Bakar Fitness & Recreation Center

Best gym experience in San Francisco. The gym is very clean, spacious, and they have been putting in effort to improve over the last 6 months. Compared to some other spots, the 5-7 pm crowd isn't unbearable.

They have been expanding weekend hours and giving out guest passes (huge plus). There are 2 weight areas and 2 cardio areas (one on first floor and one on fourth) with a good mix of equipment. Worth the experience for the price.

I've worked out here since 2017. Good gym for people who want to lift weights. There's 5 squat racks, 5 completely overbuilt platforms for deadlifting/the Olympic lifts (Their Eleiko SVR platform costs over 4k apiece), dumbbells that go up to reasonable 100 lbs, a leg press, landmine, and numerous bodybuilding machines, all from Matrix.

The employees are all great people. You can tell they really care about how things are run. They've listened to concerns about a lack of barbells, and some time later, I saw 2 brand new Rogue Ohio power bars and 2 Rogue Ohio bars. A couple of them have actually spotted me on bench press too.

HOWEVER, I've got a couple of improvement suggestions.

1. Could we get a pair of better benches? The current hammer strength benches are problematic.

a. They don't have any safeties, and I've had to lift the bar off of quite a few different people over the years who didn't ask for a spotter. This could really lead to some bad accidents.

b. They also only have 2 j-hooks for the bar, which means people of different arm lengths will struggle to use them. Rogue makes several benches with built-in safeties and many attachment points for the j-hooks, so lifters of all sizes can use the bench more easily.

2. This gym used to have 4 functional trainer cable machines. After the pandemic, 2 of them were removed from service. PLEASE BRING THEM BACK! There is always a line for the cables, and this is a versatile and popular piece of gym equipment that is always in high demand.

As it is, the current cable machines often need repairs, meaning that there is often only one cable machine in service. Repairs also can take months! At least, if there are 4 of them in total, if one of them is down, we can use the other 3. Also, with 4 cable machines, they will wear down more slowly since the wear will be distributed on 4 different machines.

This is my current gym of choice due to the convenience of being close to work. I will say this gym is very clean compared to any other I've been to. I hope it stays that way and not only because it was very recently remodeled.

On the main floor, there's a good number of cardio machines and cages but somewhat lacking in benches and cable/weight machines. At peak hours, there realistically aren't that many people but the feeling of overcrowdedness looms due to there being only one machine unit for many of the popular exercises. This problem is further exacerbated by a lack of variety. There are a few, if any, apparatuses for decline exercises, for example.

Hours of operation are particularly short and especially so on weekends. The mobile app is dated and definitely needs a mega update. You can't even change your password on it... For $84/mo (UCSF employee rate), there's a lot to wish for but I remain hopeful that this will be remedied in the near future.

Obviously as you can tell from many reviews, the gym suffered an extreme flooding event a few years ago. Sometimes accidents happen and I am not sure why one would blame the facility for this accident. I think they handled it really well, giving members the option to freeze their membership if desired. Now the gym is completely fixed, so it's not an issue at all any more. I give it four stars rather than five because it's a no-frills public university gym, not a juice bar kind of place. It does have the best outdoor pool in San Francisco, and I love that there is open family swim indoors on the weekends.

This gym is poorly ran and maintained. Although it charges a premium price, the gym is plagued with problems such as flooding which close entire floors, as well as routine closures of the pool and other important amenities. On the weekend, this gym closes at noon which doesn't barely give you a half day to use it. There is no free street parking nearby because all of the property is owned by the University of California, so you need to pay to park every time you come to the gym. Parking easily adds up to more than the gym cost itself if you go regularly. Ever since I became a member a few months ago, and I can only recall a few weeks where everything in the gym was in working order.

If you work full time, which most people do, the chance of getting to the classes are slim.
And even, when you sign up, classes get full and people steal your spots! I signed up for the spin class, 24h ahead, got there early, put a towel on the bike to save my spot while going to changing room, when I went to the class, it was full and someone took my spot!! no one checks...i wonder why one should even bother to sign up.
at the gym, all machines are always full...
what a waste of money!!!

Would still highly recommend against joining. Day of closure notifications, very limited weight lifting equipment that is STILL in a dusty studio. Many people use the weight floor and the cardio equipment is hardly utilized in comparison, yet weight floor is jam packed with people- may have to wait 20+ min for a bench during regular hours. Paltry offering for additional equipment on the weight floor even with the remodel (if the proposed layout is any indication). The gym is going to be a disaster come new year's for folks looking to get back into shape. Lack of accountability regarding deadlines for construction- I don't care how complicated "multi-layered" programs are, if you aren't sure about dates offer customers incentives so they aren't getting totally shafted having to deal with unforeseen circumstances and construction scheduling issues.

I loved this gym when I joined.
It included parking for seniors.
The gym is great, clean, I go during the weekdays. So no lines for equipment.
Sadly after a few months the parking was taken away then covid hit. Now with warriors near by, the lot has become a big $$$ maker. $50. For game parking. With that extra money I wish they would consider helping seniors with parking. It really does make the membership too high for a fixed income by the time you ad in $8 to 10. Everytime you go.
That's easily $120. A month. Plus membership. And if you want a class...
It's just out of reach for seniors.
I would love to go back. I hope you consider this.

I agree with Zach S. I joined in February and was so excited to have a nice pool and Zumba classes. Since then, the outdoor pool flooded the entire first floor so the classes have been moved to a "pub lounge" and the Zumba classes are outside on cobblestone (which is TERRIBLE for dancing/jumping/joint pressure).

The pool is often really dirty. Can't the lifeguards just use their nets to clear out the debris and bugs so we aren't swallowing them?!

I was there for an hour and half today and it cost me TEN DOLLARS to park on top of my regular $112/mo membership.

I have complained about the lack of amenities and services many times, and they have only offered to put my membership on hold.

I say they let the members park for free, or at least a more discounted rate. If I go 6-7 days a week, which I do, parking could cost MORE THAN MY MEMBERSHIP.

I turned up today after being talked into a monthly membership. It is a blazingly hot, beautiful sunny San Francisco day and the outdoor pool is ... closed! Not open until 4:30 pm. Closed ALL DAY and only opens at 4:30 pm for lap and leisure swims.
So I thought "Oh well - I'll do my lap swim in the indoor pool ..."
CLOSED AS WELL!
Are you kidding me?
I asked why and the front desk girl said: "short-staffed"
What?
They can't find anyone to watch over an outdoor rooftop pool in a beautiful location in summer in San Francisco?
What's the freaking point of having an outdoor pool in SUMMER then?
I spent good money in a cab to get there and had to go straight home.
I can hardly believe this.
Get your act together!