Having your very own personal trainer has several great advantages:

Trainers provide motivation, professional expertise, and personalized attention – all key components of reaching your personal health and fitness goals. All Fitcorp Asia personal trainers are certified by an accredited professional organization (ACSM, ACE, etc.) and tertiary educated with a degree in Exercise Science. However, personal trainers vary greatly, not only in educational background and costs, but also in personal philosophy, training and consulting practices.

Before simply hiring the first personal trainer you come across, shop around and meet with them to learn about their personal philosophy, education/credentials, experience, and rates. This way you’ll know if the personal trainer is qualified and likely to meet your personal needs before you spend your hard earned money. Once you’ve narrowed down the list, you should talk with the trainer, make sure your goals and objectives are very clear, and see if the trainer is best-suited to help you. Call or meet with the trainer and ask the following questions:

1. Why did you become a personal trainer? Personal trainers should not only have a passion for good health and fitness, they should also love to share their expertise and help others reach their personal goals.
2. Do you keep current with research? The answer must be yes! Personal trainers need to continually update their knowledge through seminars, workshops, books, etc., in order to provide you with safe and effective information.
3. Can you supply client references? Good trainers have satisfied customers and won’t hesitate to put you in touch. Give two or three of the clients a call, asking about the trainer’s strengths and weaknesses, and if they were professional, informative, and dependable. Also ask them if the trainer explained the reasoning behind their recommendations and program decisions.
4. Do you have liability insurance? Personal trainers should protect their clients by insuring themselves and their services against personal injury and property loss.
5. Are you certified in CPR and first aid? The trainer must know the proper procedures to follow in emergency situations.
6. Are you available on the days and times I’ve selected? The whole point of having a personal trainer is to get the personal instruction and motivation you need, at times that are convenient for you.
7. What are your fees? The answer to this question varies greatly. Personal training can cost as little as 500 Baht, or as much as 4000 Baht per hour. The personal trainer should not only be qualified, he/she should also fit comfortably within your budget. Be sure to ask if there are any additional fees and if the rate includes the use of a local health club.
8. What are your training/business policies? It’s a good idea to find out up-front their policy on extra fees, contracts, cancellations, and billing procedures.

After speaking with the personal trainer, ask yourself the following questions:

1. Did the trainer ask me questions about myself and my lifestyle?
2. Does the trainer promote an integrated program that includes all five components of optimal health (strength training, weight management, cardiovascular exercise, nutrition, and flexibility training)?
3. Did the trainer have good listening skills and communicate well?
4. Am I comfortable with the trainer’s gender and will I get along with this trainer and look forward to working with him/her??

Fitcorp Asia is the premium provider of personal training services in Thailand. Please contact us for further information. info@fitcorpasia.com

Exercise can be a time-consuming affair for people who lead busy lives. Successful business executives and managers exercise regularly.

Time equals money! However, time also equals health! It is no use having all the riches in the world if poor health won’t allow us to enjoy it.

Health is a priceless commodity. No matter how much money we spend on state-of-the-art fitness equipment, expensive nutritional supplements or trendy health club memberships, our personal fitness will always be a long-term investment that requires a minimum amount of time and effort.

Get Serious
Make a commitment
Take responsibility
Make it your Lifestyle

Set Goals
Your road map to success
New investment project or product range without a business plan
Set short, intermediate and long-term goals
Set goals that are attainable.

Get Organised
Schedule a daily appointment with yourself
Make notes in your diary a week in advance
Ask your assistant to remind you take a ‘fitness break’
Home exercise equipment in a corner of your office or at home
Avoid going home before you go to the gym
Get in the habit of packing your workout gear the night before

Surprise Yourself
Forget the rigid workout schedules
Do whatever you can whenever you can
Short bits of exercise are as effective as long workouts

Don’t Give Up
Make up for it tomorrow
Fitness is not an all-or-nothing affair!

Have Some Fun
Bring some fun into your workouts
Train with a friend
Try Boot Camp
Create Corporate activities related to Health and Fitness – Everyone will benefit!
Train with Fitcorp Asia!!!

Fitcorp Asia specializes in Executive Fitness Programming to ensure you achieve more in less time, make your training habitual, part of your lifestyle and guarantees results.

Contact us to see how you can… “Improve your People, Productivity & Performance

Yours in Health,

Daniel Remon
Managing Director/Founder – Fitcorp Asia Co., Ltd.
www.fitcorpasia.com www.personaltrainingbangkok.com

Exercise anywhere, anytime is the message of Fitcorp Asia. Exercise does not
need to be complicated, nor does it require expensive equipment. You have
all the tools to effective get fit and lose fat with you right now, as you are
reading this article.

With the right instructions and the right amount of motivation the following
exercises are fun, effective and guaranteed to get you in better shape in no
time. The following series of exercises will target the entire body, and
designed to maximise heart rate, boost your metabolism, get you strong,
lean and fighting fit!

Choose your desired location to exercise whether it be your home, the office,
the gym, the park, the Laundromat, at school, by the pool, at the beach, at
the airport! The options are endless! I’ve even seen people exercise at the
car park of a local shopping centre!

Exercising at home is often the last place you think about when it comes to
losing weight, staying fit and just generally maintaining an active lifestyle. In
reality, the home has to be one of the most effective and convenient
locations to exercise. Gone are the days of the Jane Fonda workout videos.
The leotards and leg warmers have vanished and all that hair!

When preparing to work out, the same safety principles apply to your
exercise. Warm up and stretch before engaging in any higher intensity
strength exercises. Warming up will increase your body temperature,
activate your muscles, increase blood circulation to the working areas and
divert from your internal organs, and gradually increase the range of motion
of your joints.

Without a treadmill, bike or elliptical there are many ways to warm up
sufficiently. We will go through a couple of options in this issue.

Now we can make this so simple. 15-20 minutes is all it takes to start
building your solid foundation of strength.

Mountain Climbers

Start on your hands and knees, with your arms parallel to the ground. Raise
your bottom in the air, taking your knees off the ground and bring one knee
into your chest and place on the ground. With a little spring from your feet
push your bottom in the air and swap feet positions, land softly and repeat.

Once comfortable with this movement, continuously switch forwards and
backwards, forwards and backwards.

Shoulder Matrix

This series of arm circles will burn like never before, strengthening your
rotator cuff and shoulder muscles. Stand up straight, arm out to the side,
slightly forward. With palms facing down, thumbs straight and strong, make
20 small forward circles, 20 small backward circles. Now thumbs up, make
20 small forward circles, 20 small backward circles. Change to thumbs down
and make 20 small forward circles, 20 small backward circles. With the left
arm, 20 big arm circles forward and 20 backward. Repeat with the right arm.

Squat Press onto Toes

Place elbows and closed fists together, feet shoulder width apart and toes
pointing slightly outwards. Pretend to squat down to sit on a chair, shifting
your body weight towards your bottom, keep your body weight through your
heels, drive upwards simultaneously raising your hands above your head.
Repeat.

3 Point Modified Push up

Get on all fours, with arms straight. Take one leg off the floor, and extend
contracting your glutes. Keep your abs strong, slowly bend your elbows, and
descend towards the floor, aiming to place your chin between your finger
nails. Push up strong, keep elbows soft.

Lunge and Row

Kneel on one knee, making sure your front knee stays behind your toes
through the entire movement. Slowly descend, never allowing your knee to
touch the floor, keep body weight through your front heel, drive up, while at
the same time pulling your arms backwards and squeezing your shoulder
blades together, hold and repeat. After 15 repetitions, switch legs and repeat
a further 15 times.

Body Weight Tricep Dips

Sit on the floor with knees at 90 degrees, arms placed behind your bottom
and fingers pointing towards your heels. Keep your body weight over your
wrists, bend your elbows and slowly descend, push up strong without locking
your elbows. Keep your elbows soft at all times.

Reverse Lunge Rotation

Standing up straight, feet together, and arms straight in front of you with
fingers interlocked. Take one step behind you with your left leg and perform
a lunge, swing both arms (maintain a position parallel to the ground) around
to the same side as your front leg, return to the starting position and repeat
with the right leg.

Straight Arm Push Ups

Place all fours on the ground, with a neutral spine, core tight. Keep your
elbows locked straight and squeeze your shoulder blades together. Hold the
contraction, and push your upper back in the air, separating your shoulder
blades. Repeat both phases of the movement 10-15 times each.

Alternate Superwoman’s

Lying face down on the floor, extend both legs out and both arms in front of
you. Raise your right arm and left leg at the same while also lifting your head
to the same level of both limbs. Hold and return to the start position and
repeat on the opposite side. Repeat both side 10 times each.

V Crunch

Lie on your back with arms and legs extended. Lift both arms and legs while
performing a crunch movement till your toes and fingers meet at the top
above you. Hold and contract your abs, returning to the start position.

That’s it! You are ready to go. The above exercises offer such an abundance
of variety to keep your body stimulated and guessing for months.

Your greatest asset to working out alone and without equipment is
motivation and confidence in your ability to perform the exercises safely and
effectively.

The key to any exercise program, regardless of goals, objectives and
equipment is ICV – Intensity, Consistency and Variety. The combination of
these three parameters alone will determine your successes.

Intensity – refers to how much effort you put into your training. The best
way to monitor your exercise intensity is my measuring your heart rate. Take
2 fingers and place them on the side of your neck. Count the number of
‘pulses’ in 15 seconds a multiply by 4. This will give your beats per minute or
BPM.

Consistency – refers to your frequency of exercise. You should be making
exercise a part of your ‘daily’ life. Yes that’s right, daily! Whether it is going
to the gym, playing tennis, golf, trekking or yoga – whatever it may be.

Variety – this is essential. Constantly varying the stimulus of exercise
ensures your body constantly changes, adapts and progresses. I like to sue
the analogy of reading a book. If you read the same book over and over
again, you are not going to learn anything new, are you?

Try these at home and get moving towards your best body ever!

Fitcorp Asia is also the only organisation in Thailand to offer Online Fitness
Training. At a fraction of the cost of one-on-one personal training, OFT allows
anyone with internet access can now have access to personalized exercise
programming and support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. We will discuss
this in more details in future articles or log onto www.fitcorpasia.com to learn
more on how Fitcorp Asia is innovating the personal fitness industry.