Renter Friend Vs Personal Training

Do you want to rent a friend or have a Personal Trainer?

For my first post I thought that I would tell you a little about myself and the differences between Personal Trainers.

The Fitness Industry is a fantastic industry so many different approaches and so many avenues to go down. In this article I (Amy Black), am going to be talking about my journey to Absolute Training and the difference between Personal Trainers and Renter Friends. These are two completely different things as i will explain, as well as give you a little backround knowledge on myself.

As some of you may know i have just started working with Absolute Training, very different to what I was used to. Do I like it or prefer it? Well you’ll just have to wait and see……!!

I left school at 16 which did get frowned upon slightly by friends but of course I just wanted to earn money so I got a job as a leisure assistant at the Oxford Belfry hotel cleaning the gym and working on reception. I had a lot of fun to and also got qualified as an NVQ level 2 fitness instructor and that’s where the journey begins.

I left to work in Cannons now Nuffield Health. It was like a dream a massive gym and a 20 metre pool, classes, inductions, health assessments loads to do.

Well for the first few months.

Then it was standing on the gym floor for about seven hours a day cleaning. Have you ever walked into a gym and seen fitness instructers look like anywhere else would be better than where they are now?

Well that’s how i felt. I went on to my level 3 in advanced training to allow me to do Personal Training. I had been there a year and started to build a client base but things weren’t making any sense to me. On my course we got told machines are rubbish leisure centres aren’t doing the right job, trainers don’t train people properly. My head was just in a whirl wind I’m being told so many different things. I was looking around and was seeing clients achieve nothing although they had been with there trainer for two or three years.

Is that possible?

Trainers were taking their clients from machine to machine each week counting to 15. In my head I was thinking ‘surely this cant be my future job’ ‘Do I want to do this’. The answer was NO!!

Yet another Health assessment to do ‘GREAT’ but little did I know this was the health assessment that would change my future. I had the Clare that we all no and love.

 As two normal girls we got chatting about the industry and hormonal issues, from that health assessment I met Keith. I got to know him more when I attended the Personal Nutrition Course where I learnt heaps and felt so positive about life in general.

WOW food has a massive impact on our lives, something I’m sure I’ll be writing about in the future.

We got chatting and then the next thing i know I’m looking after his clients for a week while he is in America.

I have to admit there were times when I freaked and didn’t want to do it or felt I couldn’t but I just took a deep breath and got on with it this then led me to working with Keith and Clare, becoming part of the Absolute Training Team.

‘I’ll be ok I’ve done Personal Training before,’ or so i thought.

But in actual fact i had been a renter friend not really taking an interest in there posture or lifestyle I was there to talk to them have a laugh and watch them exercise.

Now I have people with injuries, stress issues, poor posture and muscle imbalances. Gone are the days where I ignored that, it has to be dealt with to get any results. AHHHHHHHHH it can be a complicated nightmare!

More days come where I thought I can’t do this im out of my depth. But by watching Keith listening and learning and discussion I have built on the solid foundation of my qualifications, so much information so fast!  

The early mornings are hard although I am getting there. We are working with real people not lycra gym bunnies, people with real worries and injuries. I have learnt that you need to start with the inside before the outside gets focused on.

Building real relationships with the clients working together to help build a better quality of life. That is why I can get quite tiered because you build a relationship with that person and you can go away still thinking of ways to help them. No client is ever forgotten about.

So The Differences between a Personal Trainer and a Renter Friend:

# Renter friends think its all about the exercise.

# Personal trainers build a relationship and coach’s people with all aspects that affect health.

# Your health and your results is the most important thing for a Personal Trainer

# Renter friends have lots of machines

# Personal Training is not ‘JUST A JOB’ we have a passion to making you feel fantastic inside and out.

The answer to which one do I prefer…..

Well a renter friend is a whole lot easier but who wants easy, so of course there is no doubt it is working with Absolute training being a Personal Trainer!!!

Hope to see you soon

Amy

Power Vs Endurance

Who do you think has the lower body fat Percentage….A marathon runner or a sprinter?

It’s the sprinter, did you get it right?

On average a sprinter is between 5 and 6% body fat and the marathon runner is about 14%.

Now this gives you some clues as to the best way to train to reduce your body fat %, decreasing your weight and giving you a toned, strong body.

Knowing this also means that you don’t need to run/walk for mega long periods of time each day to get your desired body shape. Short sharp explosive work is far more effective as stripping the fat off you then long slow (boring) endurance based exercise. You could be in and out in 40 minutes having had the most effective work out of your life.

But how do you do this?

Well one way is to use a professional fitness team such as us the Absolute Training team and train one on one doing short 30/40 minutes cost effective workouts, saving you time and money but getting you the results that you want.

If one on one is too daunting or you have budgetary concerns, than your best bet is the Fit Body Bootcamp. You will still be working with qualified personal trainers and they will guide you through the exercises that are required to get you the figure that you need.

If you can’t get to either of these you need to ask you gym team about the correct exercises - exercises such as mat flipping/ running, single leg press, dead lift, clean and press etc. If this is not an option you could try the killer workout that we have videoed for you, which you can find featured just on the right hand side of this page.

Committed to your success

Keith

P.S well done to Bruce for doing the Killer work out the other evening! Awesome!

Step By Step

Sometimes what you need to achieve is just to bigger a mountain to climb.

Yesterday I was working with a personal training client one on one. He has a multitude of problems, some are structural, some are internal lifestyle related diseases, and then he has the weight that he needs to lose. All of these problems make it seem like there is no light at the end of the tunnel, it has been turned off and you can’t seem to be able to see the way ahead.

This client turns to me and says… ‘I feel like giving it all up’

I asked him what he meant and he told me. There are too many problems too much to do and I don’t know where to start with it all. Plus the usual problems in life when you have a family to support, a job and a girlfriend. It all seems too much.

You see,  if your body does not work well as its painful, but you need to lose weight, but your metabolism is messed up making it difficult to and then you have medication that also stops you from losing weight it’s almost a catch 22 situation.

Can’t exercise to lose weight as your body hurts, can’t lose weight because your metabolism has been knocked out of balance, need to exercise to get metabolism and blood sugar levels right, but can’t as it hurts!

You see how difficult this problem could get in someone’s head.

So what do you do?

In this case we are starting with the structural problems, with massage and some specific strengthening exercises; he can now walk round the field without his back seizing up.

This means that we can exercise and slowly as he gets stronger and more stable we can increase the intensity and therefore his metabolism.

At the same time we are starting to talk about diet and nutrition, so that we can get the internal environment right to increase metabolism and control blood sugar levels.

Once these two things are in place we can start to lose weight, as we’ll have a body that works inside and out.

But what has this got to do with your boot camp session?

Sometimes your weight loss or toning goal will seem like you have bitten off more that you can chew, it’s too much and it will take too long. Don’t let yourself succumb to these negative thoughts. Make sure that you know what you have to do every day, each week to get yourself the result that you want.

Make sure that you are doing all the small things every day and getting the basic right all the time.

What are the basics I hear you ask?

Step 1, get enough sleep
Step 2, only eat whole foods, nothing processed
Step 3, water water water
Step 4, have some you time! Relax, unwind and de-stress

If you are struggling then make yourself a flow diagram of what you need to do step by step. For instance if you want to lose weight, but have painfull areas box one in your flow diagram would be to address your painful areas, get them working, stable and strong. A brilliant way to start the process is to get a full body diagnositc done; http://absolute-training.org/body-diagnostic/

Your next box could be to address your lifestyle and diet. The personal nutrition course will address nutrition and lifestyle, helping you to build healthy habits. To focus on your lifestyle and food go here www.absolute-training.org/personal-nutrition/

Your next phase could be the introduction of……. da da daaaaar, exercise! There are two ways to go about this but both start the same way. Book yourself in for a free consultation and then you and I can work out whether you’ll get more out of a boot camp or more from personal / small group training. 

To find out more about the fit body boot camp go to www.fitbodybootcamp.co.uk

To find out more about Personal training go here http://absolute-training.org/personal-training/

Committed to your success

Keith