Attention personal trainers ......

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geechegal
geechegal Posts: 29 Member
in Motivation and Support
Hello Everyone,

My goal is to become a personal trainer and I would like to hear from personal trainers who themselves used to be overweight or are still working at it. Tell me how is your career coming along and how was your first job or group of clients?

Ms. Mo

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  • BeautyFromPain
    BeautyFromPain Posts: 4,952 Member
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    Hey there,

    I am still in training... I am doing a year long course to become a Personal Trainer, extending it to 2 years with my Diploma.
    It's a bit different because I am training clients in the school gym atm, and the teachers choose the clients for us but I'm loving it :)
  • Awkward30
    Awkward30 Posts: 1,927 Member
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    Tagging to find this thread later, I've been considering getting certified and trying it out. I think that a lot of people would respond well to a trainer who has their own before and after pictures. Especially if the after is what the client is looking for. I love reading about health and fitness, so I think I could do a good job... I mostly just have reservations about how much the certification costs with no guarantee that you'll be able to find a job after!
  • geechegal
    geechegal Posts: 29 Member
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    Award30 , You are right about the before and after pictures. So I will take some decent before pictures periodically to build my portfolio.
  • SHBoss1673
    SHBoss1673 Posts: 7,161 Member
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    hello geechegal et all,

    You just described me to a T. I was overweight (obese) but about 7 years ago decided to shape up, and joined MFP, lost the weight, and in the process did a ton of research (it's my nature). Learned a ton about healthy living, exercise, and nutrition in the process.

    At that point I said, i"m going to get my certification. Researched which ones were the best, Thought about cooper institute and NASM but both of them required a lot of extra classes and even intern work, so I couldn't really do that as I have a full time job. The next best one I found through research and contacting gyms was ACE (American Council on Exercise). So I studied hard took the test (it's actually a hard test, I've taken a lot of tests, and this one ranks right up there) and passed (first try, woo hoo, many don't).
    That was about 3 years ago, since then I've also received a certification in Olympic weight lifting by the United States Olympic Weight lifting team and a certification in Agility, Quickness, and Reaction time (AQR) through Swift Fitness.

    I've maintained my active status in all the certs, and kept my job the whole time (not always easy) and currently I take on 1 client at a time. It's nice because I still get to train, but I'm not struggling to "sell" myself as a trainer because I still have my full time job. While I'd love to be a trainer full time, I know many trainers and know how hard it is to start and maintain a client base in this industry. So until I have enough money in the bank not to care about how many clients I have, I'm going to continue this way. I love helping folks out AND pursuing something I enjoy. It's very rewarding (but takes a lot of time if you do it my way).

    -Banks
  • ChristinaBarnhouse
    ChristinaBarnhouse Posts: 274 Member
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    Bump :)

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