Personal Training with Scott

I have regularly exercised since my teenage years and started going to the gym in my late teens when I was at college. After college I met a girl and drifted away from the gym and more towards eating out, take-aways etc. The whole couple comfort zone thing. After 9 years we broke up and I saw this as the kick in the pants to sort my life out. I started working out again, playing football and making better nutrition choices. Sometime later I got married and had 2 kids. I was a stay at home dad for 6 and a half years when the kids were younger. This kept me active and pushing the pram around, walking to the park etc. definitely helped me with the cardio aspect of things. When the kids both started school I needed to find work and, as I had enjoyed playgroups with my children I decided to qualify as a teacher assistant. However, juggling work, family time, and studying proved quite tricky so I can relate to 99.9% of parents who have problems fitting in fitness time and so I put fitness on the back burner for about a year maybe 18 months. I was stuck in a routine that had grinded me down and I had put on a considerable amount of weight. Then in 2014 I had a life changing moment. When visiting my parents one day my Father said to me "Jesus look at the size of you! Why don't you do something about it you fat greedy pig?" Very blunt but he could be like that, especially when he drank.. 2 days later he died and they were his last words to me.
I took my grief, pain and anger and channelled it towards becoming a healthier, better version of me. I was determined to prove him wrong even if he was no longer with us. I was determined that I would not drink myself to an early grave like he had. I wanted to be a role model for my children. A hero even.
I started working out 5-6 days a week, with resistance training and a bunch of cardio. I read numerous magazines, books (including Joe's) and internet articles about fitness and weight training. Initially I saw quite a bit of change but after a few months my progress had stalled. I was eating loads of protein and working out but I wasn't seeing any progress. So I enrolled with an online personal trainer who showed me and taught me that I wasn't training effectively. I was overtraining and overeating and not resting enough. Although I was eating healthily he showed me the importance of macros, and calorie surplus/deficit. Almost overnight (but not quite) it all clicked into place - I had more energy, I was working out less but with more focus, I was calculating my macros and eating well. Naturally, the gains really hit and lost about 3 stone in around 6 months and I felt (and looked) amazing. This was fantastic. It was like finding the elixir of youth. Now, if only I could share this feeling and help others to feel like this.
I have always offered advice on fitness and health to friends and people but it just wasn't enough so I decided to enrol and become a qualified personal trainer. Too often I had seen people unhappy with themselves, quitting "diets", beating themselves up over nutrition mistakes. I needed to help these people and show them that there is a way forward. A way to feel great, to eat well and to have a feeling of confidence that cannot be put into words. Helping people to help themselves is magical. When a client achieves a goal that they had set a few weeks/months previously is a wonderful moment (e.g. losing excess weight, improving their bench press or sprint time) and that’s the payday for me. Like a proud dad feeling. My mantra is that personal training is not about lifting weights, it’s about lifting people.
So I enrolled on a few courses with Premier Global and obtained my level 2 Gym Instructor qualification, my level 3 Personal Trainer qualification and my Fitness Nutrition Specialist qualification. I find the workings of the human body really interesting and it is fascinating how processes work and how the body functions. I now have the qualifications to match my 20+ years of exercise and gym experience and my 40+ years of life experience and I am in a great position to help people feel good about themselves and to make some positive changes in a world that can too often be full of negativity.