Athletes are back in the gym.

Professionals are relieved to reopen after months of shutdown, but their economic situation is precarious.

The end of aid and the need to repay loans guaranteed by the State are real sources of concern for the future.

The sports halls are open, but the owners have finances in the red.

Since June 9, athletes can return to the gym.

Despite the joy of the reunion, the professionals of the sector draw up a sad assessment of these long months of closure due to the Covid.

Added to this is a gradual authorized recovery and forecasts for a return to normal which suggest several months of famine, which worries professionals for their future.

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Only "30 to 35% of turnover" will be achieved

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But behind this euphoria of the reopening hovers a financial abyss.

"We will be well below our planned objective. We are at 30 to 35% of the turnover forecast for the year 2020-2021", underlines François Petit, the founder of the room.

To this is added "the loans guaranteed by the State. We will have to repay them and especially that puts us in debt. For two to three years it will be complicated."

Concern over stopping aid

In the fitness rooms, the situation is even more gloomy.

They lost on average half of their turnover in 2020. The same year, a third of subscribers returned their card, worries Guillaume Schroll, vice-president of the France Active union, which represents companies in the sector.

"It is estimated that it will take 12 to 18 months to regain the level of subscribers before Covid."

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But if the money is going to take time to come back, "the fixed charges, we will find them. And not to mention the rent debt which has been postponed for some, and which will have to be repaid", emphasizes he does. So, "the concern comes from the fact that the aid will stop at the end of August". Like professionals from other sectors, it requires financial support at least until the end of December. The time that the French find, for good, the path of the sports halls.