How To Find A Personal Trainer

It wasn’t long ago that knowing how to find a personal trainer would have only been a problem for celebrities and gym junkies. But nowadays more and more people are seeing the benefit of paying a professional to help them get fitter, leaner, stronger and provide a motivational kick up the butt on their off days.

Even thinking about how to choose between the vast number of personal trainers around can be enough to put you off getting started, so we decided to put together a checklist of what to look for when you’re making your decision. After Donna was asked for help recently on exactly this topic, we thought we’d put my 25 years’ experience of being coached and trained for running, triathlon and gym fitness to good use and give you some sound, practical tips on making the best possible choice.

Top 5 tips on how to find a personal trainer

1. Watch Them Train

One of the best ways to choose a personal trainer is to see what they do in their own workouts. This is more easily done if you’re going to be working with a personal trainer in a gym because you’ll see them training at some point when they’re not seeing a client. If that’s not possible, many personal trainers have their own websites or do short workout videos and post them on e.g. YouTube, so take the time to have a look at how they train themselves.

The reason this is important is two-fold: first, you’d be amazed at how many personal trainers don’t actually do much training and second, you’ll get to see their form, range of techniques and knowledge level simply by the way they do their own training.

2. Are They Watching and Listening?

Both Donna & I work out at one of the busiest gyms in Sydney and about 40 personal trainers work there. I could narrow down my search for a personal trainer in this gym by about 75% just by observing them working with a client and seeing if the trainer a) is attentive and listens to the client and b) watches the client perform an exercise.

If you choose a personal trainer and they don’t ask you about your goals and then work on them with you, listen to you during the session or watch you perform every exercise you undertake, then you need to be looking for a new trainer…pronto.

3. Are They Motivating and Inspiring?

Lots of people become friends with their personal trainer, and vice-versa. Although this can be a positive bonus of working with a personal trainer, you’re not trying to find a new best friend. But what you do want is for your personal trainer to motivate and inspire you to do more than you’d do without their encouragement and guidance.

Some popular TV shows have promoted bullyboy tactics as the best way for personal trainers to motivate and push you to your physical limits. If this approach works for you, great, but remember most of us don’t respond to this type of motivation long-term. Find a personal trainer that motivates and inspires you.

4. Are They in Good Shape?

If ever there was a profession in which someone needs to walk their talk, then I believe it’s personal training. Paying an out-of-shape and overweight (yes, this does exist) personal trainer to get you into shape is like paying a bankrupt financial adviser to look after your money. If someone is unable to motivate and coach themselves to be their best, how can you expect them to do it for you?

5. Look Beyond Basic Qualifications

As in most professions, the minimum qualifications you need to be a qualified personal trainer are really just the start. I did the minimum qualification myself a number of years ago, and I personally think it’s only just enough to scrape by. Any personal trainer who’s committed to their work will have done extra qualifications or be refreshing their knowledge with new courses. So, ask them what they’ve done above and beyond the basics.

We hope these tips will help you with how to find a personal trainer – remember that the hardest part is taking that first step, so get started today!

Some Resources For How To Find A Personal Trainer

As well as word of mouth, your local gym and local paper, you can also go to industry association websites to check out personal trainers.

Australia

Fitness Australia: http://www.fitness.org.au/

UK

National Register of Personal Trainers: http://www.nrpt.co.uk/

USA

Fitness Trainers Network http://www.fitnesstrainersnetwork.com

[NB There could be a better resource, US readers, happy to stand corrected!]