What makes a great personal trainer?
Not all personal trainers are equal! In this article we outline 4 points on what makes a great personal trainer.
A great personal trainer will provide a plan of action to take you towards your goal
In fitness, planning is called periodisation. Without training periodisation performance will quickly plateau and results will suffer. Most workouts will stop yielding beneficial gains after 4 exposures, yet how many people do you see in commercial gyms doing the same routine for months if not years without any significant progress?
A great personal trainer will take you through planned cycles of intensification and accumulation every 3-4 weeks ensuring continuous progress towards your goal.
A great personal trainer will make you healthier, regardless of your goal
From completing your first triathlon to dropping a dress size, whatever your goal a great personal trainer will make getting you healthier a priority. It is possible to take short cuts towards certain fitness goals for example going on a juice diet to lose weight very quickly. However a good personal trainer will appreciate that the sudden weight loss seen on drastic calorie restriction is predominantly from water and muscle glycogen.
A great personal trainer will appreciate that this type of diet is very stressful on the body and can be very detrimental to your long term health. A great personal trainer recognises that if general health improves all your fitness markers will also improve with it. This should start with an in depth consultation and a thorough movement screen to identify any individual structural Imbalances and continue with appropriate training, nutrition, lifestyle and supplement advice.
A great personal trainer is strict and precise when it comes to exercise technique
An exercise carried out with good form through its full range of motion will have a profoundly different effect to one carried out sloppily. At best the exercise being performed badly will do nothing but at worst it could be setting you up for an injury further down the line.
A good personal trainer will recognise that the knee must travel past the toe in a split squat in order to fully develop the VMO and nourish the cartilage of the knee, and that failure to do so will likely lead to muscle imbalance, tight hips and probable knee pain.
A great personal trainer will ensure you train with enough intensity to get the most out of your body every workout
As much as we don’t like to admit it to ourselves we are all inherently ‘lazy’. Very few of us have the internal drive and discipline to push ourselves to our true maximum every workout. Yet if we want to see dramatic changes and results with our bodies this is what it takes.
It is hard to portray this point in print, but the best personal trainers know how to push you to limits that you never thought possible yet still keep you safe and ready to go again next session. Perhaps a Wednesday night strongman class led by Roan when he is hungry is a good place to start!
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