How To Spot A Bad Miami Personal Trainer

There is an alarming trend that has become too common over the last few years:
Everyone and their mother is a “personal trainer”

Without fail, every time I tell someone what I do for a living I always get the same response:
“I was/am/am becoming a personal trainer too!”
Followed by the obligitory
“You have a sweet life… Just hang out in the gym all day!”

Really? I don’t know about other trainers, but I don’t “hang out” with my clients. That sounds a lot like a “gym escort” not a personal trainer.

Further investigation has shown the common problems associated with bad Miami personal trainers:

Personal training is a career (not a part-time job) that requires a great deal of experience and knowledge to be great at.
Many trainers fail to understand that their clients have specific goals, medical concerns, and abilities. A truly masterful personal trainer can educate and motivate a fitness beginner, as well as enhance and improve upon the abilities of professional athletes.

Here are a few quick signs that your current or prospective personal trainer is less than great.

1: Phone Usage
Can you hear me now?!
It’s boggles my mind at the amount of personal trainers who check text messages and answer calls while with a client.
A professional trainer will have their phone on “silent” and out of sight for the duration of a client’s session. In the event of an emergency or extenuating circumstance the trainer should mention the possibility of an emergency call/text at the start of the session and handle the communication as quickly as possible should the need arise.

2: Gossip Queen
Gossip and intimate personal discussion during the session is rarely acceptable. Depending upon the client, they will enjoy chatting or hearing quick blurbs while working out in order to make exercise more fun and interesting…
BUT personal stories and gossip should never interfere with or take time from the session.

3: Last Minute Cancels and No-Shows
Most trainers have a policy regarding clients canceling their session at the last minute or not showing up. The same rules apply to the trainer. A professional personal trainer will ensure that they have adequate time to travel to the client (if needed) and will cancel only in the event of an emergency – making sure to contact the client as early as possible to advise them of the situation.
I expect my clients to show up and they expect the same of me. If an emergency ever arises that causes me to cancel last-minute I always reimburse my client for the missed session and offer the next session free of charge.

4: Bar Molesters
These trainers are typically the muscle-bound giants who are seen throwing ridiculous amounts of weight around during their workouts.
While that training style may work for them, it is not the proper workout routine for 95% of personal training clients.
Holding the bar or machine and assisting clients while they lift should only be needed if lifting close to the 1 rep max… So basically never.
It makes no sense to select a specific weight on the pulldown machine and press down on the bar while the client exercises.

How much weight are they really lifting?
Are they progressing or plateauing?
Neither of these questions are able to be answered if the trainer is doing half of the workout for the client.

5: Make It Up As You Go
Sure, anyone with a decent knowledge of exercise can show up to your gym and make you do lunges and burpees until your legs collapse and you puke up a lung…
But how effective is that and bringing you closer to your fitness goals?
The best personal trainers know that it is essential to plan a workout ahead of time around a client’s abilities and goals. Having a plan is also a way to chart progress and ensure that you performing exercises that are bringing you closer to your goals rather than simply exercising for the hell of it.

6: Shock and Awe
The most annoying trend to pop up lately is for trainers to come up with ridiculous exercises using random equipment to seem more advanced and elite than their peers.
These individuals, for the most part, are a joke. While a select few off-the-wall exercises genuinely benefit fitness enthusiasts, most do not.

I had a demo session from a trainer recently who had me doing the most ludicrous exercises. One of which included me standing on a bosu ball (wobbly half-dome object) while doing barbell curls. When I asked her why I was doing the exercise she responded,
“We are working your biceps and adding in core stabilization for your abs”
That’s great, but since I told her my goal was bigger arms and a cut six pack it would have be much more effective to stand me on the ground to allow for greater leverage during the curls – enabling me to lift with a greater intensity and thus recruit more muscle fibers to stimulate growth.
Then super-set with a turkish get-up, leg lift, or any other abdominal exercise to actively target those muscles rather than use them in a secondary manner for stabilization purposes.

There are many good personal trainers and there are also low-quality trainers. Look out for these tell-tale signs and you will quickly and easily be able to assess whether a particular personal trainer is worth hiring.

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