Client question about meeting trainer 1 time per week

Question:

Question from Jerry: Trainerbob…  My schedule only allows me to meet with you once per week, Can I make any progress?

Answer:

It depends! I have several clients who met once a week. People are busy and sometimes carving out time for added activities is difficult to do. Meeting with a trainer isn’t about getting your butt kicked until you collapse. It’s about meeting with a professional who provides accountability, instruction, knowledge and guidance.

When you meet with your accountant, doctor, attorney or any other professional, you trust they will provide the service you’ve paid for. Now to answer Jerry’s question. Will meeting with your trainer only one time per week provide any benefit? Answer… It depends. If a client is depending on the training sessions to provide 100% of the exercise and nutritional benefits, then absolutely not! And I do have lots of clients who do depend solely on our training sessions to meet all their exercise needs, however, they are meeting several times per week. So how can meeting with your trainer only one time per week work best for you?

Easy… The session becomes more about accountability, new information and information exchange. The client has to be willing to implement homework activities and track various exercise and nutritional information during the week between sessions. Take Jerry for example. We meet every Tuesday at the same time each week. I have designed various exercises for him to do at home along with having him food journal using an application which I can log in to and see his daily caloric intake along with his food choices. When we meet, I provide a simplified fitness test comprising both weight and % body fat. This lets me know if we are heading in the right direction or not. Then we hit the gym. While he is warming up for 5 minutes, I’ll review his diet, making any suggestions for improvement. Once he’s warmed up, we start exercising. If I like the progress made from the previous week’s exercises, I will add or make changes to his existing homework set. By the end of the hour, he has a clear picture of what is needed for next week.

If a client is willing to work during the week, there is no reason they can’t derive similar results to a client meeting with a trainer several times weekly. Unfortunately, most people won’t do it. And that’s why the accountability of the actual physical meeting works best. It isn’t that the client doesn’t eventually learn what they need to do, it’s human nature to put off what you don’t want to do. So I become the adult babysitter that makes it happen.