About becoming a personal trainer

Kettlebell training at the moment is not officially recogonised by Fitness Australia, it is recognised by Kinetics. I am into Kettlebells myself and want to do the certification and am looking at doing it through Dynobells, they cost $250 and you get about 2 ces points, while Austalian Kettlebells course is $895. There is another provider called the Kettlebell Academy which is coming to Australia and also Kettlebell Kingdom which may offer courses in the future. Either Kettlebells are becoming very popular. Virgin possibly offer Kettlebell group classes. In few years they will be at least as big as aerobics.

Thanks Poopoohead, but I won my battle with the bulge about 5 years ago now. Lost 25kg, which is a lot when you are a midget like me.

I still get people asking how I did it. They are all very disappointed to hear it is about diet and exercise and that I still train at least 6 times a week!

bree, it'd be excellent if you could post some before and after pics, those are always inspirational. And that is a good part of personal training. Of course for privacy you can blur out your face.

My fat pics are all when I was at uni i.e. couldn't afford a digital camera and they were pretty $$$ back then (I make myself sound like a nanna, but I'm only 28). I should load them up though and use them as a reminder to help me out when I'm lacking inspiration. Should take a pic of my arms and post them. Impressing myself at the moment.

fitnation said:

In few years they will be at least as big as aerobics.

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and then they'll be ruined by big name commercial gyms aimed at fatties looking for the next lose weight fast fad with pissy light weights. possibly something along the lines of "underwater kettlebell PUMP fitness" doing it in water will lighten the weight and make it easier of course.

64kg UDL's off blocks is where its at.

Your not wrong there mate. I came across the Weider Powerbell on Youtube which was basically the Weider answer to a detachable kettlebell. It was a very impressive infomercial alright. The models were very buff. The thing that was off was that the weights were 10 lb at there heaviest, whereas the detachable kettlebells you buy from the regular kettlebell companies like Dynobells and Australian Kettlebells can transform into 10 sizes which go right up to 40 kg. They mainly advertise in Martial Arts and serious fitness magazines as well as mainstream magazines. The detachable kettlebell is about $264 and is aimed at serious athletes or people who are serious about their fitness. I are definetly becoming more mainstream, you can even buy them at Rebel Sports and Amart Sports. The thing I have noticed is that very few people selling them have a clue what they are and even in popular stores where they are sold I am yet to see them come with a good instructional Dvd. Although Workout World does sell the Great Kettlebell Handbook, which is pretty basic. It is a very effective system I hope they don't try to water them too much.

I saw a cross fit kit for at home- even came with a chin up bar you can mount in your door frame and won't damage your walls (unless of course you weight more than 80kg and the door can't hack the weight). Have to say it was a more entertaining infomercial than the usual ab machine!

Kettle bells in classes are stupid. If you don't use them properly you can damn well hurt yourself and look like someone has been beating you up. They'll never be able to get past two kilos or they will break their wrists when they flip the bell over.

In terms of versatility and what they offer, they are definetly the way to go. They provide the same if not better Vo2 gains as the noric rower, treadmills and concept 2 rower. When they make quality dvds available when you buy them in stores and they get more press which is only a matter of time, you will see them come to the forefront of the industry.

hyjak said:

i train at PTC once a week, Markos knows his shit and the people he trains all get top results, myself included. it is definitley not for the faint-hearted though. 200kg+ deadlifts happen on daily basis, heck even one of the girls deadlifts 135kg, all lifts are raw. no belts, no straps, no gloves just chalk. He also has over 30 years experiance in the industry, his wife holds national powerlifting records and his brother also competed as a powerlifter. He considers this a minimal amount of experience before training others

oh yeah theres f**k all injuries too

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Why would there be any more injuries at PTC than any other place that trains for strength?

All my clients lift to get strong, thats how it all began back in the day, before lifters lifted to attract the opposite sex.

Most of the injuries at PTC have been shoulder soreness, which quickly subsides as the client gets used to the workload. Here is an example.

Nick started on my bench press specialization program. Its a twice a week bench program. He benched a 1RM of 115kg 14 weeks ago. Last wednesday night he benched 140kg.

Now to make this kind of progress you need to train hard. He was doing 180kg negatives and his shoulders took a beating. We trained around that for a couple of sessions while he adapted, and now he is fully recovered, as you can tell by his 140kg effort.

I have had no one go down with a back injury at PTC, or knee. Two or three hammies during cardio, sore shoulders and wrists, and thats it.

Remember, an injured client makes me no money.

Cheers

Markos

A rather daft one today. Communication, stages of group development, coaching skills, lots of standing up in groups awkwardly roleplaying things while a too-frequently smiling teacher cheered us on. "Awesome!"

The basic ideas are useful. Mostly they're common sense, but the sort of common sense you don't realise until someone says it out loud. You know, groups get together and everyone's quite and super-polite at first ("forming"), then someone speaks up and tries to take control to steer the group in a useful direction but someone else doesn't like it ("storming"), then they settle down a bit and work with each-other ("norming") and so on.

Formalised common sense, I call it. Which is fair enough, not everyone has the same life experiences, and some people need it all spelled out.

I could probably do without the awkward role-playing, though.

"Awesome!"

It felt like one of those "team-bonding" weekends particularly cruel HR managers sometimes send their staff on, during which the team bond by... complaining about the weekend and the person leading them through it.

"Awesome!"

And next week.... gym maintenance. Yes, we have a lesson on wiping sweat off benches. Ho hum.

Way I see it, every job and every bit of education you do has some bullshit in it. You have to wade through that to get to the good stuff. It's only the second week of 18 or so, so I'm still wading.

"Awesome!"

Today we had a gym class, training chest, shoulders and triceps. After a quick workout, I was helping less experienced people learn form. It's amazing how distracting a woman's implants are, even if you're not attracted to her at all. They're just... out there. Right where the bar is being lowered.

On bench we all got shown up by an old Russian guy, former powerlifter and boxer. He hasn't trained for ten years, but when we had 70kg on the bar and were grunting it up for 6-10 reps, he happily and quickly pumped out 12 reps. We whacked another 10kg on and he wasn't disturbed, another quick 12 reps.

There's a bloke whose name I forget but I think of as Wolverine, as he's reasonably big and strong and has wicked sideburns. He trains at home with kettlebells and stuff, I think I mentioned him before. Today I pointed him to ptcfrankston.com, saying "I've never visited there, and I'm sure my back couldn't handle the training, but I think you and he have similar philosophies." I quoted some of the mottos.

Was the russian a guy or chick?

this is where i was starting to think this course is a real waste of time and money:

Kyle Aaron said:

And next week.... gym maintenance. Yes, we have a lesson on wiping sweat off benches. Ho hum.

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then i read this part:

Kyle Aaron said:

It's amazing how distracting a woman's implants are, even if you're not attracted to her at all. They're just... out there. Right where the bar is being lowered.

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where do i sign up???

Well, not too productive a day today, the teacher emailed in sick. Unfortunately, this was long after I had dragged myself out of my warm bed and cycled in the cold.

Interesting that the 18-21 year olds immediately said "woohoo!" and walked off, but those older hung around for a bit. Those of us in our 30s or older are there because we really do want to be there and learn. Maybe tertiary education should have a minimum age of 25...

I made an open offer to anyone who wanted to hang around and study the manual, or do a workout by running around the campus, some pushups, etc, but there were no takers. The gym itself is privately run (ie separate from TAFE), and not available to students unless they pay or are escorted by a teacher - yes, even fitness students, and yes, the teachers agree that's stupid. But the place is privately run, what can they do.

One bloke was pissed off.
"Oh well mate," I said, "if he's sick, he's sick, not his fault."
"Bah, he's a softcock. You were in the Army, mate, you don't just call in sick there do you?"
"Sure you do. You go to the RAP, the clinic, and they give you a piece of paper, you're on Light Duties."
"Light Duties?"
"Yeah for example, the company is going on a 30km march in full pack and webbing that day, you have the flu so you can't go, rightyo they say, you can clean the toilets for eight hours."
"We should make him clean the toilets."
"Harsh."

Another display of the attutudes of the Gen Y population.
There has been a bit about it in the media lately.

Want everything now...
Don't want delayed gratification.
Want to be able to buy a median priced house in their 1st year of work.
Want to be able to pick and choose a desirable job in the current financial climate, etc, etc.

They need to harden up.

I don't think it's Gen Y as such. It's just that when your most recent experience of education is being forced to go there, if you can wiggle out of it you cheer. I was the same at 18. Those years of 16-25 are when you're not really sure what you want to do with your life, you just kind of drift in and out of jobs, education, relationships, etc.

I think I was saying before, a lot of the people in the class very obviously won't go on to do a job in the industry, because they're not really sure why they're there, or they intend to do the job but obviously don't have a clear idea of what it's like day-to-day. Those are mostly the younger ones.

The ones in their 30s and above are (most of them) there because they really want to be, they often know a bit about the course materials already, know what the job would involve, etc.

I would guess not more than 6 of the 30 will go on to get jobs in the industry. But that's not too different from other courses. Those who've been to uni or TAFE can think of their classmates, how few went on to do that job...

Maybe tertiary education should have a minimum age of 25...

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That's a rather odd thing to say!

Well, both teachers showed up today so that was a good start.

First half of the day we looked into some anatomy. Lots of latin names for things.

Second half was some confusion when teacher #3 tried to give us a lesson teacher #1 had already given us last week. "But on the lesson plan, that's not his section."
"Don't tell us, tell him."
"Okay, we'll revise."

After that we began on fitness testing. The scales measured me as 12.1% bodyfat, the calipers as 16%. I think they were both wrong

I learned that while nobody is terribly proud of their measurements, some are extremely sensitive. We were in groups, and randomly measured each-other. One woman in my group had mentioned that she used to be a lot bigger, and I'd said same for me. I held out my paper and said, "This is how I measured up, how about you? Give us a look."

She pulled her sheet back indignantly and said, "phuck off..." and looked me up and down with contempt, "... kunt."

I think perhaps there are a few people in my class who will have to adjust their presentation and demeanour before being able to secure steady employment.

Of course everyone is entitled to their privacy, but since there were 25 or so of us measuring each-other in a room together, and since it's part of the course, I didn't think it'd be an issue. And you can just say, "no" or "I'll keep that to myself."

She pulled her sheet back indignantly and said, "phuck off..." and looked me up and down with contempt, "... kunt."

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Sheesh! No room for gloom!

I think she may need an attitude adjustment before dealing with the pleasurable public.

At the moment my guess is that of my class of 30

• about 5 will not see the end of the course, or if they reach the end won't pass (due to not handing assignments in)
• 5 will pass, but still not know what they want to do
• 5 will pass and not want to have anything to do with fitness again
• 5 will pass and want to do some non-PT but still fitness-related job (eg basketball coach)
• 5 will pass and want to work as GI/PTs, but won't get or be able to keep jobs
• 5 will pass and work as GI/PTs.

I already see two people definitely in the first category: they're late every single day, and sometimes after a morning/afternoon break they just don't come back (the teachers don't know the class well enough yet to notice, as far as I can tell).

The second last category is the most amusing, like Ms F.O.C.

But what's most interesting to me are those who stick it out, what makes them end up as GI/PTs or whatever else they end up doing. I'd be curious to know if the teachers can tell. Those of us with some gym experience, sometimes we can tell if newbies will stick to it for long - there must be the same thing with teachers, surely.