Get fit faster. Hire a personal trainer.

A groundbreaking new study from UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine reveals that personal trainers can have a dramatic impact on fitness levels. Here’s how self-directed exercisers compared to those coached by personal trainers:

•  Increased their lean body mass by 3.3 pounds, while self-trained group saw no change.
•  Increased muscle strength by 42% vs. 19% in self-trained group.
•  Increased muscle power by 10% vs. 0.1% in self-trained group.
• Increased VO2 Max by 6% vs. a 3% decrease in self-trained group.

I have two jobs: freelance writer specializing in health and Pilates instructor. Pilates is taught on the mat in group classes and as a private, personal training

experience.  If you want to get the greatest return on your investment in time.  Do it one-on-one. If you want to avoid injuries, get inspired, and realize more of your own potential – hire an fitness expert to help you. Of course, you want someone that’s well qualified because sadly, a personal training and Pilates certification can be earned in a weekend. So look beyond certification acronyms. True pros earn the equivalent of a master’s degree and continue to earn education credits to maintain their credentials.

They should have some people skills as well as educational background. Don’t be shy, ask about their experience and their background. They too, should ask you some key questions.  To learn more about what to look for, what to ask, and what they should ask you click here

Anyone can bark out orders. I recently read about someone who felt ill, stupid and embarrassed after a session. Um, just no.  A professional will design a program that fits your needs, challenges you and also inspires you to believe in yourself.

When I first started in the fitness business more than 10 years ago, someone said to me, “personal trainers are just babysitters for people who don’t know how to work out.”

Oh yeah?  Tell that to professional athletes and Olympic champions who rely on their trainers for inspiration, motivation, and fitness know-how. And now those who have invested their hard earned cash into personal trainers can rest assured – with well qualified trainers – you will see better results.

Ways To Incorporate Activity Into Schools

• Promote collaboration between physical education and classroom teachers. For example, physical education teachers might provide ideas for "fitness breaks" to classroom teachers, where 5-minute aerobic activities could be used to break up the school day. 
   
• Provide extracurricular physical activity programs. Interested teachers and parents might be encouraged to establish developmentally appropriate clubs and/or intramural activities of a competitive and noncompetitive nature. Walking clubs, in-line skating, jumping rope, water aerobics, and intramural swim teams provide a few examples. 
   
• Coordinate physical activities with community agencies. Schools might allow use of school facilities by community agencies that sponsor physical activity programs, facilitate training programs for volunteer youth coaches, invite community groups to an "activity fair" for students in the school gymnasium, or provide a listing of community physical activity resources to students. 
   
• Encourage and enable parental involvement in physical activity. Parental activity level is very important in promoting activity among children. Schools can help encourage activity in parents by sending home activity homework that parents and children do together, recruiting parent volunteers for physical education classes, and sponsoring parent-child activity programs at school. 
   
• Provide physical and social environments that encourage and enable physical activity. For example, schools might allow access to facilities before and after school hours and during vacation periods, encourage teachers to provide time for unstructured physical activity during recess and during physical education class, and help school personnel to serve as active role models by enabling and encouraging their own participation in physical activity.

Back & Arm Workout

How Much Physical Activity Is Enough?

Health benefits can be derived simply from becoming more physically active, but the greatest benefits come from engaging in planned and structured exercise. Cardiovascular risk factors can be reduced and physical fitness enhanced with low to moderate levels of physical activity (40-60% of a person's maximal aerobic capacity). Low- to moderate-intensity activity is less likely than vigorous exercise to cause musculoskeletal injury and sudden heart attack death during exercise (a very rare occurrence even for vigorous exercisers), while it is more likely to promote continued adherence to activity.

Current recommendations state that children and adults should strive for at least 30 minutes daily of moderate intensity physical activity. An alternate approach that may be equally beneficial would be to engage in 5 to 10 minute bouts of moderate intensity activity throughout the day, for a total accumulation of at least 30 minutes for adolescents and adults and 60 minutes for children. Walking briskly or biking for pleasure or transportation, swimming, engaging in sports and games, participating in physical education, and doing tasks in the home and garden may all contribute to accumulated physical activity.

Children and adults who already engage in regular activity may benefit from more vigorous activity. The specific amount of energy expenditure needed by children to decrease their risk of cardiovascular disease is not known; for adults, approximately 3 kcals/kg of body weight/day has been recommended. Weight in pounds can be converted to kg by dividing by 2.2. Thus, a 140-pound person (140/2.2 = 63.6 kg) should expend about 192 kcals/day (63.6 X 3).

Why Is Physical Activity Important?

There is no debate about the value of physical exertion--regular physical activity has significant health benefits, and even modest increases in energy expenditure can have health-enhancing effects, including:

Reduction in chronic disease risk--hypertension, type 2 diabetes, high blood lipids, cardiovascular disease, and obesity. Even among children and adolescents, physical activity can prevent or delay the development of hypertension and can reduce blood pressure in those young people who already have hypertension (Physical Activity, 1996);

• Lowered risk of colon cancer;
• Increase in bone density;
• Reduction of anxiety, improvement in body image and mood;
• Development of physical fitness;
• Promotion of weight control through caloric expenditure. This benefit is of particular importance to children, who are experiencing the same epidemic of overweight as adults.