Tag Archives: personal trainer

American College of Sports Medicine Certification Profile

The American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) was the first organization to certify health and fitness professionals and with more than 20,000 certified professionals worldwide, they are the largest sports medicine and exercise science organization in the world.

ACSM establishes the exercise guidelines that all the other certifications use for their own training and certification programs. ACSM certifications are NCAA-accredited, meaning they meet the highest qualifications and something employers often require when looking for certified candidates for jobs.

ACSM offers many certification programs, including:

ACSM Certified Personal Trainer, which will certify you to write and implement exercise programs safely and effectively to help clients reach their fitness goals.

ACSM Certified Health Fitness Specialist, a more advanced and indepth certification program than the personal trainer certification to train you to work with individuals with medically controlled diseases.

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Posted on March 28, 2024 by Kelly

John Carter’s Taylor Kitsch Calls Obesity Epidemic an “F-ing Joke”

Taylor Kitsch appears shirtless in most of the upcoming John Carter movie, but he isn’t just a celeb with an expensive trainer on a strict diet. The Canadian actor is actually a personal trainer and nutritionist himself, and takes his work very seriously.

Kitsch revealed in a recent Men’s Health interview that that he lost 35 pounds in just two months to play photographer Kevin Carter in 2024’s The Bang-Bang-Club, and it wasn’t easy.

“It’s just way too extreme, and being a nutritionist I found it hard. Everything I knew just went out the window,” he said, admitting that the weight loss had affected him in many ways. “I was very bipolar. My mood swings were f**king insane. I was very emotional, I had night terrors, I couldn’t sleep. It was a zoo.”

All the effort was worth it to him though, and that’s how Kitsch describes his work ethic, in and out of the gym. You have to put forth the energy in order to reap the rewards.

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Posted on March 6, 2024 by Kelly

Jay Cardiello’s Success as a Fitness Professional is No Accident

Think you’ve got to be on some inside track to become a celebrity trainer? Not really. Jay Cardiello, creator of the J-Core program, did so by accident. Literally. A martial artist for most of his youth, Jay left his New Jersey home after high school to attend the University of Arkansas where he was part of the 1996 national championship track & field team. He was there to become a lawyer, but an accident on the track would not only send the disks in his vertebrae “flying every which way,” but also his career plans. He landed wrong during a jump and the damage to his spine would require 13 major surgeries over the next few years.

“I knew my career as an athlete was over,” he told us in a recent interview. His life was far from over, and arguably, just getting started. He had some down time for a couple of years as his body repaired from the damage. Back on his feet, he went returned to college at William & Mary where he worked as a volunteer assistant for the men’s and women’s track teams and “got to fall in love with coaching people.” If Jay Cardiello had a calling, this was it.

What happened from there played out like a case study for being in the right place at the right time. Jay could be called a poster child for having your whole life planned, and one small accident can change the entire course of your life for the better. After William & Mary Jay moved back to New Jersey to work as the head strength and conditioning coach for the Red Dogs for two seasons. After that, he was an unpaid coach’s assistant for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. At only 26 years old, he was compared to the best of the best and it was evident he knew what he was doing by now.

After some time in Tampa he was ready to put that expertise to a different kind of test and decided to work one-on-one with clients. He moved to New York City to be a trainer at Clay, an elite gym. It was there that Jay’s career took another hard right. During his third session working with a client named Curtis James Jackson III, better known as 50 Cent, and having just signed on a NYC apartment, Jay was asked to be the rapper’s dedicated trainer. “You’re coming with us,” Jay says 50 Cent told him. It was supposed to be a three-month gig, traveling as part of the entourage and keeping 50 Cent in shape. It turned in to four years. “I lived with him as a trainer and nutritionist,” Jay told us. “I was glued to his hip.” (more…)

Posted on February 29, 2024 by Natalie K

American Council on Exercise Personal Training Certification Profile

The ACE personal training certification is the largest, most widely recognized and widely accepted personal training certification there is out there. The draw is that you can complete the course at your own pace, on your own time, completely independently. While many find this the perfect choice to become a personal trainer, some criticize the ACE for not requiring hands on experience. While they do strongly recommend that you do 100 hours of practical experience, it isn’t a requirement. Find out more about the ACE certification process and decide for yourself if it works for you.

You can purchase study materials online that range from a simple textbook and practice test to DVDs, flashcards and practice tests. When you feel you are ready for the test, you can sign up online at any time and pick a testing area close to you.

The prices for study materials vary whether you go with the Premier, Deluxe, or Standard package, but expect to pay around $300-$400 for the exam materials. The ACE certification group also runs an Exam Review course every three months or so around the US. This counts as 1.6 continuing education credits (CECs), runs you around $220 and gives you the opportunity to ask any questions you may have. This is not a requirement to get your certification.

Also every three months, the ACE runs a 2 day, 15-hour Practical Training Program for additional help before the test to give you insight into critical areas such as Assessment, Program Design, and Strength Training. This runs about $300 and can be counted as 1.5 CEC’s but again, is not a requirement.

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Posted on February 28, 2024 by Kelly

Dr. John Spencer Ellis’ Advice for Resolutions, Personal Trainers, and Eating Right

Few people know more about the fitness industry than Dr. John Spencer Ellis. Active in the fitness and health community for more than 20 years, and a renowned member, Ellis is known for a variety of things, including his stint on the Real Housewives of Orange County, the creation of NESTA, and most recently the launch of DietGuru.com.

We had a chance to speak with John and catch up on a few goings-on in the fitness world right now. We talk about making the resolutions last (yes, there’s still time!), identifying the best personal trainer for your needs, and how Diet Guru can help you become an A+ eater.

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Posted on February 7, 2024 by Natalie K

NESTA Personal Training Certification Profile

You’ve deiced to get your personal training certification- congratulations. But with hundreds of certification programs out there, how do you know which one is right for you? Today we take a look at one of the most respected programs, the National Exercise and Sports Trainers Association (NESTA), and what you can expect from their NESTA Personal Fitness Trainer certification.

The NESTA Personal Fitness Trainer certification is NCCA Accredited, a requirement amongst most places of employment. While the NESTA PFT is the most widely known of their programs, they also offer many coaching and specialization programs that are very unique to NESTA including the Mixed Martial Arts Conditioning Coach and the Triathlon Coach programs. They also have several programs specifically designed for the in-depth sciences, such as the Biomechanics Specialist program or the Heart Rate Performance Specialist program which was co-developed with Polar Heart Rate Monitors.

NESTA believes that in order for their graduates to be successful in the fitness field, they need a strong grasp of foundational exercise science and, more importantly, the application of that science.

“In my experience, many programs stress the science and are weak on application (or vice versa). Furthermore, the science is typically taught in a dry, boring manner. We strive to create the most engaging educational experience out there,” says Scott Gaines, NESTA’s Senior Vice President. While to program is completely online, they prefer to teach interactively, as opposed to learning material from a “boring textbook,” and use teaching methods that enhance experience, like proprietary 3D animations and visuals within the coursework.

“Most people enter this field because they have a passion for health and fitness and they want to share that passion for others. We want our education to fuel the flame of their passion for health and fitness, not snuff it out like many educators do.”

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Posted on February 3, 2024 by Kelly

Stuff People Say in the Diet and Fitness Industry

Originating with a Twitter account owned by Graydon Sheppard and Kyle Humphrey, popularized through YouTube video and quickly generating a whole universe of spin-offs, the “Sh*t People Say” meme has proved to be a thoroughly entertaining phenomenon. Some may take offense, some may already think it’s played out, but we couldn’t resist sharing a few of the gems that apply to our work here at DietsInReview.

Stuff Foodies Say

Our love of real, unprocessed, organic foods here at DietsInReview is sure to cause a lot of people to stick most of us in the “foodie” category. Shopping at the farmers market or Whole Foods, participating in a CSA and obsessive back-of-package label reading are some of the key characteristics of the foodie. They typically love greens, local food and sustainable farming, and may also adopt more rigorous eating regimes, such as going vegetarian, raw, local, vegan, paleo or gluten-free.

One thing we’d like to add to the script:

“I only shop at perimeters of the grocery store.”

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Posted on February 1, 2024 by Margaret

Empty Calories Comic: Affordable Personal Trainer

See more Empty Calories right here in the blog each week, or receive one each month when you subscribe to our free newsletter. (more…)

Posted on January 13, 2024 by Health Buzz

CrossFit Affiliate Certification Can’t Guarantee Trainer Experience

In the past few years CrossFit has been capturing the eyes of many individuals from around the world. With their affiliate gyms popping up everywhere, it seems that CrossFit is carving out its own unique niche within the fitness industry. If you were to log on to any social media site, there are many CrossFit fan pages, videos, and advertisements on where you can do this type of physical training. The question to be asked: Is CrossFit for everyone? And with popularity and large masses of people doing it, what are the pros and cons?

The CrossFit corporation is not a franchise, but you can buy into their affiliate program, which costs $3000 and you must take and pass their Level 1 Certificate Course, which cost $1000. Once you take and pass this course, you are now eligible to apply to be an affiliate of CrossFit.

This is where some of the bad publicity comes into play with CrossFit, and it has been getting a lot of press in the health and fitness industry. Are the individuals who are becoming business owners of affiliate CrossFit gyms experienced enough to run such a facility, and do they have enough training experience? We know that CrossFit is an excellent system if the right trainers are in place to teach these methods. If the wrong instructors/trainers are not qualified and the only training they have taken is the Level 1 Certification Course, then this is not a good sign. This is when CrossFit needs to focus their attention on due diligence and really qualify individuals before granting a CrossFit affiliate license. If the qualifications are stricter, it will create more credibility within the health and fitness industry. (more…)

Posted on January 2, 2024 by GuestBlogger

Spot a Bad Personal Trainer Before You Spend the Money and Risk Your Body

Because of the New Year, novice exercisers everywhere will be dusting off their tennies to begin an exercise program. This is the first step, and one to be applauded, but most don’t know where to go after that. There is no shame in that- you can’t know something you have never been taught. Hiring a professional, like a personal trainer, to create a routine for you and show how to effectively exercise and eat right is a great plan of attack. However, hiring the wrong trainer, despite your best intentions, can leave you broke, discouraged and possibly injured.

Most people don’t know this, but there is no regulation on the personal training industry. Just because someone calls themselves a trainer doesn’t mean they have any direct education or training in the field. Often, I have found that the title personal trainer in many box, chain gyms is just a small promotion above membership sales; a title that has more to do with an employee’s ability to get you to open your wallet than get you into shape. There are a lot of “bad” trainers flooding the market these days with the fitness industry exploding at the same rate as the seams of America’s pants. Some have zero training, some have zero experience  and some may be a bad fit for you personally, but perfectly qualified.

Unfortunately, fitness expert Liz Neporent, co-author of the new Fitness for Dummies, 4th edition, sees this all the time. She recently had an all too typical “bad” trainer experience at her gym. “There was a trainer at a residential gym I witnessed recently who the clients loved but I could see was probably bordering on dangerous. She had clients doing high impact joint crunching workouts day after day. No certs, no insurance. [She] was offering them diet advice she got out of a Suzanne Somers book! But the clients loved her because she looked the part so they lobbied management to keep her. Sure enough, one by one they started coming up with injuries. She really was a disaster but was finally forced to at least get insurance coverage and a low level certification.”

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Posted on December 29, 2023 by Kelly

NESTA Approves Mixed Martial Arts Conditioning Association for Continuing Education Credits

The National Exercise & Sports Trainers Association (NESTA) has just approved the Mixed Martial Arts Conditioning Association’s (MMACA) online certification program for 4.0 continuing education credits, which also can be applied toward recertification for the NESTA Personal Fitness Trainer program.

Health professionals of all levels have teamed up with best MMA athletes around the world to make an effective and comprehensive online certification program to educate personal trainers, coaches, and martial artists with the physical and professional skills to start and maintain a successful MMA business.

The MMA certification teaches you important combat drills, plyometrics, mental focus, TRX kettlebells, conditioning, sports nutrition, and flexibility. The program to become a certified mixed martial arts conditioning coach includes online lectures, video demonstrations, a digital textbook, and audio lessons. The program is 100 percent online and there is no time limit, so the training fits into your schedule, no matter how busy you are.

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Posted on December 15, 2023 by Kelly