Why You Should Consider One-On-One Personal Training
What Are the Benefits of Having a Personal Trainer?
It’s that time of the year again. New Year’s resolutions, especially for our health and fitness. Do you make them and break them? Do you find it challenging to keep on track with fitness goals? Could 1-on-1 fitness training provide the discipline and inspiration you need to achieve your physical health targets?
In this article, one of our trainers, Mallory Reilly, discusses the benefits of working with a personal trainer and the challenges you might face when you participate in 1-on-1 personal training.
What’s stopping you from one-on-one personal training?
Many people hesitate when it comes to hiring a coach.
“Self-development is scary,” says Mallory. “You have to change and make sacrifices. Once you hire a coach, that’s another person that knows your weaknesses and what you need to be sacrificing and can hold you accountable.”
This accountability is a double-edged sword. You have to be accountable for your own actions, but now that you’re not in it alone anymore there’s a kind of fear of being held accountable by someone else. Yet, simultaneously, this also becomes comforting. Like a problem shared is a problem halved.
The secret?
“You must be vulnerable with your coach. It’s this vulnerability, the honesty required, that holds people back,” explains Mallory. “If you’re not ready to be honest and vulnerable, you’re not ready to be coached.”
What are the risks of training on your own?
People who aren’t ready to be coached often go it alone. They watch a few videos, read a few articles online, and then try to put into practice what they have learned.
The problem with this do-it-yourself approach is that you don’t see the small mistakes you’re making that can make a dramatic difference to your progress. You risk not reaching your full potential, and injury, too. Indeed, the fear of injury can stop you from achieving your goals.
“There are many benefits of working out with a personal trainer,” Mallory tells us. “When you’re working with a personal trainer, they can show you your blind spots. This could be a weakness that you don’t realize you have – this may be a personality thing or a physical thing – and that is holding you back from reaching your highest potential.
“A lot of times, it’s negative beliefs that you have about yourself that aren’t true. You’re living your life, and your reality may not be the actual reality of the situation. A coach will empower you by helping you see how great you are already, even though you are trying to change.”
It’s difficult to work on your relationships with yourself. A coach will help you overcome your fears and eliminate the risk of not being the best person you can be for yourself – and surely this is the greatest risk of all?
4 Benefits of 1-on-1 personal training
People who work with personal trainers are more successful in reaching their health and fitness goals. And there have been many studies that demonstrate this. For example, research by the Journal of Sports Science and Medicine found that working with a personal trainer produced incredibly positive results, including:
73% of participants improved their attitude toward physical activity
The average fitness goal success rate increased by over 30%
Why does working with a coach achieve such positive outcomes?
You benefit from the coach’s experience and expertise
“Clients aren’t necessarily the best to make decisions regarding the plan they should be on, what they should be doing, for how long, and when should the plan be switched up,” says Mallory. “When it comes to the design of your program, you know that there will be fewer mistakes than if you are trying to do it all on your own.”
Faster measurable progress
Because your program is more targeted and less error-prone, you’ll make faster progress toward your goals. A coach can help you make small adjustments to keep you on track – adjustments that you won’t identify as needed. And seeing that progress really helps to energize your motivation to achieve more.
A personal trainer keeps you accountable
It can be hard to stay motivated when you are working out on your own. Other things get in the way. A single workout missed leads to another, and another. Before you know it, you’re missing all your fitness targets, and that demotivates you.
“Accountability will help you stay focused and challenged. It helps you to remain consistent. Your coach knows what your goals are, and will hold you to them. They make sure you get there and help you through the good and the bad days.”
Personalized programs to meet personal goals
We’re all unique. Our bodies, lifestyles, and health and fitness goals are unique to us. An off-the-shelf program rarely succeeds as it promises because it cannot take this uniqueness into account. And when plateaus happen – because mistakes are made, or life gets in the way – we feel demotivated.
“From the very beginning, we design the program so that plateaus don’t happen,” explains Mallory. “You know, we’re all human. Things happen. Maybe a few training sessions were missed, or we planned them wrong. Sometimes plan A and B don’t work, so we have to move to plan C.
“The thing is, a personal trainer has a lot of different ways to mix things up, make you feel challenged, and get that adaptation out of your body again.”
It may not only be about your training regime, either. A good personal trainer will get to know you. The relationship should become close enough that you can have conversations about your lifestyle and fitness goals. If your lifestyle or goals change, then these conversations will help the coach adapt your program to keep you on track.
Honesty is the key to maximizing the benefits of 1-on-1 personal training
“There are many challenges that people face when working with a personal trainer, but the biggest is the person being honest with themselves.,” says Mallory.
“Even if you see me every weekday for an hour, that’s only five hours a week. What holds many people back are the choices they make outside of those five hours.
“If you lie about your sleep, your nutrition, your workplace stress, it’s going to be harder for you to successfully work on the thing you want to improve – whether that’s your strength, endurance, or whatever.
“When people are not honest about their lifestyle choices – and this dishonesty isn’t always purposeful – that’s what makes coaching them hard, and what produces underachievement.”
Are you ready to be honest with yourself and with a personal trainer?
To start your journey to a new you, sign up for a complimentary fitness assessment.
