I can't believe people pay good money for this…
I'm amazed how many exercisers keep paying for session after session for a personal trainer who doesn't keep records.
My students and I track not only the standard sets and reps, but also track rest periods (crucial yet typical ignored), exercise order, and even note client quotes about particular exercises.
For example, if you LOVE a certain exercise, I have a shorthand note that tells me that so we'll be sure to do more of that one in future workouts.
If you hate an exercise, I'll ignore you. Just kidding. I'll note it and do my best to come up with an alternative that accomplishes the same goal.
And if you show, for example, lack of internal rotation in your left hip in a certain exercise, I'll write that down and make sure we tackle that later.
But if your trainer does not keep thorough notes,
- he'll tend to forget what you like (your workouts will be less enjoyable)
- he'll forget what you don't like (your workouts will be MUCH less enjoyable), and
- he'll forget the issues you really need to work on for best results.
Most of all, without records, there's no plan and no scientific progression. And without planned progression, you cannot get optimal results.
One of your goals for your workouts HAS to be to do more over a period of time.
Research on what's called "periodization" tells us you don't want to increase everything in every workout, but over the course of a month (or two weeks, or one week, depending on your model) you should be increasing your weights, increasing your total reps (or volume), and/or decreasing your rest time between sets.
In short, today's workout should be more of something than the workout you did a month ago.
In my almost 30 years of personal training, I've found that the most common problem keeping people from gettiing results despite consistently showing up to the gym is that people don't understand the importance of progression.
It's this simple:
Same workout = same body.
Progressively more challenging workouts = Progressively better looking body.
An effective personal trainer will help you develop a progressive workout program.
If, however, your personal trainer doesn't keep records, then you know he doesn't have a scientific program, and it's time for you to get a new trainer.
Tags: fitness program, exercise program
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