The Chairman's Fitness Challenge Blog

In the Globe and Mail on Monday, one of my favourite bloggers (Alex Hutchinson) reported on a study conducted at Ball State University on personal trainers.  Surprise, surprise - the study found that working with a personal trainer yield better results.  I am not surprised by this, given the number of people piddle away in the gym with bad form and a random training regimen (and I should probably put myself in that category - until recently.)  But the very interesting finding of the study - it's because someone working with a personal trainer tends to use higher weights, working harder and getting better strength gains in the process.

This is something I can relate to - since refocusing on the Hard-Body Plan, I have been militant about upping the weight whenever approaching the ten-rep limit.  Going back through my journal, I see way too many "tens" without corresponding increases in weight - and every one of those is a lost opportunity for strength gains.  And by pushing the weights up, I have been seeing plateaus shattered.  (For example, tonight on the machine I did leg extensions with 105 lbs/leg - versus seventy lbs or so just a few weeks ago).  Take a look around the gym, and you'll undoubtedly see people working well below the 50% one-rep max that is required to stimulate muscle growth - every one of them is sub-optimizing their workout by doing so.  (If you are interested in figuring out your one-rep max on a given exercise, select a challenging weight, do as many reps as possible, and try this calculator.  It works at 20 reps but is more accurate at lower numbers.)

There is also evidence that the personal trainer achieves results by providing motivation and encouragement - again, very logical, but nothing a great workout partner couldn't provide for free.

The bottom line is that the right personal trainer, one with knowledge enough to tailor a workout to his or her clients' needs, can achieve results, and be a worthwhile investment to someone just starting out or looking to bust through a plateau.  However, if you are being honest in pushing yourself, with challenging weight loads and a good degree of motivation, you are probably getting most or all of what you would get out of a trainer-led session already.  

So, I gave in and had my "assessment" done by a personal trainer (PT) at my gym today. She was nice enough, went through the standard questionaire on goals, fitness habits, and medical history, then did a three-exercise "assessment" based on push-ups, body squats and the plank pos'n. Oh, and I weighed in about seven pounds higher on their scale (not too surprised) but it also measured my BF% at 27%, which I figure is at least 5% too low. Odd.

I have to wonder how valid the assessment was, given that I'd just busted a 1-hour fitness class and did an upper-body resistance training session before that. Honestly, I was pretty bored with the "plank" and pretty much just dropped after what I thought was a respectable time because of lack of interest. I'd probably be a fitness trainer's worst nightmare.

I got the lecture on RT cranking up the metabolism and how, if we did three sessions a week (at a cost of approximately $600/month based on my in-my-head calculations) I'd get great results. I don't doubt that, I've seen the trainers working around the gym and they seem to do some good stuff with certain clientele, who I've figured out to be either people just getting into the routine with limited knowledge, or advanced fitness buffs looking to get to the next level. Odd, though, that there was nothing in the way of specifics, no mention of how my workouts would change, or even of any nutritional component to the program. She was horrified, though, at the thought that I had a "program" I was following that in all actuality sounds identical to what she was describing - focused on large and core muscles, free weights, and 3-4 cardio sessions a week. I didn't have the heart to tell her it worked once before, and was based on Men's Health routines ripped out of a magazine (and not dissimilar to the HardBody plan published a few years ago).

With someone like me, a subject who has read voraciously on nutrition and exercise, with the short-term objective of maintaining muscle through a prolonged weight-loss phase, I'm not sure the value is there for more than a session or two to check form and solicit pointers once in a while. And given that I'm currently focused on studies/unemployed/looking for the next opportunity, the asking price is a little out of reach. I am considering it as an option for "the next phase", after I get out of the reduction mode 45 pounds from now and start focusing on building strength.