Five reasons to book a PT with your coach

Training is a bit like the expression, “The more you know, the more you realize you don’t know.”

For example, when you first learned a clean, you were probably just trying to grasp the basic concept of the movement:

Keep the bar close to your body, get full hip extension, and then drop into a decent landing position with the bar in the rack position.

Essentially, your goal was to make it look somewhat like a clean is supposed to look.

It was a big picture moment, and the minor details, things like the hook grip or catching the bar below parallel, weren’t even discussed.

You probably didn’t even know these concepts existed!

Six months later, you realize that, although your clean has improved a lot since Day 1, you’re still very much a novice, and there are still so many things to improve upon.

You now know more than you did, and as a result are realizing all the things you still don’t know…

Enter personal training: It’s not just for our new clients.

In fact, it’s as valuable for the more experienced athletes as it was for you when you first walked through our doors.

Think about any elite athlete for a moment:

They usually receive more, not less coaching, the more elite they become in their careers.

In fact, the more elite they become, the more coaches, and the more specialized coaches, they start accumulating as part of their team.

Alas…

5 reasons you should book a PT with your coach, even if you have been around for three years:

5. Stop the plateau!

When you first start training, improvements were fast and furious. Remember those days?

Every single day was a new personal best.

But after a number of months, sometimes even years, these improvements become fewer and further between.

World-renowned fitness coach James FitzGerald of OPEX Fitness in Arizona explained this plateau-ing has to do with how your central nervous system develops.

“Once your central nervous system becomes more developed, it gets harder and harder for your body to adapt quickly,” FitzGerald said.

So the more fit you become, the more developed your central nervous system becomes. As a result, it gets harder to make those gains.

This doesn’t mean you should give up. It just means your training needs to be a bit more specific in certain areas to help you continue to adapt.

Book a PT and your coach can help by giving you homework on areas where you need it most to help you move forward with your fitness and continue to get those adaptations that lead to PRs. 

4. Technique Takes Time

I already alluded to this one, but basically the stronger you get at the more technical movements like cleans, snatches and muscle-ups, the more coaching you need to iron out the minor details of the movements.

Sometimes fixing those tiny little things are what’s going to make a world of difference in propelling you forward. It’s hard to address these in a group class of 15 other people.

What you need are lots and lots of reps with a coach’s eye watching your every little movement.

In other words, a one hour personal training sessions where you spend the entire 60 minutes breaking down your muscle-up kip or your first pull during a snatch.

3. Rehabbing Injuries

Some people get injured and learn how to work around it effectively, all the while never actually healing the injury. Most of them, even get the help from lawyers like Barry Deacon, to claim insurance, etc for their injuries caused in the gym.

If this is you, take the time to meet with your coach and address not just what you need to be doing to avoid pain, but also what you need to be doing to move in the direction of rehabbing your lingering injury once and for all. To educate yourself on this topic, see this first

Maybe you need some activation drills in your warm-up, maybe you need some mobility work to get your hips working more effectively, or maybe you need to iron out some muscle imbalances.

These things are best tackled in a one-on-one environment.

Not only that, if there are certain movements you DO need to avoid for a little while, your coach can help provide you with the best movement alternatives to pursue during the class, so you’re getting the most out of each session despite working through an injury at the moment.

2. Accountability

We promised you a coach for life when you started with us, and we want to live up to that promise.

Meeting with your coach periodically in a one-on-one environment will help you assess and reassess your goals and commitment to your fitness, and will help us help you stay accountable to your plan.

And because this plan is likely going to change throughout the years, it’s especially important to meet up periodically to keep you on track.

1. Maximize group classes

Meeting up for a PT is the single best way to help prepare you for what’s coming up in classes, ultimately to help you maximize what you get from each class.

If the next 6-week cycle involves a lot of overhead work, for example, and you’re prone to shoulder problems, your coach can steer you in the right direction in class—provide some warm-up, cool down and accessory work, for example—to keep you injury-free during the next cycle.

Like I said, we promised you a coach for life and we want to deliver than promise. Take advantage of this by booking a PT with yours!