With over 3200 employees, Intel's massive computer chip fabrication plant in Leixlip, Co Kildare qualifies as a small town in its own right. But unlike many Irish towns of a similar size, the company has a sports complex which any city planner might envy.
The building known informally as the "Fitness Factory" houses basketball, volleyball, and badminton courts, a gym with exercise equipment and weights, a sauna, and full changing facilities.
"We're trying to take a bit of what we have on our US sites and bring it here," says Frank Turpin, academic relations manager for Intel. That means an organised but optional daily routine which begins in the morning with 10 minutes of company-wide stretching exercises - "we just go out in the corridor and do them", says Turpin.
A typical workday might then include reminders over the tannoy that an aerobics class starts shortly, a company-wide e-mail message announcing the formation of a hill-walking club, a workout in the gym, and a departmental soccer match at noon.
Many Intel employees are old hands at pumping iron and are delighted to have an on-site gym open from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., but for the average out-of-shape engineer, even a lowly treadmill - now complete with digital readout - can prove intimidating. The person charged with luring reticent employees deep into the recreation centre is manager Caroline Peppard, a woman who gets to go to work every day in a comfortable track suit.
"When we started off here we really had to go back to the basics," she says. "In general, people wouldn't be familiar with the equipment." The centre's approach is reassuringly comprehensive for the neophyte fitness fanatic - Intel employees must first go through a medical evaluation and then are given a rundown of all equipment before having a programme tailored to their needs.
That kind of structure appealed to employee Robert Mehigan, who has worked as a skills trainer at Intel for two years. Sitting on an exercise bicycle, he's working through a fitness routine he's been following for a month. "A long time ago I was a lot fitter," he laughs, noting that he decided to start working out in the gym after a basketball game in the centre left him winded.
Because he's on shift work, he likes the flexibility of the centre's opening hours. He also participates in various sports clubs, primarily basketball. "When I moved out here from Cork, I started coming over," he says. "It's a good way of meeting people."
After a vigorous treadmill jog, Anita Curran is making a pit stop at the water cooler. She's been with the European repair centre at Intel for three years, but has only recently started coming to the gym. She's familiar with the equipment because she used her local gym in Lucan regularly before moving to Leixlip a year ago.
"I just decided I wanted to get back in shape again," she says. She adds that she's considering signing up for a team sport, or perhaps aerobics. "I never actually realised how much is going on here," she adds, pointing out that the gym area, on the first floor, overlooks the activities taking place in the ground floor exercise area and basketball courts.
After all the hard work - or maybe even without it - employees can head for the sauna downstairs. Peppard says it's proven to be highly popular. "I believe the conversations in the sauna can be priceless," she says wryly.