Ian Ryves and Ian Spiby own Wellbeing Fitness, a health and fitness studio with main branches in Northamptonshire. They also own Wellbeing Fitness Education Centre where they run Level 3 Diploma courses for people who wish to qualify as personal trainers, sports masseurs and nutritional advisers. In addition, the Education Centre licenses these courses to over 40 gyms and fitness studios in the UK, Ireland and Europe.
Some thoughts by our members Ian Spiby and Ian Ryves
If you work in the Wellness industry, as a massage therapist for example, have you ever thought about adding a personal training qualification to your portfolio?
You might be thinking, “Why would I want to?” But before moving on to the next article in this newsletter, let me explain a bit.
You might have an image in your mind of what a personal trainer looks like – and it could possibly be the stereotype of someone young (a man usually) with overdeveloped muscles, not very bright intellectually who shouts at his clients to make them exercise harder (“No pain, no gain”)
Well, like many stereotypes, the actual truth is rather different.
Personal trainers have very good knowledge of the human body and the effect of exercise on different parts of the body. They also have understanding of nutrition and the effect different foodstuffs can have. They are used to working with people in a one-to-one situation, so they become good at communicating – and even more importantly, motivating their clients to change. Most clients decide to do personal training because of some problem (often obesity) and more often than not, they have an underlying physical difficulty such as shoulder issues or chronic lower-back pain.
As a massage therapist, you can do a certain amount to overcome these problems but with personal training expertise, you would be able to take a more holistic approach, recommend exercises or have one-to-one sessions where you teach them the exercises.
And you don’t have to have a lot of expensive and bulky equipment. Ninety percent of effective exercises can be done using the body weight and with simple everyday items such as a hard-backed chair.
There are other benefits too. You increase your knowledge of the body and its capabilities, and you increase your own confidence as a practitioner. You’re able to recommend and especially demonstrate exercises/routines which will help your client.
At Wellbeing Fitness Education Centre, we have over forty partners throughout the country who offer part-time PT courses, over ten weeks, usually for four hours on Saturdays or Sundays. They are face-to face so you get a real educational experience unlike so many of the online courses where the only time you ever see another live body is when you do your final assessment.
And the icing on the cake is that as well as being validated nationally and internationally through ThinkTree, our courses are Ofqual approved and recognised by CIMPSPA, a requirement that is frequently insisted upon by the big corporate gyms such as Virgin Active or David Lloyd.
If you’d like to know more information and where there’s a course starting near to you, email us at ianryves@wellbeingfitness.co.uk
You can find more info on the two Ians Nutritional Course here:
Best wishes
Ian and Ian
