Personal Training 101

How to Prepare For a Personal Training Test

Do you want to become a personal trainer? Here are some tips to help you prepare for a certification test and for life after the test.

1. Study before the test. If you don’t study you won’t pass. If you want to be a fitness professional, you need to invest the time  to do it.  The organization that you want to be certified by has textbooks to help you prepare for their certification so you should get them.

2. Can I use bodybuilding books to help prepare? I don’t recommend bodybuilding books or magazines as your only source of information. This is because bodybuilding is not the same as personal training. As a personal trainer, your clients likely will not be bodybuilders.

3. If I pass, am I certified? Technically you are certified after you pass a  certification exam. Certification does not mean you know everything. After the test, its important to continue to stay educated because a certification only means you know the “minimum“.

4. I like to work out. Will I make a good personal trainer? Maybe. Its a good first step. That training yourself and training another person can be very different.  For example, one of the things you’ll need to  know is how to prescribe exercise so it is safe for people with various injuries and health issues.  That comes only with study and practice. Still, if you like to workout, the odds are very good that the science of fitness training will be interesting to you.

5. What is the best certification? I’ve known people with “good certs” who didn’t know much – and I’ve seen people with no certs who were very smart. Don’t believe the hype – there is no “best” cert.  All have their strong points. The key is to find a cert that:

• is affordable
• teaches you what you need for the real world
• is credible
• is relatively easy to maintain

The secret that few people know is that most people will ever ask you “who are you certified by?”. The only people who ask this question are other personal trainers and health club managers.

6.  How long should I study? It depends on where you are starting from? Somebody who is in college studying exercise science needs less prep time than somebody who just decided yesterday they want to be a personal trainer.

7. Any tips on taking the test? Yes, bring ear plugs. When you take the test, you’ll likely be in a room with other people. Their movements, noises etc. can distract you. Ear plugs can help you stay focused. Taking a practice test can help too by giving you an idea of what you may expect to know.

8. What should I study? Many people fail a certification test because they listened to their friends who said You need to study this or You don’t need to know that. Big Mistake. Study everything because there is no guarantee that you will take the same test your friend did. The more you know, the more successful you will be. Certifications are useless if they are not backed up by knowledge! Don’t study for a test. Study with the intention of being the best fitness professional you can be!

As you study, ask yourself

• “How can I use this in the real world?”

and

• “is it possible somebody might ask me this question?”