About becoming a personal trainer

leachy said:

I suppose that's a compliment. I see alot of people getting trained and both the trainer and trainee treat it like a social visit!

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Well, it turns out what she meant was that she'd previously had as a trainer some buff young guy who was more interested in looking at himself in the mirror than looking at the person he was supposedly training.

I'd like to mention DC again, the young bloke who threw up after a session but came back for more. He started on October 7th this year, and has had 14 sessions.

He is 1.75m tall and began at 59kg and 10% bodyfat, mild scoliosis and desk job leading to frequent back pain, he ate like a 13 year old girl, missing breakfast, eating junk for lunch but having a decent dinner. I got him to have a drink every day made up of 1lt milk, 3 eggs and 100g milk powder - he adds some sustagen for taste. He also drinks this during or after a workout. He now eats more fresh fruit and vegies, and has oats for breakfast. He began with just 10 bodyweight squats and pushups. He had never done free weights before.

Last night after exactly eight weeks of training he weighed in at 65kg and still 10% bodyfat, no more back pain. He did OHP 35kg 3x5, SQ 70kg 3x5, and DL 95kg 1x3. He then went home and had a 500g ribeye steak for dinner.

Very dedicated guy, and getting the results from it. No credit to me, his consistent effort over time has got him results. He's the engine, I'm just the guy turning the steering wheel to guide him.

Hold on Kyle, are you saying this guy gets bigger and stronger by eating food and lifting weights?

I'd like to see some scientific data to back up your claims.

Do you know for a fact he's not taking creatine, noexplode, prohormones etc

nice work big fella, I hope he tells his mates for your sake, its how the best clients lists are formed

Markos, not sure if I mentioned it, but one day DC came in and was working out on his own, I boasted about him a bit to another trainer.
She said, "Steroids?"
"No, just milk."
"It has to be steroids, those sorts of gains are impossible without them. I've never seen it."
I was pissed off now, so I said, "So in other words you've never got those sorts of results with your clients?"

I don't think I made a friend there. Point is, as you say eating better and lifting more is so rare and unusual that when people do it they get results other people think can only happen with magic or drugs or something.

As for telling his mates, he already dragged his dad in for a session, dad came for his own session afterwards, he hasn't signed up but has gone to the gym and worked out regularly since. Another guy working out has been watching and asked me about training him. This is not really a good time of year to get people signing up, though, have to wait for the Resolutioners in the second week of January.

I still have around 15 clients at the gyms so I am doing alright. Of course the sessions will drop off around Christmas/New Year, and some people won't come back, but others will come. Once I have 15-20 regular clients at one workplace I can just work there, going between the two workplaces is doing my head in.

Kyle get your clients off the roids, stop sneaking them in to his milk.

Kyle Aaron said:

Markos, not sure if I mentioned it, but one day DC came in and was working out on his own, I boasted about him a bit to another trainer.
She said, "Steroids?"
"No, just milk."
"It has to be steroids, those sorts of gains are impossible without them. I've never seen it."
I was pissed off now, so I said, "So in other words you've never got those sorts of results with your clients?"

I don't think I made a friend there. Point is, as you say eating better and lifting more is so rare and unusual that when people do it they get results other people think can only happen with magic or drugs or something.

As for telling his mates, he already dragged his dad in for a session, dad came for his own session afterwards, he hasn't signed up but has gone to the gym and worked out regularly since. Another guy working out has been watching and asked me about training him. This is not really a good time of year to get people signing up, though, have to wait for the Resolutioners in the second week of January.

I still have around 15 clients at the gyms so I am doing alright. Of course the sessions will drop off around Christmas/New Year, and some people won't come back, but others will come. Once I have 15-20 regular clients at one workplace I can just work there, going between the two workplaces is doing my head in.

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I would imagine that would be pretty annoying.

I'm hoping to (eventually) open up a PTC style gym one day in the future.
For now I'm just relieved to have to have passed my Cert III

Muscle memory

The other day a gym member came to me for a new routine. He said, "I've worked out before, so progress should be quick! Isn't that muscle memory?"
"What have you done before?" He'd done leg press and curling on swiss balls and stuff.
I just smiled and said, "If you work hard, progress will be quick, yes."
He wanted to get big and strong. Okay, easy - squat, overhead press, deadlift.

After I showed him through, he said, "my muscles don't remember anything like this."

After I showed him through, he said, "my muscles don't remember anything like this."

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Kyle: "Oh so you haven't worked hard before"

Muscle Memory

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I hate that term.

How come your clients don't bench press Kyle? (from what i've read in the past few posts)

unt0uchable said:

How come your clients don't bench press Kyle? (from what i've read in the past few posts)

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Many people coming from a sedentary background have an increased kyphosis, meaning that their pecs and front delts are short and tight, their upper back muscles weak. They need to stretch them out, working them hard in flat bench prss would make them tighter. We could match the pressing work with pulling, but then both pressing and pulling muscles would get stronger at the same rate, and the imbalance would remain.

As well as making their posture unattractive, this strength imbalance leads to all sorts of back and shoulder problems over the years. So the priority is to fix it up.

Also, being on their feet for every exercise improves their midsection or "core" strength. The person who can put 50kg overhead will have a stronger core than the one who can put 20kg overhead; whether they have a 100kg or 50kg bench press won't affect their core strength much. Improving core strength makes other exercises stronger, improves posture, reduces incidental back pain, and so on.

Lastly, in day-to-day life people mor often need to put something heavy overhead than to push something heavy away from them. The exception is for some sports. One client is a rugby player, he benches.

So I usually have them press overhead and improve their pulling strength. When they can put more than half their bodyweight overhead, or at least 40kg for the quite overweight ones, and when they can deadlift their own bodyweight x1.25, by that stage their posture has improved a lot, they stand taller with shoulders back, and they're ready to bench press.

It's also good motivationally. Whenever you see a picture of someone presented as strong, they're shown with a weight overhead. So it encourages the newbies a lot.

The rule of thumb is

Walk into a commercial gym, take note of the most popular exercises, dont do them

Check the least popular exercises, do them

There is a reason why squatting, deadlifting, overhead pressing is seldom seen in a commercial gym by average clients.

Sounds like a good rule to me, well put. Hence why I don't prescribe swiss balls and curls.

Anyway, what I usually find is that with general gym members and clients who only have one session a week, okay they're doing their own work, too - and they usually add stuff like bench press, crunches, curls, or zillions of hours of cardio.

Like today I saw that guy I mentioned earlier, the one who'd previously been doing swiss ball wall squats and yet was able to squat 60kg, deadlift 100kg, and so on - when I saw him, he said he'd added exercises because the squat, bench, row, press and deadlift in one session I'd given him, he said it wasn't enough. I said, "You may feel differently when you're squatting 100kg, but have fun in the meantime."

I give them the stuff they wouldn't do without me. The stuff which will actually help them achieve their goals.

Kyle, do you have clients who are not gym members?

If you do, or plan on getting some, pm me, I have an offer.

I have offered this to a couple of other PT's who are starting out, I dont want to see them renting floor space in gyms.

I have clients outside the gyms, and some clients at the gyms are not members, they only come for PT.

I don't pay rent, I'm paid to be there at certain times, if I have PT clients I get extra. There's a steady stream of people interested in their fitness, some of them want PT. Basically signed up a new one today, though I had to stop him molesting a current client

Email sent.

Some progress of my lifters in the last couple of days. The two guys used chalk for the first time ever today.

After 4 sessions, Monica @63kg - SQ65.
After 12 sessions, Agatha @63kg - OHP27.5, BSQ55
After 15 sessions, Andrew @85kg - OHP55, BSQ125, FSQ110, DL140
After 17 sessions, David @65kg - OHP37.5, BSQ75, DL100

Those are the ones focused on strength, my other clients care about other stuff so their progress in lifts is slower.

i just found this thread, interesting reading

"This morning I did a workout, 20 rep squats. In the first few reps the bottom of my foot cramped up. It really hurt. However, the 20 reps seemed easier than last time, and looked more confident. My workout partner commented that maybe the pain in my foot distracted me from the pain of the 20 rep squats. So if you stall on the squat tonight, I thought we might put a nail in your foot."

"Sounds good."

Tonight Dave (DC) was at 65.7kg up from 59kg, and he squatted 80kg, pressed 40kg, and deadlifted 110kg. Not bad for 9-10 weeks.

Andrew with considerably more training behind him at 85kg front squatted 115kg, back squatted 130kg, pressed 60kg overhead, and deadlifted 145kg. Another trainer told me afterwards he used to be obese and have dreadlocks, now he looks like Matt Shirvington (except I've never seen him in speedos).

Good to see you're getting results with your clients

Mum (now that I've at least got Cert III) has booked me in to run group sessions for the older people at her dance school (pretty sure they're all in the 40-50 range with maybe one or two outside of that)

Still not 100% sure of what im going to do with them but I'd suggest it will focus on 'quality of living' focussing on improving ROM (for any that may be limited) as well as improving their 'functional' strength through the use of squats, lunges and deadlift variations. I've got fairly limited equipment for group exercises so may end up resorting to doubling up those green shopping bags and filling them with small plates or dbs lol
Vertical pressing is another good one to make it easier for them to put things in cupboards etc (as long as they don't have high BP)

As always, the aim should be to have people do more than before, more weight, more reps, or more sets. But remember that with particularly deconditioned people, there is a fourth "more" - increasing range of motion. Don't be discouraged because their first squats are one-eighth squats, be patient and over time they'll increase their range of motion, more quickly than you expect.