Meet the Client

By Choloeloe

Being a NYC personal trainer I get to train a wide demographic range from high level athletes to a young 60+ year old wanting to stay fit. To be honest, there really isn’t much of a difference from my time in the college and professional arena to now. Whether it’s personal training in NYC or working at the college/pro level, we still need to develop and cater the program based on the individuals needs and goals. One of the biggest mistakes I see many NYC personal trainers and sports performance coaches make is to not meet the client at their fitness level and goals.

Catering

I believe it’s very important for personal trainers in NYC to focus on catering specifically to the clients needs and where they CURRENTLY are in terms of handling intensity. Far too often do NYC personal trainers try to through a new client into high fitness intensities that they are not fully prepared for. This mistake is on the personal trainer, the trainer has to take control over the intensity and workout based on the clients feed back and the initial assessment. While we all want to push the intensity and do XYZ lifts, it’s up to the personal trainer to prepare the client both mentally and physically to better prepare them for higher intensities and challenging lifts/workouts.

So how do you avoid these common and unprofessional personal training mistakes?

Things to DO

• Find out clients past history, contraindications, and level of intensity they feel comfortable with.
• Watch for changes in the client i.e. do they look defeated, enjoying themselves, hate it etc…
• Ask them: “how is the intensity?” “how are you feeling, is the intensity ok?” etc…

 Conclusion

It’s all pretty common sense, while you may want to push the intensity, you still need to respect the client’s wishes. Most general fitness client will have a bit of a different mentality than an Olympian…but don’t get me wrong, I’ve had some general fitness clients with a stronger fire in them than a LOT of my former D1 players.

“Train hard, train smart” ~@FusionTrained