Sand and Steel Fitness
Paul Roberts
Like for many people who catch COVID-19 and have symptoms, Paul Roberts’ journey started with a tickle in his throat.
Now that he’s recovered, he’s on a mission to help educate the public and other business owners on coronavirus safety and preparedness.
The co-owner of Sand & Steel Fitness was careful, wearing a mask at all times, washing his hands and spending thousands of dollars on specialized equipment for his West End gym. He thinks he caught the coronavirus in his apartment building.
“My best guess is that I caught it in my apartment building, because they really did not enforce masks and distancing in elevators, and they really didn’t do a good job on common areas,” he said.
Sand & Steel Fitness, at 5418 Eisenhower Ave., is equipped with a bipolar ionization fan with a plasma air ionizer, which converts oxygen molecules into charged atoms that can deactivate mold, bacteria and viruses. In addition, the gym is equipped with a Carrier Opticlean 1500 CFM HEPA filter air handler and air quality sensors. The gym staff also uses Ryobi’s Floor Sprayer and Fogger and Simple Green-D to aid in disinfection.
Roberts also requires that all of his clients wear masks at all times, even while exercising, which goes beyond Virginia state requirements. He also enforces distancing by having clients make reservations, and he offers online classes.
As soon as Roberts started having that tickle in his throat, he quarantined himself and got tested as soon as possible, even as he tried to convince himself it was just a cold.
“Like any disease, people are reluctant to get tested for it because they don’t want to get bad news,” he said. “It’s easy to deny.” He stayed home until he got that bad news.
Virginia laws required Roberts to tell his employees but did not require that he inform his clients — but he didn’t feel right withholding any information.
He had taught two classes with nine people in each class between the time he thinks he was infected and the time he started showing symptoms. Roberts paid for rapid testing for every client who needed it, followed up individually with all of them, and found out that none of them had caught the virus.
“Nobody got it from me in those classes — we followed up with everyone and paid for rapid testing for everyone. Those precautions, and particularly the ionization fan and HEPA filter and really enforcing distancing and masks both ways, that’s really why,” he said.
It seems like all the preparations, equipment, masking and distancing worked — Sand & Steel Fitness was a safe place when it mattered most.
Roberts is now providing information on equipment, sanitation practices and safety measures to other gym owners now, through a series of blog posts and press releases. He also released a video (below) with information about the precautions he's taking.
Virginia does not require people to wear masks while exercising, but Roberts thinks the masks were a key component in keeping the gym’s clients safe.
Roberts said he had symptoms for several days, from that sore throat to a loss of smell, loss of energy, muscle aches and more. He does not seem to have any long-haul COVID symptoms from his infection this winter, he noted.
His blood oxygen level got down to 95 percent and breathing was difficult. Severe headaches put him in bed.
“One thing that I learned that isn’t well mentioned anywhere is that a good portion of people lose their sense of smell, and there are steroids you can get after you recover that can help you regain that. I had lost my sense of smell until I took Prednisone. ... After two weeks, my sense of smell returned,” he said. Not taking the steroids can make it harder to get your sense of smell back, as the loss of smell may be related to nerve damage, some experts say.
One scary moment for Roberts came when bread was left in the oven too long and burned. “We had a fire in my apartment and I was in the same room and I obviously would have smelled it, but I didn’t.” He saw the flames in the oven and smoke in the air, but never smelled the burning food.
Roberts has registered to get his COVID-19 vaccine but is still on the waiting list. In the meantime, he’s back at work and offering advice:
- Pick up cold medicine (check with your doctor to make sure the medicine is safe to use during a COVID-19 infection).
- Get a pulse oximeter before you get sick so you can monitor your oxygen levels. If you get to 92 percent, go to the hospital.
- Familiarize yourself with Instacart and other online, contact-free services.
- Get tested as fast as you can and quarantine yourself as much as possible while waiting for results.
Even with precautions, anyone can get the virus.
"I wasn’t really sick anymore after seven days," he said. "But it took my body a good 45 days to completely recover. COVID-19 is a wicked virus, and I was good in health."
