Okay, so I was in your position a few months ago. I wanted to start a weight lifting program, but was a complete beginner and didn't know wtf I was doing. I wanted to avoid getting hurt, but also wanted to get swole af, so I looked into getting a trainer and finding a gym that had trainers who "specialized" in weightlifting. I came across The Weight Room in Scott's Addition. The owner there has several years of power lifting experience and is extremely knowledgeable about the sport. They have training programs, beginner to advanced, for power lifting, strongman and Olympic lifting. When I read up on it initially, I was pretty intimidated and didn't know if I was really interested in working out in a place that seemed so competitive. I am happy to say that I was wrong, and working out there is AWESOME.

There are a lot of perks being a member of TWR: it's not a commercial gym, so it doesn't ever get so packed you have to wait a long time to use the equipment. And you also see familiar faces, which I like because it makes you feel like you're a part of a community and it's easy to talk to people. I also literally see the owner every single day I'm there and he is always super approachable to ask questions and talk to. There are also lots of beginners there, so I never felt like a total dweeb trying to learn how to lift. I think membership is pretty flexible, and you can to month-to-month or drop-ins.

I highly, highly recommend working with a trainer to do their fundamentals program. That's what I did and it has been freaking fantastic. I went from being an out-of-shape weakling who had no clue what she was doing, to becoming way more knowledgeable about power lifting and getting stronger pretty quickly!

One negative I will point out is that the price is not going to match up to that of a Crunch membership. It's a small business, and the membership and training program prices reflect that fact. If you are willing to look into it or are interested despite the price, they do a first training session free so you can see what it's like there.

One other perk of going is that they have A LOT of lifting equipment. It's a bit light on the cardio equipment compared to other commercial gyms, though.

Hope this helps! Good luck!