I have been working as a personal trainer for almost 7 years and for the last 4 years, I have been working on my own located in Kitsilano Vancouver. ( the gym for only personal training )
Here is a list of what you can expect from me.
- Core training – ultimately prevent low back pain
- Weight loss program
- Corrective exercises and postural assessment
Core Training
Do you know traditional sit ups don’t train your core effectively? In fact, it can potentially harm your lower back.
Why?
If you break down the movement, the first part of sit up targets the rectus abdominis which is most of our favorite six pack muscles. The rest of the movement of sit ups actually targets hip flexor muscles.
Hip flexor muscles attach to the lumbar spine. As we do sit ups, the spine naturally curves from the lumbar spine and your hip rotates posteriorly. There are many other exercises that can train your core muscles without the lumbar spine movement.
In addition, the rectus abdominis muscle is just the surface of an abdominal muscle which is not mainly responsible for engaging your core.
Instead, you want to activate the transverse abdominis muscle.
Weight loss program
Every year, a new year is coming and many people have their goal to lose weight. AND the majority of them quit in a month.
Why?
That’s because you don’t see the result right away.
First of all, there is no magic pill to lose weight. In order to lose 1lb, you need to burn 3500 calories. all you have to do is to calculate
calorie expenditure – calories intake
Secondly, the muscles are heavier than fat. If you have done nothing before and start strength training, you may gain weight due to having more muscles. In fact you already lose fat. You are just more compact with more muscles with the same weight or possibly a little weight gain.
Lastly, it takes more time than you are thinking. Weight loss must be a long term goal.
My job as a personal trainer is to give you the right type of exercise for you who wants to lose weight.
Check out my previous post here
Corrective exercises and postural assessment
You have heard from everywhere such as news, TV shows, social media and so on, how important your posture is.
But have you wondered why?
I am going to use kyphotic posture for instance.
Kyphosis is considered as a bad posture in which you hunch over / slouch due to sitting down too much, use cell phones, lack of confidence and you name it.
If you leave this posture, do nothing about it, here is something that could happen.
- Disrupt lymphatic flow
- Restrict breathing
- Disrupt digestion and increase the chance of arthritis in your neck
- Compress the nerves of the brachial plexus and cause carpal tunnel syndrome
- The abdominal organs sag, causing crowding in the torso and making more work for heart and lungs.
It may also be sign of being osteoporosis.
Good news is, there is a possible solution for this bad posture. Strength training for certain muscles and stretching certain muscles, too.