On Saturday morning, the researcher arrived at the gym at the same hour -- five a.m. -- to find no one but the staff present. This situation persisted for more than an hour and a half, when two men in their early forties -- one white and one black -- arrived and signed out equipment and a court to play racquetball. These individuals were the only people using the gym until just before seven a.m., when a black male in his twenties entered and began to use one of the treadmills. By eight o'clock, there were two white males, one white female, three Hispanic males, and one Asian male using the weight machines, two white females, four Hispanic females, two black males, and one white male using treadmills, and the four lanes of the pool were occupied by one Indian male in his fifties or sixties, a white female in her twenties,...
Though there was some rotation in the remaining hour of observation, no major demographic changes were noticed by the researcher.
After the experience on Saturday and speaking with the staff at this gym, the researcher did not come at five o'clock on Sunday but rather cam at seven o'clock, instead; only two people were in the gym; a black man in his fifties was on a treadmill, and a Hispanic female in her twenties was using a weight machine. By eight a.m., the male had left and the female was using a treadmill; two other treadmills were being used by two white females in their thirties that had arrived together. For the rest of the morning, the majority of gym traffic consisted of women in their twenties and thirties of all ethnicities.
