The best ones will have credentials and a college degree to help you create a workout regime and avoid injuries.

By Daniel Q. Haney
Bloomberg Markets April 2008

If you're considering hiring a personal trainer, focus on the quality of the candidates' credentials rather than the size of their biceps. A bad choice may mean tendonitis, back strains and other injuries.

As the unregulated and unlicensed profession grows rapidly--the U.S. Labor Department estimates there were 235,000 personal trainers in 2006 and the number will surge 27 percent by 2016--consumers should beware. Many trainers today don't have enough knowledge of fitness or physiology to help you attain your goal, whether that's preparing for a marathon or adding 20 pounds of muscle, says Neal Pire, a trainer with almost 30 years of experience who chairs the Indianapolis-based American College of Sports Medicine's personal trainer subcommittee. "The worst case is you could get hurt physically because your trainer doesn't know how the joints work, how the body moves and how to control momentum," Pire says.

The first thing to look for in a trainer is credentials. He or she should be certified by either the ACSM, the American Council on Exercise, the National Strength & Conditioning Association or one of the six other organizations accredited by the National Commission for Certifying Agencies. Certification requires a high school diploma and passing an exam on physiology, exercise techniques, client assessment and exercise program design. "These are exams of minimal competency," says Richard Cotton, the director of certification at the ACSM, a 20,000-member organization of sports medicine and exercise professionals. "It's not an assessment of trainer excellence."

Cotton says the best trainers will also have an undergraduate degree in exercise science, kinesiology or physical education and a list of references. Avoid a trainer who doesn't begin your regime by gauging your base-line fitness with a detailed medical history. A competent specialist will also have a referral network of dietitians, physical therapists and physicians. If the trainer sells supplements, Cotton says, don't hire him or her. Although this sideline is lucrative, the supposed benefits of products such as megavitamins and herbal supplements are largely unproven.

Experienced trainers, who tend to charge $75-$150 a session, excel at designing detailed workouts to help ratchet up your performance in a particular sport. If you're a cyclist, Pire says, a trainer may assemble the most-efficient combination of stationary, road and spin exercises, adjusting the frequency of speed and hill work, the intensity of sprints and the length of rest periods.

Many people--such as Susan Dick, a recently retired private banking and trust executive in San Antonio--use trainers to slim down and tone up. Dick, 58, says she's benefited from specialists who pushed her to double the length of her workouts to 90 minutes three times a week and vary her exercises by combining free weights and machines. In three months, she boosted her bench press to 85 pounds (39 kilograms) from 70 pounds. "They provide the challenge that I can't muster on my own," she says.

Daniel Q. Haney is a freelance writer based in St. Petersburg, Florida. danqh@earthlink.net

#<257571.18602.1.0.69.26862.25># -0- Mar/03/2008 17:33 GMT

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