Hi all! I have been a personal trainier for 2 years and just joined with a large gym (name withheld to protect the innocent ;-). Before I joined with this large gym I trained my clients out of my home which had a decked out gym in the basement. Now I went ahead and got my NASM CPT (I was ISSA Certified) and am a PT at a large (chain) gym.
I have myself been working out for 14 years and I mainly use free weight compound lifts with myself and all my past clients ( like to traing them T-Mag style!). Now that I studied the NASM and joined a large gym as a PT, I am being told I should have my new clients, who have little lifting experience, to first work on balance and stability training to help develop their â??coreâ?? and balance system (mind to muscle link) for about the first 4 weeks of training. This will in turn lead to better lifts when we move on to more basic heavy lifting. I donâ??t see anything wrong with having my clients do about 10 minutes of â??coreâ?? training during our workout but I donâ??t see much sense to having a person progress up to being about to balance for 1 minute, on 1 leg, on a BOSU ball. To me this seems like a waste of time.
For me, I give my new clients some â??coreâ?? work (like stated earlier) but then I like to spend the most of their workouts doing things like Lunges, DB Row, DB presses, and maybe some standing cable stuff (pulls and presses). I like to see my clients challenged by the lifts and work up a sweat. I know a person will only see muscle gain and fat loss results (which is what all my clients want) by lifting heavier weights to cause a muscle response and eating correctly.
Now there are some great trainers at my gym, but I see some of my fellow trainers spending too much time teaching their clients stability and balancing that I believe they are wasting their clientâ??s time and money.
Just wondering what some of you other trainers out there have your NEW clients do. I want to be able to provide to my clients the best programs I can give them. They pay very good money for me and deserve the best routines as to help them reach their goals.
I am also NASM certified and believe that the OPT model is a great tool to utilize. I agree that balance work on a bosu and such can be pointless. But in a chain I often start many new clients on machines or free motion cable machines and some basic movements such as a stability ball squat againist the wall or a step up (i base these exercises from a postural assessment, I’m a CES).
I find it very hard at times to teach a client how to do a DB row when they don’t know how to properly use their muscles or even bend over without ridiculous amounts of flexion. So it’s easier to get them used to firing muscles correctly using cables and machines, especially some of the folks you will see in a commercial gym setting. And then progress them from there. Some will move faster than others.
If its a “requirement” set by your gym/supervisors, then you really dont have much of a choice.
You can talk to your boss and say what you know and think about it. Looking at your pics, I would say you definitely know what you’re doing so, I think if you say what you gotta say, they might reconsider and just let you do your thing.
Ignoring the fact that standing with one leg on a bosu is stupid, I suspect if I tried to make someone balance on a ball for an hour they’d walk out and never come back.
What I do depends on where the client is coming from, their personality, their goals, etc.
If they don’t know me at all and are just a walk in, I get more sales if I “give them a workout.” I’ll do a brief assessment, make sure nothing I’m doing is going to irritate any injuries they might have, and I’ll pick challenging exercises that are very easy to learn (like a split squat). After I’ve built up some rapport, then we can begin to work on imbalances and the like. It’s not my ideal way to do things but if you’re working in a health club or dealing with a casual clientele then you still have to worry about making the sale. You don’t need to generate results on the first session.
If the person is a referral from another client, the person is already open to whatever you have to say, so I’ll cut the BS and for the first session take a detailed history, talk about goals, and do a full assessment.
I hear you. I am a trainer also come from W.I.T.S. and I 've had to educate myself as far as what I should be doing with clients. For me its a continual learning process.
I do think commercial gyms are mostly a rip off for clients. I also think to much is based on balance and stability. Don’t get me wrong sure they are important but you have to listen to see what the client want and then if you can get them on the road to achieving their goals. In many ways you were better off in your own place. but now you have to deal with the gym so as the last person said you might not have much choice.
Also it depends on the client and how quickly they learn how perform an exercise with just their own body and then with resistance. Basically I do agree with you, since i don’t think there is an overall basic exercise that a person can do that is going to have carry-over to other exercises so. I pains takenly work with new clients allowing them to attempt the movement say learning to squat or learning to deadlift and making hands on corrections along the way. I have to say this its amazing how the majority of people do learn rapidly, then its a matter of reinforcing the correct movements taught until they have them done like second nature. Becoming machine like in our movements is something that we work on all the time some as logic tells us are better than others at perfecting a movement. anyway…
I manage a large fitness facility and when we start new clients up with a personal trainer the style of exercise the client will go through is completely based on what they need… I dont understand why they are telling you to do something for everyone, it should be based on the client, and if you know what a client needs they should be cool with letting you do what you feel is appropriate seeing as you have some good certs and experience.
Most large gyms will preach a basic form of periodization where every new client should go through a “conditioning” phase. Now while this is a good thing and necessary for nearly every new client it sounds like YOUR gym has created a cookie-cutter approach to conditioning. To contrast, my fitness consultants create an extremely detailed assessment on each client, testing strength imbalances, core, posture, joint stability, flexibilty, injuries and health conditions and our PTs take the information and start training the client specific to the starting point and end goal.
We’ve actually fired trainers in the past for using similar training protocols for different clients… not everyone should be doing box jumps… not everyone should be doing lunges… every person is specific and they should be treated as such. If a trainer cannot individualize a program for someone they obviously don’t have the proper amount of knowledge to be trusted with someone’s health.
they actually tell me to train with my style which is cool and they give me my freedom, but they hint that I “should” do this and this a bit more… at least that is the felling I get. Many of these people do seem to know there stuff, I dont want to take anything away from them.
They are a great group of people. I just am wondering if this stability ball/BOSU ball stuff is really THAT important.
Also, I am a big fan of the anabolic diet and I talk to some people there about it and they tell me how its not healthy and I need to take in carbs at some points in the day everyday. But I know that this type of diet works great for me and I feel great doing it. I really like to keep an open mind about training and diet. Im just going to do my best to be the best trainer I can be to get my clients the results they deserve.
When it comes to training at someone else’s gym, you have to strike a balance between what will keep you from getting fired and your values. You also have to understand that the values of many of these places, aren’t about getting results or what is best for the client. Many times its about money, making it seem more complicated than it actually is, and making the client sweat/hurt.
So you gotta find some kind of balance.
But who is going to have better “stabiliy” someone that can balance on a bosu ball while doing 10lb curls, or someone that can barbell squat 1-2x their BW. You know the answer.
[quote]mdl76 wrote:
they actually tell me to train with my style which is cool and they give me my freedom, but they hint that I “should” do this and this a bit more… at least that is the felling I get. Many of these people do seem to know there stuff, I dont want to take anything away from them.
They are a great group of people. I just am wondering if this stability ball/BOSU ball stuff is really THAT important.
Also, I am a big fan of the anabolic diet and I talk to some people there about it and they tell me how its not healthy and I need to take in carbs at some points in the day everyday. But I know that this type of diet works great for me and I feel great doing it. I really like to keep an open mind about training and diet. Im just going to do my best to be the best trainer I can be to get my clients the results they deserve.
Thank you all greatly for your input.[/quote]
All you have to do is Drop your pants and take your shirt off and a do a Double bicep pose. They will be in awe… thus giving you ability to do whatever you want
Hhhmmm, if its more focus on core they want. Overhead squats, Farmers walk, Kettlebell swings. Another thing, if they are watching you to see if you are listening to them try this. Do your normal warm up and get started on your normal routine. But work in a “core” exercise that you think they (the “evil” gym) would like in between sets or exercises. Consider it “active rest”. That way it looks like you have really added it to your workout and they’ll get off your back.
[quote]optheta wrote:
mdl76 wrote:
they actually tell me to train with my style which is cool and they give me my freedom, but they hint that I “should” do this and this a bit more… at least that is the felling I get. Many of these people do seem to know there stuff, I dont want to take anything away from them.
They are a great group of people. I just am wondering if this stability ball/BOSU ball stuff is really THAT important.
Also, I am a big fan of the anabolic diet and I talk to some people there about it and they tell me how its not healthy and I need to take in carbs at some points in the day everyday. But I know that this type of diet works great for me and I feel great doing it. I really like to keep an open mind about training and diet. Im just going to do my best to be the best trainer I can be to get my clients the results they deserve.
Thank you all greatly for your input.
All you have to do is Drop your pants and take your shirt off and a do a Double bicep pose. They will be in awe… thus giving you ability to do whatever you want
[/quote]
[quote]chey2333 wrote:
Hhhmmm, if its more focus on core they want. Overhead squats, Farmers walk, Kettlebell swings. Another thing, if they are watching you to see if you are listening to them try this. Do your normal warm up and get started on your normal routine. But work in a “core” exercise that you think they (the “evil” gym) would like in between sets or exercises. Consider it “active rest”. That way it looks like you have really added it to your workout and they’ll get off your back. [/quote]
Seriously you would have a novice a do Overhead squats?
So you train at Urban Active, Golds Gym, Ballys, or 24 Hour Fitness? I feel your pain. Basically a lot of big box gyms sold their souls to the NASM. NASM gets their cert out there and offers trainers like a 20-30% discount on the cert.
I train at Urban Active and ignore everything coming from above. Train your clients, make them happy, make sure they renew and no one will care what training you use.
if you really want to know how to train you will want to get certified in westside barbell.European methods that are proven.Takes training to the next level
