Topic #13 (Part 1) Choose a Strength Coach or a Personal Trainer?

The new topic series includes peer-reviewed blogs by health and fitness professionals in the Triangle to address the questions clients, parents, and students have about trainers.  This month-long series in October will focus on each of these professionals’ perspectives on the similarities and differences of strength coaches and personal trainers.

Which One Should You Choose? A Strength Coach or a Personal Trainer?

The Health and Fitness field is fairly new, yet ever-evolving with many aspects becoming specialized. Several areas include: coaching, personal training, athletic training, physical therapy, and group training. Each one of these areas of specialization may not seem different to the inexperienced person/client; however, there are many differences and some similarities that can help show what each area will offer. In my experience as a strength and conditioning coach and now as a personal trainer, I would like to address some of these similarities and differences between these two areas in the field of Health and Fitness.

Let’s start with the definition of a strength and conditioning coach:  a fitness professional, educator, and movement specialist who uses exercise prescription and programming specifically to improve performance in athletic competition. Strength coaches also help athletes with injury prevention and proper mechanics within the realm of sports performance. Moreover, strength coaches will tend to work mainly with athletes or clients that want to learn how to move correctly and utilize their body in peak conditions.

A strength and conditioning coach will usually have a 4-year undergraduate degree in Exercise Physiology/Kinesiology. More advanced coaches that work with professional and Division I universities have advanced degrees (Masters and PhD) in one or more fields of study under Kinesiology. It is important for a strength coach to have knowledge about the different stages of development in adults, teens, and children, and to have an understanding of the bio-mechanical aspects of movement (planes of motion, how to make movement simpler, how to make it safer), and periodization of programming (which exercises and why, which intensities depending on in-season, off-season, and post-season demands of competition). In addition, a strength and conditioning coach may need to know advanced aspects of exercises such as Olympic lifts and the safe progression to these lifts, advanced progressions of speed, endurance, agility, and quickness and how to execute such movements. Finally a strength coach is more involved in the maintenance and planning of the facility that he/she works in. Each of the strength coaches I worked with at Athletic Lab and Cardinal Gibbons had a minimum of a 4 year degree in Kinesiology and relevant experience. Most of these coaches had tremendous base knowledge about athletic development, speed, power, and lifting mechanics and technique.

In the health and fitness field, a personal trainer practices exercise prescription and instruction by motivating clients in setting goals, providing feedback, and acting as accountability partners. Personal trainers also measure their client’s strengths and weaknesses with fitness assessments that provide information about their individual body composition, health status, and nutritional habits. Personal trainers use a different set of skills than strength and conditioning coaches, as they work with a broader population: stay at home parents, older adults, or clients looking to lose weight versus only working with athletes. One of the most common clientele for personal trainers are those with the goal of weight loss. This requires a nutritional intervention, as well as educating clients on basic movement patterns. Personal trainers may use strength training to help expedite caloric expenditure, and to build or maintain muscle mass while the pounds are shed, thus targeting loss of fat as opposed to lean tissue. Many clients of personal trainers are new to resistance training and may lack coordination, stability, strength, and confidence; consequently, personal trainers have to use more psychological aspects of training to keep the clients engaged and motivated.

Finally, most personal trainers working at chain commercial health clubs are commission based, so having certain strategies to obtain, service, and maintain clients is needed. In my time so far at Lifetime Fitness, I have learned so many great ways to speak to the needs of the clients and help them realize that their health is worth an investment greater than just their membership fee. Clients are not only paying for training, but they are paying for the time a personal trainer spends outside training planning and forming a program to help the client cross the bridge to a better and healthier lifestyle.

Strength and conditioning coaches mainly work with athletes, but the demands of sports, top facilities, professional settings, and colleges require a higher expertise in movements, sports, and coaching. This means that Strength and Conditioning coaches need to be highly specialized in the specific demands for athletes. Personal trainers, however, require a more business oriented mindset: seeking out and obtaining clients is a day in and day out aspect of this fitness professional career. Using more psychological plans to help clients change their lifestyles and creating a welcoming environment (friendly and inviting, versus challenging and demanding) are a few examples of what personal trainers have to do differently from strength and conditioning coaches.

In my 3 years of experience so far in these two fields, I have enjoyed working with larger groups of athletes, thus impacting more lives at once. However, as I continue to work in the personal training field, I am finding that being a positive influence in a person’s life makes my work all worth it. Overall, careers in the field of health and fitness are rewarding and competitive.  Each specialization is rewarded by the results achieved by clients, athletes, and students to promote a healthier and happier community around us.

References:
Chat Williams CSCS. Youth Performance and fitness – strength and conditioning information for parents. NSCA Personal Training Quarterly Volume 2 issue 3.
Bret Contreras CSCS, Movement Patterns Continuum: A fundamental component of personal training. 04, NSCA performance training Journal 12.1

Amer Nahhas, BS, CSCS, NSCA-CPT, USAW-L1

“The views, opinions, and judgments expressed in this message are solely those of the authors and peer reviewers. The contents have been review by a team of contributors but not approved by any other outside entity including the Roman Catholic Diocese of Raleigh.”