Finally at the last step, finding that personal trainer. So after a little bit of time and work we now know everything we need to know about ourselves and how we want to train, so we need to track down this “one” Personal Trainer to help guide us on this journey.

 

So what do we actually look for? Since we know the style of fitness we want to do, we can actually look at the facilities that offer this service and see what services are being offered, advertised or recommended. The best option is through personal referral, as the person referring you can give you the complete run down and the ability to understand whether the potential new Personal Trainer will match what you are after.

 

But what happens if you can find a referral, or the type of training you are looking at doesn’t use a facility. Well this is where it comes down to what you know, and can ask the Personal Trainer themselves and this is where this article is the very important for you.

 

Some of the easiest things that you need to ask them are:

• How much do they charge – No point asking anything else if they are too expensive.
• What payment options do they offer?
• Do they discount for prepurchasing multiple sessions?
• How long is the average session – some are only 30mins, where normal is 60mins
• What times and days are they available for training – Again no point going past this stage if they can’t train you when you’re available.
• How long have they been training people for?
• Do they have referrals from other clients?
• Can you talk to some of their other clients?
• What is their background, and do the specialise in certain types of fitness (you should already know this otherwise you wouldn’t be talking to them, but no harm in rechecking)
• What are their current qualifications?
• How often do they attend extra training to improve their current qualifications?
• If you currently have a medical issue, are they capable of working with or help to fix it?
• Do they currently hold professional liability insurance and do they have proof of it?
• What sort of updates do they provide to their exercise programs?
• Do they provide how exercise programs to go with the Personal Training Sessions?
• Do they offer nutritional advice – and if not do they have referrals to people can provide this

These questions are the basics that you should be using all the time, when auditioning a new instructor/trainer. But these questions aren’t the only things you should be assessing while you are talking to them; there are 3 more keys things:

1. Are they actually listening to you and are the forth coming with the answers?
2. Are they paying attention to you during this conversation and not looking around and being distracted?
3. Do you think you can actually get on well with this person. Are they a close match to your personality. Without this bond, it will be very hard to get a result from them?

So as you can see there is quite a lot to look at in regards to selecting your first personal trainer and well delve into this more in later posts. But this is the start and the journey is going to be enjoyable.