Questions re: working with a personal trainer

[Anonymous]

I'm a mom with 40 pounds to lose. A friend and I are talking about getting a personal trainer to work with us for one or two hours a week at a gym (we need to split the cost -- can't afford solo sessions -- and ideally would be once a week with "homework" given, to reduce cost). I've had a couple of random one-time training sessions over the years (one-free-with-membership type things) but never found them all that helpful. I'd like to start this attempt with clear goals and expectations, for myself and for the trainer, so I can maximize the benefits. But I'm wondering what those should be. Any suggestions?

[Anonymous]

Only you can say what your goals are.

What do you want to accomplish? Look a certain way? Feel a certain way? Look/feel how you did ten years ago? Run a marathon? Squat X times your body weight? Be able to do a pull-up? Just lose weight (which is accomplished by dieting, not training at a gym) . . . .

[Anonymous]

if you need to lose weight you need to focus on diet. i'd look for a trainer who will help you with this and hold you accountable.

i worked with a trainer in the past and the things that were most helpful to hold us both accountable were taking before pictures and measurements, scheduling weighing/measurements at certain time points, giving me diet guidance and holding me accountable. This can be checking your food journal or just asking about how you are doing on the diet/checking in.

Trainer should also give you homework/a plan for workouts they expect you to complete on your own.

For me the best thing about a trainer was getting me more comfortable with weight lifting and the accountability.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm a mom with 40 pounds to lose. A friend and I are talking about getting a personal trainer to work with us for one or two hours a week at a gym (we need to split the cost -- can't afford solo sessions -- and ideally would be once a week with "homework" given, to reduce cost). I've had a couple of random one-time training sessions over the years (one-free-with-membership type things) but never found them all that helpful. I'd like to start this attempt with clear goals and expectations, for myself and for the trainer, so I can maximize the benefits. But I'm wondering what those should be. Any suggestions?

I was a trainer for a number of years. A lot of gyms have nutritionists on staff as well, so you could also schedule a one-time session for meal plans, or do weight-watchers in conjunction.

Tell the trainer what you're looking for: once-a-week with him/her + x number of sessions on your own. He or she will probably use the first couple of sessions to help you set up an easy-to-follow workout for the times you're on your own, and then use that once-a-week session to do more interesting/fun/difficult exercises that you can incorporate into your solo workouts as you get more confident in them.

Let the trainer know what your goals are re: weight loss/body sculpting, and how much time you have to devote to it.

When I did the one-off gym sessions, those were usually devoted to helping people get oriented to the gym, understand what a workout should look like to cover all the bases in whatever time they told me they intended to workout, answer questions, help them identify safe, alternative exercises if they were pregnant, or had joint or other limitations, and help them determine the proper settings on the machines. There wasn't much focus on the longer term, because they weren't planning to come back to me.

For clients I knew I'd see often, we started with the body fat/weight/strength/flexibility/cardio assessments, and then focused on getting great workouts that stayed interesting and challenged muscles and aerobic capacity.