Gyms are core to your school’s brand - they are shared spaces, the home of your sports teams and the hub for your school’s community. Gymnasium wood floors wear down and get seriously dirty, whether from gym class, basketball games, school dances, or fundraisers. Worse yet, they become unsafe as the finish wears off, reducing the amount of slip resistance. These factors combine and make your floors look dull and neglected. Â
Even with regular maintenance, restoration and even replacement are inevitable. Traditional floor restoration involved a lot of mess, labour and money. Reactive floor care costs you more, so having a wood floor program helps you plan and make smart investments at the right time. Here are our recommendations for monitoring and preparing a wood floor program for your gymnasium.
Key challenges in maintaining gymnasium flooring
Damage from heavy use: Physical activities, sports events, and regular foot traffic take their toll on your floors. The repeated impact of sports equipment, such as basketballs and volleyball shoes, can cause scratches, scuff marks, and dents on the surface.
Moisture and humidity: Gymnasiums often have high humidity levels due to sweat from athletes and inadequate ventilation. Moisture can seep into the flooring material, leading to warping, swelling, or mould growth, which is especially problematic for wood floors.
Surface finish deterioration: Gym floors are typically finished with protective coatings, such as polyurethane or epoxy, to provide durability and a smooth playing surface. However, these finishes can degrade over time due to abrasion, chemical exposure (from cleaning agents), and UV radiation, leading to a loss of shine, discoloration, or uneven patches.Â
Cleaning challenges: Maintaining cleanliness in a gymnasium can be difficult due to the large area and various contaminants. Sweating athletes, spills, dirt, and debris require frequent and thorough cleaning. However, improper cleaning techniques or using harsh chemicals can damage the flooring material or compromise the finish.
Line marking maintenance: Gym floors often have markings for various sports, such as basketball, volleyball, and badminton. These lines need regular maintenance to ensure visibility and accuracy. Over time, the lines may fade, peel, or become damaged, requiring repainting or reapplication.
Budget constraints: School budgets may limit the availability of funds for gymnasium maintenance. Properly addressing flooring issues requires periodic refinishing, repairs, or even complete replacement, which can be costly.Â
Establishing regular maintenance routines helps mitigate these issues, including scheduled cleaning, inspections, and repairs. Employing appropriate cleaning methods, using protective mats or covers during non-sporting events, and implementing proper humidity controls can also help extend the lifespan of gymnasium floors.
Example of flooring requiring re-lining due to lack of preventative maintenance.
A fast, effective gymnasium wood floor program with less mess
Preparation And Deep Cleaning
Traditional methods: First, strip the floor of lines if you're in a gymnasium. Use a dust mop to wipe the surface, and ensure you're not just spreading the dirt around. Rinse the floors afterwards, allotting time to dry.
Swish's Wood Floor Program: Besides dust mopping, which you should regularly do, Swish has a unique wood floor prep solution that removes black scuff marks and embedded dirt. You can prep floors for finish and apply with a floor scrubber. Then simply rinse the floor afterwards with a simple damp mop.
Sanding & Additional Deep Cleaning
Traditional methods: It could take a day just to sand the floors, stripping them down to a new, undamaged layer, creating messes from dust that you'll need to vacuum and unhealthy air quality.
Swish's Wood Floor Program: No sanding needed. Seriously. This means no mess and a lot of saved time. Instead, Swish recommends a deep scrub to remove the damaged finish, and you already have the machine needed for this because you just used it to apply the prep solution.Â
Applying Finish
Traditional methods: Apply finish evenly. Dry for 24 hours. Sand. Apply finish evenly. Dry for 24 hours. Sand. Repeat if needed. Then you must wait at least a full day before you can use the floors. Some sources suggest waiting up to a week. Not to mention that in a gym, you still have to reapply the lines.
Swish's Wood Floor Program: Our water-based urethane acrylic high gloss Swish® Wood Floor Gym Finish  applies easily and is slip-resistant. But the most significant benefit is that it dries in under two hours, so you can apply the second coat that same day. After that dries, you're free to use the floor! And if you require more slip resistance, Swish has a wood cleaner/restorer called Swish Clean & Green® High Traction Gloss Restorer that cleans your floors while reducing the risk of slips and fall accidents.
Periodic Cleaning And Maintenance
Traditional methods: Sweeping and dust frequently mopping spread dirt around and don't help floors with their shine.
Swish's Wood Floor Program: Dust mopping to remove soils and reduce the risk of damage. Swish has aheavy-duty no-rinse wood cleaner that can be applied with a scrubber to emulsify salt residue or other soils that dull floors quickly. Feel free to buff or burnish if you want a more substantial gloss. We even have ahigh gloss solution made specifically for wood.Â
High-traffic wood floors like gymnasiums require restoration once or twice a year, but depending on the wear and tear, it may need intervention sooner. Restoration traditionally could take up to a week, but mid-term doesn’t allow much flexibility. Swish's program refinishes floors in one day and without sanding.
When its time to resurface your gym’s wood floors
Gym floors are your school’s showcase, and the team at Swish wants to help you maintain their natural beauty safely and cleanly. Find out more about our 5CE floor care program here.
