Times & Speaker reporter Stacey Mullen was given a guided tour of the revamped gym by supervisor Paul Murphy — and was more than impressed with the changes.

North Lanarkshire Leisure Ltd has invested around £500,000 in refurbishing the gym and much of that cost went to introducing the new Technogym technology, which is expected to be in full use over the next few weeks.

Used by top athletes and footballers, Technogym is an advanced programming system that not only caters the workout to suit your individual needs but it also makes sure you are making progress.

Paul said: "Although the Technogym technology will not be up and fully running for a few weeks, when it is implemented, we will have the ability to see each of the users' programme and we will instantly know things like if someone has a heart problem, so we can keep an eye on them while they are working out."

The gym not only has the very latest in equipment including cardiovascular, strength, kinesis, vario and excite+, but it has also increased the number of popular machines such as the treadmill from 17 to 25.

And the gym even has equipment which allows wheelchair users to work on their upper body strength.

The revamp has already gone down well with long term gym user Tracey Lamont, from Holytown, who said: "I am normally a runner but the weather has brought me into the gym more and the equipment is just fantastic."

Full story in January 7 edition of Times & Speaker