Training for an event, rehabbing from an injury, or just looking to stay in tip-top shape? Look no further than Dakota Personal Training & Pilates, an Upper West Side gym suited perfectly to those looking for one-on-one customized fitness plans.
Owner Penny Smart has been in the fitness business for nearly 30 years — “I started working out as a teenager and got addicted to it,” she jokes — and has tried her hand at everything from group fitness classes to working as an educator for fellow trainers. After finding her niche in personal training, she opened up her first studio on W 72nd in 2012, steadily building her client base and working with fellow trainers until the pandemic hit. “It was horrible,” said Penny. “We were closed for five and a half months and our old landlord nearly put us out of business.”
But as Penny worked to rebuild after the quarantine, she found a sign of hope — literally. “One day on my way to work, I saw a sign on this building saying that there was a commercial space for rent,” she told us. “It was my birthday, and I thought, ‘this has to be a sign!’”
She signed a lease on the space and began the process of moving in — lugging multitudes of large, unwieldy gym equipment up several flights of stairs and setting up a new studio. “What forced me here was bad, it’s been much better,” she said of starting over. She’s been able to add a physical therapy station into the gym, allowing PT Karn Santikul to work in tandem with her training clients. Penny is now focused on working with an expanded roster of clients, from longtime Upper West Siders to younger folks with more work-from-home-flexibility.
“I love the vastness of the people I get to meet in this neighborhood,” said Penny. “Because of the adjacency of the neighborhood to the arts, I’m always surprised by what people do for a living.”