Cityfile: New York's Most Notable and Influential

Crunch Gets Crunched | Crunch filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection today. The chain won't be disappearing, though. The chain reports it has a buyer lined up and willing to take over, and only two locations willl close as the company reorganizes. As part of the filing, Crunch also revealed that it owes more than $100 million to 50,000 creditors. So if you check your credit card statement next month and you see you were "accidentally" billed you for the next three months, that probably means you're one of them. [Reuters, Crain's]

Gwynnie's Trainer Heads to the Marriott | What do you do when you're a celebrity trainer who can't find clients willing to pony up $900 a month to join your new downtown gym? Head to the Marriott Marquis, apparently. Tracy Anderson, the woman who takes credit for Madonna and Gwyneth Paltrow's buff bods and Scarlett Johansson's newly svelte frame, will be holding two classes there this month, charging $200 for a three-hour workout and one-hour Q&A session. Anderson isn't promising any of her famous clients will show up, but that probably won't deter any of the people staying at the hotel, who likely booked the Marriott Marquis because they were under the impression they'd be situated in the hottest nabe in NYC. [NYO]

In these dark times, we'll take good news from wherever we can, let alone spectacular news like this. Basically, any guilt you were harboring about not having been to the gym since the beginning of the new year you can replace with smugness, because scientists now say that exercise isn't going to make you thin. In fact, it might even make you fat! "Your appetite goes up when you start to exercise," according to one physiologist. "Your body is telling you it needs more calories, so you eat more." More

Shelter of Shame | Here's an unsettling ad campaign that will probably make it to NYC in the near future: A gym in the Netherlands configured a bus shelter so that the weight of the person sitting down on the bench is displayed for all to see. Painful, huh? But maybe this is the radical approach Gwyneth Paltrow should consider adopting given she's having so much trouble finding people to join her new gym in Tribeca? It's not like reminding the public at large that they're all fatter than her could do much more damage to her already battered reputation, could it? [Adfreak]

The Slum on East 13th Street | You don't need to travel all the way to India to experience the "party" portrayed in Slumdog Millionaire. You can "recreate the final scene of the Oscar winning, Bombay rags-to-riches tale" as part of a new workout class at the Crunch gym on 13th Street! "It's great," NYU professor Rebecca Packer tells the Daily News. "One can have fantasies and delusions of grandeur." Well put! "Grandeur" is totally the first word that comes to mind when we think of the movie, too. [NYDN]

Gwyneth Paltrow's Gym is Tribeca-Bound | It wasn't a joke: Gwyneth Paltrow really is planning to open a gym with her personal trainer, Tracy Anderson, the same woman responsible for Madonna's freakishly muscular arms. Paltrow's publicist tells the Daily News that the gym will be located in Tribeca. But don't expect to see Gwynnie in person when it eventually opens: When she went on Oprah last fall with Anderson, she said her "favorite gym in the world" was the one located in her own home. [NYDN]

Impossible Physical Ideals for All! | These may be sad times economically, but there's encouraging news on the sexual equality front: At last, men are suffering from the same kind of crippling vanity as women, as evidenced by sales of men's fitness mags, gym attendance, and levels of manorexia and "muscle dysmorphia syndrome." Responsible, of course, are advertisers, and their increased use of "undressed male models" in ads. But we're sure the internet should somehow take credit too. [Times UK]

Ever wake up and wish you looked just like Derek Jeter? No? Well, you're going to get your chance anyway. 24 Hour Fitness, the gym chain that has signed the likes of Magic Johnson, Andre Agassi, Lance Armstrong, Shaquille O'Neal, Jackie Chan, and Yao Ming in the past, has tapped the Yankee to serve as its public face when it opens four gyms later this year. Three locations will be located in Manhattan (SoHo, Madison Square Park, Midtown). One will be located in New Jersey, where we imagine the concept will be infinitely more popular.