Showing posts with label Things. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Things. Show all posts

Tuesday, 14 February 2012

6 Things To Look For In A Good Personal Trainer

The decision to employ the services of a personal trainer to help motivate you, and correctly direct you how to go about achieving your weight loss or fitness goals is tough enough.

Finding a trainer that fits this criteria is another challenge all of its own, here are 6 things to look for in a good personal trainer that should make the job of finding a good match for your needs much easier.

Correctly registered
All good personal trainers need to be registered with their state or national accreditation council to operate as a trainer in this country.

Every 2 years a trainer is required to obtain a certain amount of education credits to be eligible to re- register.

This ensures that a correctly registered trainer is up to date with the latest training methods and has the proper qualifications to operate in the fitness industry.

Walk the walk
A trainer worth their salt doesn't just work in the fitness industry, they live eat and breathe it!

To truly be able to prescribe exercise to another individual, I firmly believe you need to have experienced the feeling and outcome of any given activity.

Your trainer should not be getting you to do anything they cannot or have not done themselves in some form before.

Good communicator
A good communicator will help get across the purpose and understanding of a particular exercise and be able to correct your form and technique in a way you understand and can relate to.

Being able to do this will enable you to feel more comfortable with exercises or activities you may not be familiar with.

Professional attitude
Professional attitude comes in a range of areas that not all personal trainers I have met or worked with completely get.

To build a strong trusting relationship with a client a trainer needs to understand the boundaries and responsibilities of their role.

There are simple things like; answering the phone in professional manner, being punctual, personal hygiene, dressing appropriately, and focusing their attention strictly to the client they are training, are all common sense things that sometimes aren't all that common.

Sometimes teaching a particular exercise might require a hands on approach, and knowing how and where to touch a client appropriately is also important.

A trainer must understand and adhere to strict confidentiality guidelines as any other health professional must do.

Hard but fair
A good personal trainer should approach every session with a hard but fair attitude.

Some clients need to be pushed out of their comfort zones to be able to achieve the necessary levels to get results.

Getting a client to reach these levels should not require barking at them like a sergeant major, this usually belittles the client and eventually can be counter productive.

A good communicator will be able to encourage someone out of their comfort zone by being strong, but fair.

Well recommended
One of the best signs of a good personal trainer is one that comes highly recommended.

A trainer that has clients that rave about them, are usually getting those clients the results they are after.

At Tweed Coast Personal Trainers we pride ourselves in working with trainers that tick all of the boxes above, all our trainers are fully qualified and registered with fitness Australia as exercise specialists.

All trainers have proven themselves to be active role models and embrace all areas of the fitness industry.

Each trainer has a professional attitude, are great communicators and teach with a hard but fair philosophy.

If your looking for a good personal trainer that will be able to motivate and move you forward towards your fitness and weight loss goals find a Tweed Coast Personal Trainer near you.


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Saturday, 14 January 2012

The 3 Most Important Things a Personal Trainer Will Teach You

As a personal trainer, it is my responsibility to increase my client's body confidence, maintain proper form to ensure safety and educate each person on the benefits of strength training. Every time a client makes the commitment to arrive at our facility for their workout, they are placing their trust in our facility and our abilities to guide them through a challenging and safe session. Each person arrives with different abilities and experiences; a personal trainer needs to be able to adjust to the age and stage of the individual. A personal trainer will demonstrate discipline and motivate you to treat your body, the one and only one you have, with respect.

As you begin to train on a regular basis with a personal trainer, each session will build upon the previous session. The trainer will teach you how to mentally prepare for the workout. When beginning work with a personal trainer after being away from training, there are natural fears and insecurities that can arise. It is natural to feel unsure or intimidated by the gym environment. Each week, as strength increases and clients develop a "can do" attitude, confidence will increase. In addition, if there is a weakness due to injury, a client may become more aware and do proper stretches or exercises on a daily basis as needed to help work through the injury.

Proper form is important, especially when working at an intense level. It is recommended to use machines that movements regarded as compound movement exercises. Compound movements recruit from many muscle groups at the same time. The primary benefits of properly working multiple muscle groups are maximizing the calories being used and the creating lean muscle tissue. The more muscle in our bodies, the more oxygen-rich blood will be created. It is easy to speed up or make adjustments in your body to get through a rep, especially when training on your own. If you work with a personal trainer who is dedicated to a specific protocol, the risk of injury will be diminished as you train slow and use proper form. You will learn to want to do the workout the proper way, in order to achieve your health goals.

Everyone knows that they "should" workout to maintain health and well-being, mentally and physically as we age. It is never too late to start strength training; the older we are, the more we gain from maintaining and increasing lean muscle tissue. Mentally, it is a proven fact that exercise reduces stress levels and is an important component of health and vitality. Wherever you put your attention, will result in a positive outcome; if you focus your mental strength on getting stronger muscles and work with a personal trainer to get that needed intensity... you will get stronger.

Working with a personal trainer taught me that I will always strength train. I knew early on that I would always want to "feel" strong... physically, mentally and emotionally. The positive benefits that I have received over the years continue to renew my commitment to strength training. I am amazed at the human body and how it "wants" the right stuff... so I treat every day as the new day that it is and make it the best it can be.

To get the most out of your workout, you don't need a Chicago personal trainer but it certainly won't hurt. The trainers at CitWide SuperSlow are knowledgeable, effective, and very friendly. They strive to make the experience of working out as enjoyable as possible while helping you reach your maximum potential and get the results you are looking for.


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Thursday, 12 January 2012

28 Things I Think I Know

There are many things I have learned in my 10+ years in the fitness industry. Most of them have been based on scientific principles & data I have collected over the years. Others have been hard-learned facts that may or may not be backed up by a study. But if you practice them, they hold true! I choose to believe that science just hasn't caught up to these principles yet...

1. All fitness routines work: P90X, Insanity, Jazzercise, Richard Simmons, Group Power, CrossFit, etc... It's that passion and dedication that you put behind these programs that matters!

2. You don't work out nearly as hard as you THINK you do.

3. Your diet is nearly 90% of your fitness success. If you would just eat well, then you would reduce your body-fat & retain your muscle mass.

4. The sleep you get after midnight is waaaaaaaaaaaaaay more important than the sleep you get before midnight.

5. Women train harder than men. I have no idea for the reason, but the statement is true. Sorry guys.

6. Traditional lifting (Bench Press, Squats, Deadlifts, Curls, Pull Ups, Dips, etc) will produce the best long-term results. Everything else is just a modification of these basic principles.

7. Sprint programs for cardio are superior to long, slow distance programs. I'm looking at you marathoners!

8. Morning cardio, with no calories ingested, with a nice cup of coffee or stimulant of your choice, really does burn off extra fat.

9. Varying your programs up daily will produce you a better fat-loss result.

10. Cardio is more important for overall leanness for the average person than weight training. Most people will not put forth the time to strength train correctly. So they will get more out of a sprint program.

11. Spot reduction works. Maybe not in a traditional sense (no scientific data), but training one area again and again will provide an improved effect.

12. Varying your programs up weekly will yield you a better performance result.

13. If you're going to cheat with alcohol, do it in this order: Vodka > Wine > Brown Liquor > Beer

14. You have to stay on your diet for a minimum of 3 days for it to have any positive effect on your body; otherwise, you're simply putting yourself into a caloric fluctuation. You will not effectively lose fat.

15. Every diet works when you ACTUALLY follow it. Try following the simple rule of: IF IT DOESN'T SPOIL WITHIN 7 DAYS WHEN LEFT UNREFRIGERATED, DON'T EAT IT...

16. Eating OUT is not the same as Eating IN--even if you are having the same thing.

17. All new weight training programs work for 3 weeks. No new weight training program works after 12 weeks. Change is good.

18. Finishing what you began is better than starting something new.

19. Workout music can make or break your lifting day--it has an effect on your mood, adrenaline levels, & overall well-being.

20. It's better to ingest a cheat meal(s) in a constrained time span (all bad things within a couple hours) than it is to spread it out over the entire day.

21. It's better to have an entire cheat day than to have lots of 'mini-cheat' meals thru the week.

22. Working out in a cardio theatre does not yield as good of results as working out where others can see you. You try harder when others are watching you.

23. The stair climber is the best piece of cardio equipment. Period. I don't care what the calorie counter says.

24. Weight training before cardio will provide you a better fat-loss result / lifting experience. You can dedicate your stored sugars to lifting and you're stored fat to cardio.

25. Adding a daily diuretic to your food intake (lemons, asparagus, green tea, etc.) will give you a psychological boost that will help improve your workouts.

26. Working out before 8am is more productive for your day than working out after that time.

27. Workouts designed for athletes are not good for the normal populace. An untrained individual needs to be taught the basic motions first, then graduate to the harder, more dynamic moves.Teaching someone how to olympic lift before a dumbbell chest press is like having a baby run before it can crawl.

28. Weight loss / fitness is a psychological game, not a physical one. If you can master your mind, you will succeed more than someone that can workout better.

My name is Michael Baes. I am a personal trainer & nutrition coach based in Murfreesboro, TN.

With over 10 years of full-time personal training experience, I provide my clients with the best & latest fitness information; additionally, I offer many unique articles, products, and services!

All of these are available at:

http://www.michaelbaes.com/blog

Thanks for reading!

MB


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