Victoria Windham, a massage therapist at the new Brick City Health & Fitness, does lunges while working out on Tuesday.

Cheryl Polack jammed Sunday morning to music as she used free weights and a kettlebell during an aggressive CrossFit workout at Brick City Health & Fitness, a new gym that opened last week in place of Compass Health & Fitness.

Brick City employee Leanna Bonnett took a moment to eat lunch as she peered across the newly organized rows of exercise machines and watched prospective customers enjoy a free fitness pass.

The sudden closing of Compass on Feb. 16 left many customers who had paid for their memberships in advance reeling. It also left Bill Reed, who did not buy Compass, having to explain to those angry customers that he was not responsible for the losses of Compass customers.

The Compass closing was just the latest chapter of Lee Farkas, the imprisoned former Taylor, Bean & Whitaker chairman convicted in a $3 billion fraud case. Farkas was still on the Compass lease when it was not renewed in February and the operators were evicted.

After Compass closed, Reed signed a lease with Ocala Plaza and Property Corp., which owns the building on Pine Avenue just south of Silver Springs Boulevard. After two weeks of getting permits, the entire gym was cleaned, machines repaired and lights replaced.

Brick City opened at 5 a.m. on March 5. Reed decided to give free access to the gym for the first 10 days, which ends Thursday, in hopes of getting back most of the estimated 1,000 Compass members. On Friday, the membership goes to $45 per month.

Reed said after interviewing all of the Compass employees, he hired most of them back. Officials said Sunday that hundreds of former Compass members have been visiting Brick City during the free trial period.

Many of them (former Compass employees) say that they now are seeing the staff smiling again, Reed said. Reed hopes to have permits in a few weeks to open the tanning booths, caf and beauty salon.

And it seems that many new customers are impressed with the new ownership.

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New gym hopes to work out