A quick guide to becoming a personal trainer

Becoming a personal trainer can offer a fun and rewarding career. But what does it involve, and how easy is it?

If you’re passionate about health and fitness and helping people to achieve their goals, you may want to consider becoming a personal trainer. From devising workout programmes and offering health and nutrition advice, to leading group fitness classes, it offers an interesting and varied career, as well as enabling you to choose your own hours and arrange your work around other commitments.

But how do you become a personal trainer, and how easy is it? We spoke to a personal trainer in East London to find out.

Do your research

Before setting out on your journey to become a personal trainer, it’s important to do your research. Try to gain an understanding of the profession, what areas of the industry you are most interested in, and what being a personal trainer actually entails. This will help to give you a feel for whether this is the right career path for you and will help you to narrow down your options when it comes to choosing which qualifications to pursue.

Assess your skills and attributes

In order to become a successful personal trainer, you need to have a certain mix of skills and attributes. Personal training is largely about motivation so it’s essential that you have good people skills and the ability to encourage people to meet and exceed their potential. You will also need to be a good listener so that you can understand your clients’ goals, desires and barriers to success.

If you decide to go down the freelance route (rather than being employed by a gym) you will benefit from good business sense, some basic marketing skills, and the initiative and self-motivation to essentially run your own company. Last but certainly not least, you need to be passionate about fitness and follow a healthy lifestyle so that you can offer a positive example to your clients.

Get qualified

As well as having the right skills, gaining a recognised professional trainer qualification is essential if you want to become a personal trainer. As a minimum, you will need to hold a level two certificate in Fitness Instructing (Gym); Health, Fitness and Exercise Instruction; or Gym Instruction, all of which will qualify you to work as a fitness instructor in a gym. However, if you prefer to work independently, coaching clients in their homes, you will need to undertake a level three qualification in Fitness Instructing or Personal Training.

Depending on where your interests lie, you also have the option of undertaking specialist qualifications, such as pregnancy fitness, sports massage, elite fitness, corrective exercise, and nutrition.

In addition to this, any reputable personal trainer should be trained in basic first aid and CPR, and it’s also a good idea to join a professional membership body, such as the Register of Exercise Professionals (REPs) or National Register of Personal Trainers (NRPT).

There is a lot to think about if you want to become a personal trainer, and it certainly shouldn’t be looked at as an easy option. However, if you’re prepared to put in the effort and commitment, you will secure yourself a fun and rewarding career.