[John_W]

My wife and I joined MVP at Brownwood last May and we have been going 4 or 5 mornings a week ever since. We live very close to Seabreeze and my neighbor belongs to that gym, so we visited that gym first. It was very small, reminded of a workout room at a motel. It costs my neighbor about $365 a year for one person. I had been working out at home for about 5 years already, so it seemed like I would be traveling to basically do the same thing I had been doing at home.

I then visited MVP at Brownwood, of course your initially impressed with the size of the building, they even have a basketball court and locker rooms with showers. What sets them apart is classes, there are three classrooms of different size with exercise equipment and stationary bikes. Some are for cross country biking, free weight exercises to yoga or cardio workouts. All through the day classes are offered at various times, they have printed schedules and electronic information boards on the wall like at an airport. The classes are lead by trained instructors with usually loud fast paced music. There is a main open area where treadmills, bikes, free weights and machines are available anytime without classes.

MVP is not cheap but we do like many others and that is to put it on our credit card and it's charged monthly and don't even see the bill. It's $59 a month for one person and $43 for the second member, with tax it's $109 per month. We've already knocked that down to $104 by referring a friend from my softball team. You get a $5 a month credit for every person you refer. If you were to stop by for a visit, they would give a short tour and a 3 day pass. If you have a referral from a member, they will give you a 7 day pass to try out the facilities and take any class you choose.