Anyone with a personal trainer?

double post :grumble:

Good for you for dropping that trainer! A woman will not get bulky lifting heavy. I second everyone else. Lifting. Personal trainers are great when your starting out to teach proper form, order, and other techniques. If you put in the extra effort, you can learn a lot of this online and ask the staff at the gym to help correct form when you need it. Check out bodybuilding.com They have some great programs set up for beginners.

I have a personal trainer. It really helped make my body fit and toned. I realize it now it is not about the weight, and it was impossible to get the body I wanted by just dropping weight alone. She is changing up my routine all the time.

Can your friend show you?

I show my exercises to my husband, so that we can both benefit.

I got a personal trainer as a graduation gift from college, I learned a lot about my strengths and weaknesses, what types of exercises I liked and didn't like. The personal benefit I saw from a personal trainer was that she pushed me to do things I probably would have given up on. With someone cheering for me/ yelling at me I was able to push myself through my own mental barrier and achieve greater physical strength. A good personal trainer will tailor a work out to you specific needs, so having people give you exercises without knowing what your strengths and weaknesses are, will probably not yield the results that you desire. I would look into chanigng up your workout, when your body gets accustomed to a specific work out it does not have to work as hard to complete the exercises so the benefit lessens.

Sidenote- you may not need to lose 20 lbs, if any weight at all, you may just be looking to change your body composition/ bf% 5'6" at 140 is in the healthy range

I have a PT and we have hardly ever used the machines we do free weights and body weight exercises. Im just now moving on to bar bells and weight plates and i love it. I have lost more weight with her in less time than when I was hitting the gym alone. This is partly b/c I realized I could be pushed much harder than I was pushing myself.

You have to be vocal with the PT about where you are, what you want, and where you want to be. If they use to many machine say, "I would like to do more free weights," remember your paying and to an extent you have a say in the routine. I have had great results and luckly my gym has a payment plan for the sessions so its not a drain on my pocket all at once.

Right now I'm just trying to take in all the info she's giving me so that i can keep it up on my own. We do two sessions a week together then I try to do two on my own time. I aways only used the machines on my own b/c the free weights intimidated me (the men in the weight area too) but now I think I could go in there and rack up and not give a damn.

For the past year I've been doing circuits, cardio, and an hour of spinning 3x a week. I've only lost 10 pounds this past year.
I have a friend who sees a personal trainer and in a year she has dropped a ton of weight and even had a six pack going on. I cannot afford a personal trainer. I was wondering if there is anyone here who has had a personal trainer and what kind of exercises they recommended you do? I am trying to lose about 20 pounds and tone up.

I am 5'6" and weigh 140 pounds at the moment. What kind of exercises have worked for you?

I used a PT ( 2 actually) for 6 months earlier this year, and finally gave it up a month ago.

Because I really had no idea what I was doing, my first trainer, Justin, did use many machines...but he used dumbbells and medicine balls too. He was my biggest cheerleader on my back squats. he is STILL one of the only 2 men I trust to spot me.

My second trainer, Brian, had a different approach and we didn't use as many machines, but we DID still use some. Brian had me doing a lot of body weight type stuff including push ups, sit ups, crunches, jumps, battle ropes, sprints and flights of steps. I don't think we ever did the same workout twice!

A good trainer doesn't just stand there and watch you work on the machines. A good trainer pushes you to increase the weight when you aren't sure you can...pushes you to get those extra few reps...to try things that you don't think you can possibly do. Brian kept telling me that if *I* hit the ceiling with the med ball while doing squat jumps ( I haven't yet) he would do 200 push ups while balanced on 2 stability balls! I wanted to see that SOO bad, but I just couldn't do what he asked--I came really close though.