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Toronto fitness club closes suddenly after clients offered pay-up-front promotion

Click to play video: 'Fitness company shuttered after big promotion'
Fitness company shuttered after big promotion
WATCH: A trendy Toronto workout gym closed suddenly after offering deep discounts to clients willing to pay for fitness classes upfront. Larry Tracks' “Track Fitness” closed without warning, but Global News caught up with him. – Jun 28, 2019
Fitness trainer Larry Track described his favourite thing to do at his club while off duty as “[being] a client and [taking] as many classes as I can”.

But suddenly, Track’s own paying clients can’t take classes because he closed the doors of his Forest Hill Village workout studio, Track Fitness.

He did so without warning, and after running a promotion encouraging customers to pay up front for bundles of classes at a discount.

“I…never planned that it would end this way. I never wanted it to end and I did everything I could possibly do to keep it going and sacrificed my personal life along the way,” Track wrote on the company’s website.

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He didn’t explain in detail why he was closing.

“I hope we can sweat together in the future as it’s my goal to see you all again,” Track concluded.

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The phone number to the studio has been disconnected.

Frequent clients who regularly attend fitness classes at the studio are surprised.

“I am definitely feeling let down and very disappointed,” said Sam Wolfish, a regular customer at Track Fitness. “I am someone who would buy a lot of classes and I’m finding out the studio is closing.”

The studio featured high-intensity classes with names like power pilates, mile high, bodyshoc, climbmax, and the vertical mile. It had become a fixture on the second floor of a building in the upscale west Toronto neighbourhood. A Toronto publication once described the establishment as a “Forest Hill Village staple”.

Track recently opened a second studio a few minutes away on Eglinton Avenue called “the werkout.”

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“I don’t imagine that studio is going to be too successful after [Track] let down so many people,” Wolfish said.

WATCH: Toronto fitness club owner takes Global News for a long walk

Click to play video: 'Toronto fitness club owner takes Global News for a long walk'
Toronto fitness club owner takes Global News for a long walk

Global News caught up with Track at his abandoned gym.

“No comment, and if you could please leave the premises,” Track said, declining to answer questions about what happened to money paid by clients. When asked whether he would be providing refunds to customers, Track didn’t answer and escorted the Global News crew to the door.

Recently, Track Fitness offered a Father’s Day special: five classes for $100, a discount from the normal price.

Some customers told Global News they paid more than $600 for classes as a result of the promotion.

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This isn’t the first time Track has made news as a result of money problems with his fitness studio.

In 2004, former Toronto Argonaut co-owner David Cynamon sued Track, his former personal trainer, for $800,000. Cynamon alleged Track had not followed the terms of a loan repayment. As of 2018, the legal case had not been resolved.

— With files by Catherine McDonald

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