness center.
Some of the balls, weights, bands and ropes in the functional training area.
A bank of exercise machines awaits user at the new Highpoint Fitness center in Bethel Park.
Highpoint Fitness will feature an area for aquatic exercise that includes a lap pool as well as sauna, hot tub, steam room amenities.
The spin studio at Highpoint Fitness features 22 state-of-the art bikes and an accompanying sound system complete with video screens.
Some of the free weights available at Highpoint Fitness.
Raj Jadhav at the front desk and entrance of Highpoint Fitness.
When Healthtrax closed permanently in May of 2019, it created a chasm so deep for Raj Jadhav that the 52-year-old McMurray man bought the gym space with two other investors.
Highpoint Fitness, located at 1000 Higbee Drive in Bethel Park, opens Dec. 15. A grand opening celebration will be held in January 2021.
“(The closure) created a gap,” said Jadhav, who moved to the area more than a dozen years ago. “There was nothing out there that gave me the sense of community I had at Healthtrax. It really became our family.”
Jessica Mancosh concurred. An aquatics instructor for 17 years, she taught Jadhav’s two children: Aaryan, now a senior at Rice University; and Eeshann, a senior at Peters Township High School, how to swim.
“Definitely a family here,” said Mancosh.
She is excited to resume her duties at the new health club.
“A new family in a new place,” she said. “We are thrilled to get everybody back home again.”
Jadhav said old as well as new members will feel comfortable in the new fitness center. He said the new gym will be community-focused, safe and clean.
“We want this gym to be for everyone. A place people can call home,” he said. “Most people come here because they want a refuge, where they can leave the outside world behind,” said Jadhav.
Once inside the fitness center, members have an array of choices from individual workouts to group classes. The gym is equipped with 41 all-new Matrix cardio machines that run the gamut from treadmills to steppers to ellipticals.
There’s a specific area for free weights as well as a group fitness studio for yoga, step, power, Pilates and Mossa classes.
In addition to swimming lessons, an array of aquatics classes will be offered. The area features a main pool for lap swimming, lessons and classes as well as a smaller pool. Additionally, there are spa features such as a hot tub, sauna and steam rooms.
“We are not a club even though we have all the amenities of one,” Jadhav said. “We want this to be a place that ordinary people will be able to afford. As investors, our spirit was to give back to the community. All we do here is for the community.”
The community can achieve its fitness goals through personal and small group training as well at Highpoint Fitness. A specific area in the gym is dedicated to functional workouts with kettle bells, bands, balls, weights and ropes. There are punching bags and rowing machines.
Kelli Snyder is thrilled with the refurbished areas in which she will be working as Highpoint’s director of fitness. She will also manage the group and personal training.
“The owners have done a fantastic job of making this a wonderful place in which to train. It’s unbelievable and a little overwhelming to be part of such a great undertaking,” she said. “I feel blessed to be part of such a great leadership/ownership team.”
Snyder said she is hoping Highpoint Fitness recaptures the camaraderie Healthtrax once provided.
“That sense of community and family has been impossible for people to recreate,” she said. “People have tired to find a place similar, but there is no other. I’m super confident that’s what will separate us from the rest. That environment we are trying to recapture is imperative to our success and that will put us back on top.”
Highpoint Fitness also offers a spin studio that features state-of-the-art equipment, from the 22 bikes to the sound system and video monitors.
John Carberry helped design the spin studio, which displays inspirational quotes and a mural photographed by Cindy Cavanaugh, on its walls.
“I wanted to create an atmosphere that makes you realize that you are winning if you are here,” said the spin instructor. “You are here because you want to make yourself better.
“Overall, the feeling is we are here to promote wellness and exercise does promote wellness. My hope, my vision,” he continued, “is to create a place for people to come that is going to make them healthy and happy and is going to bring the community together.”
Highpoint Fitness will operate on a reduced schedule during the pandemic. Hours will be 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Thursday; 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Fridays and 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. weekends.
Occupancy will be determined by the health inspector’s recommendation. The maximum workout time is the gym is limited to 90 minutes and members will be required to scan in as well as scan out. Plus, masks are required for all activities, except for swimming.
In addition to its website, www.highpointfitness.com, the gym will roll out an app that allows members to sign-up ahead of time for classes or to monitor capacity.
“We are starting small and slowly and trying to build up,” Jadhav said. “You cannot be careful enough. We want to make people comfortable.”
Currently Highpoint Fitness has compiled an email list of 500 potential customers.
Some 350 are former Healthtrax members.
“Many people are eager to come back. They felt as if they belonged here,” Jadhav said.
“It’s amazing the small world that was built in this community. We saw every type of person. People that helped each and really worked together.”
For more information, call 412-230-1000.
Becoming a proprietor can be risky business but becoming an owner at the height of the coronavirus pandemic is quite another endeavor, particularly when the adventure involves the fitness industry.
Raj Jadhav of Peters Township and two other investors, however, are soldiering on with their attempts to open Highpoint Fitness, Bethel Park’s newest full-service gym.
Jadhav said it has been “discouraging” at times because of COVID-19. The process of ownership actually improved when the investors signed a lease in August. However, an expected October opening was delayed by construction. A surge in COVID-19 cases has caused further snafus.
“COVID-19 certainly has impacted a lot of things,” said Jadhav.
Upon entering the facility, patrons will undergo temperature checks. They will be interviewed and asked to answer questions regarding their health.
Showering at the gym will be banned. The sauna, steam room and hot tub, located in the pool area, will be closed.
Group classes will be limited based on capacity and social distancing will be enforced for all activities and use of equipment.
Masks will be required, including for spinning classes.
“We are in a healthcare building,” John Carberry said of the gym, that is housed within the Allegheny Health Network’s Bethel Park Health & Wellness Pavilion. “So we take this seriously.”
“Exercise does promote wellness,” he added. “However research has shown that it also creates risks in this environment and we are doing everything we can to mitigate risks.
Carberry said an important aspect of health comes from “regular exercise and socialization.”
“We feel there is a place for this and with proper measures we can create an effective and relatively risk-averse environment for people to come to every day to relieve stress and be healthy,” he said.
Health is the hallmark of all that Highpoint Fitness promotes. So a premium has been placed on the “well-being” of the members.
A spin instructor, Carberry admits to having concerns about operating during the coronavirus crisis. He said the last thing Highpoint Fitness wants is for a virus to be transmitted through a class or the facility itself. So he encourages people to stay home when they are sick.
“A lot of times people like to work out when they are sick because they think it works it out. No,” he said. “We want you to stay home when you are sick.
“We also want you to feel comfortable if you do come that we are doing everything that we can to prevent everybody else from contamination. Well-being is primary.”
Carberry said staff is concerned another shutdown is looming during the winter months.
“There is a lot of anxiety,” said Jessica Mancosh, who teaches swim lessons and instructs all the aquatics classes at Highpoint Fitness. “We are following all the precautions and staying super positive. We can’t change what is going on in the world but we can do our part to combat it.”
Mancosh will wear a mask during lessons as well as during small-group training. She said lap swimming will be limited to one person per lane. Class sizes will be reduced.
“People ask what are we doing different,” she said. “We are following protocols and making sure people feel comfortable walking into this facility. We are putting everybody first. It’s what we believe in.”
Kelli Snyder said the staff has attended webcasts, webinars and roundtable discussions on how to do implement all the recommendations by the World Health Organization and guidelines outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“We all think that fitness, wellness and exercise are all important pieces of staying healthy, especially during this time so we are taking every precaution and following every protocol put into place,” she said. “By adopting these guidelines, we are confident that we are going to keep our members safe and still allow them to exercise and socialize in a very safe environment. We are prepared to do all those things.”