IN PFT’S EYES

After being in the industry now for a while, we have noticed the amount of crap that is circulating.  The amount of gimmicks, fads, and latest crazes are unbelievable.  Just about everything in the fitness world must cause confusion (do you know that you can even qualify to teach these gimmicks?!)  Even the quality of trainers is poor and the advice and training methods given is nowhere near the standard it should be.   This article is to let everyone who is promoting this garbage know just how we feel!

Why do a large percentage of people who go to gyms join a class?  Aside from the obvious social aspect what benefits does this class have?  Almost all classes are cardio format or muscular endurance and excessively repetitive (most clients who come to PFT with knee, hip, shoulder problems had participated in a class!) They only train people to have one-dimensional fitness and not all various types of strength, flexibility, endurance, speed etc.  Because of the size of the class how can an instructor see movement imbalances, weakness and form?  Even if he/she had seen them how can he/she correct every single person within the timeframe of a standard class? If you had a weakness (e.g. weak hip stabilisers) and you were made to perform the infamous pulsing squat in body pump chances are your knees will be fu%@£d. Wouldn’t it be better to do exercises to strengthen the hip stabilisers to improve a squat? Yet, because the class instructor follows a protocol they will not change to adapt to an individual’s needs, and even if they could this would be impossible; as there is nothing gimmicky about training properly it wouldn’t sell well!

There are many personal trainers out there, be it in a commercial gym, private studio or freelancers in parks, outdoors, home-training etc.  While all this is good and promotes better health you tend to see that every trainer thinks they’re the best yet their service isn’t as good as they think mostly due to their equipment, knowledge, passion for the clients health (most just want their money and we know this because we worked with or know these people). Let PFT give you an example: let’s say a home trainer, unless he/she is carrying some sort of futuristic advanced way of storing a mobile gym with equipment e. g power rack, squat rack, bench, glute ham raise, plates etc (which is essential in any training programme) then there is no way in hell this trainer can achieve anything more than basic results.  I don’t care how good a trainer you are, if you don’t have the correct tools then you are not going get the best results.  Imagine a joiner working on your kitchen with a stone as a hammer and using his arms to take measurements!  You could get average joiner with the correct tools and still achieve better results than the amazing joiner with inferior tools.

Let PFT set this straight right now, 99% of general public that trains INCLUDING TRAINERS are of NOVICE ABILITY.  This means that because of THEIR LEVEL OF FITNESS IT DOES NOT REQUIRE SPECIFIC OR MORE ADVANCED WAYS OF TRAINING TO ACHIEVE RESULTS.  So basically you can get the body to stress easily and it will adapt.  That is why any person who is just starting out will achieve results no matter what they do! They could walk on a treadmill for 2 weeks do nothing else and they would still reduce their weight!  So the majority of the time the trainer who is training you is only motivating you and not actually using his/her expertise (which is questionable) to achieve basic results, which ANYONE could do.

This is the fundamental problem in this industry today; anyone can be a trainer because they can all guarantee results due to the fact that every person is a NOVICE ATHELETE. Did you actually achieve the best results?  Did you actually achieve results because of the fact the trainer was using sound strength and conditioning knowledge or was it just down to your body adapting to its new environment?  Was the trainer actually being honest about how you achieved the results? Or did they just big themselves up as the best trainer and it was because of their skills?

PFT can guarantee that practically every personal trainer in this country, if you gave him/her an athlete to train, either the trainee would lose ability or regress or he/she would be no different from when they first trained him/her and that’s not right!  Personal training was born from strength and conditioning coaches training athletes and yet most personal trainers today wouldn’t even be allowed to set foot in any strength and conditioning gym.

Now, we are not saying that every trainer should be training every client to become an athlete (actually, we are) but the principles of training an athlete should be the method which every trainer should choose (unless the client states otherwise).  Think about it; athletes have the best physiques, the highest levels of fitness, have the most FUNCTIONAL ABILITY yet personal trainers come up with some sort of fancy-dan way of training that doesn’t maximise the true potential of the client.  100% of every single programme we have seen personal trainers give is a bodybuilding programme and yet they’re trying to promote FUNCTION!  Unless you want to be a bodybuilder or want a bodybuilder physique question the programme you’re given!

Until people understand what’s going on it’s just going to get worse, new qualifications that aren’t worth the paper they’re written on are going to keep appearing, new gimmicks are going to get thought up, and more and more people are going to become “trainers”. The standard of trainers today is worse than it has ever been and yet the science and knowledge of the human body has only got better.  What the…..!!!!!!  Trainers are not going to know any better because they are stuck in a vicious circle and unless they seek the answers to what they have actually learned and find the cause it will never change.  Only when trainers start to question and form their own opinion will they will find the truth behind most gimmicks and training. 

At PFT we don’t have all the answers but we strive to achieve them all. What we will NOT do is promote crap.  What we WILL do is constantly research and give people what they actually pay for: RESULTS.  We will not conform to the current health and fitness industry, as it is just a cash-cow for the fat cats to milk. We hope this article will get people thinking about how they are training, what they do in the gyms and how they train with personal trainers.