Online COaching FAQs
Bespoke Plans
FAQs
I absolutely do work with vegans, vegetarians and plant-based eaters, many of my clients fall into one of those categories. I’ll work with you based on your individual circumstances, including your dietary requirements.
The Onside PT app contains a messaging feature which is the best way to get hold of me for any questions that fall outside of your weekly feedback videos or our phone/video catch ups. You can also WhatsApp me or email me if you’d prefer!
There is no hard and fast rule as to what is best here! I have clients who train twice a week and clients who train seven days a week with the majority training three or four times a week. Ultimately, we need to strike the balance between getting you the results you want with the time you have available each week.
In your first week of training, I’d always encourage clients (especially beginners) to send me a video of themselves performing at least one set of each exercise I’ve assigned to them. That gives me the opportunity to double check that form is okay and provide any necessary feedback.
Alongside each exercise I add to your plan there are coaching notes along with a video demonstration of the proper form and technique.
Yes – some of my clients started as total beginners who had never step foot in the gym before. As I’ve already mentioned, I genuinely treat everyone as an individual – so your plan will be built with your experience levels in mind.
When you sign up, you’ll complete a relatively detailed questionnaire which will give me all of the information I need to be able to build you a plan which is optimal for you to get the results you want to achieve.
Firstly, aside from the qualifications listed below, I read through the latest studies and research to come out of the fitness industry on a regular basis whilst also taking in lots more info from evidence-based sources in the industry. There are some amazing people in the fitness industry who put out brilliant content (Renaissance Periodization, Jeff Nippard, Brad Schoenfeld, Ben Coomber, Greg Nuckols, Alan Aragon, Emma Storey-Gordon, etc – ask me for a full list if you’re interested!)
In terms of qualifications, I realised pretty soon after getting all of my PT certificates that most people don’t actually care about PT qualifications at all but if you are interested my qualifications are below along with what each allows me to do:
- Level 2 Gym Instructor – I’m able to safely take you through a gym-based session.
- Level 3 Personal Trainer– I’m a qualified PT and can give you a periodised training and nutrition plan.
- British Weight Lifting certification in coaching Strength and Power – I can coach clients in Olympic Lifts and give well-informed coaching on strength/power.
- Level 4 Nutrition Coach – I have completed the BTN Practical Academy, a year long course meaning I can coach clients on their food and nutrition intake, give informed calorie and macro-nutrient goals etc.
Aside from the above I am also working through a Level 4 Strength & Conditioning course which will further my knowledge of gym-based training and sport specific conditioning too.
It is worth mentioning at this point that whilst the qualifications I have are all evidence based and applicable to the clients I work with, qualifications are not the be all and end all for a coach. For me, coaching is really about working with people to get the best out of them from a health and fitness perspective.
Whilst there is clearly a foundation of knowledge needed to deliver brilliant plans, I put just as much emphasis on how I interact with people and how I tailor my recommendations to them as an individual. A combination of knowledge and genuinely client centric coaching gets the best results!
Fair question!
Obviously with in-person personal training you’d be working directly with a trainer in the gym – possibly a couple of times a week. However, that service might not come with a training and nutrition plan to undertake away from those sessions – meaning you’re potentially missing out on a lot of progress.
When you sign up for online personal training via Onside PT you’ll be given bespoke training and nutrition plans alongside ongoing support, guidance and accountability to keep you on track. I basically set everything up for you in the most optimal way and then stop you from falling off the wagon!
Usually within a few weeks clients will start to see results but it ultimately depends on your goals, adherence, effort levels etc. I will strive to help you to reach your goals as quickly as you possibly can – fast tracking body transformations is something which I can definitely help with.
As well as a focus on short-terms results, I also help clients to maintain their results in the long-term too. When it comes to fat loss for example – most people have lost a relatively significant amount of weight at some point during their life – where most struggle is when it comes to maintaining that weight loss over the long-term. So while getting results in the short-term in line with a client’s goals is definitely a focus for me, I also try to keep the longer-term in mind too with continual education being key to my service.
Firstly, it’s important to say that although there tend to be some common themes between my clients, I treat everyone as an individual. This means you’ll get a genuinely bespoke service which is specifically tailored to you.
My clients tend to be seeking one of the following goals:
– Fat loss
– Muscle growth
– An improvement in overall health
…or a combination of the above!
Without your specified consent, your progress photos will only be seen by me. If I was keen to show off your results and put your photos on OnsidePT.co.uk, I’d always check if you are happy for me to put your anonymised photos up first.
I have been told of trainers who put a clause in their Ts & Cs which allows them to share any photos which clients send through on their own platforms but that isn’t something I’d ever do.
Yes you can – some of my clients don’t want to go to the gym either because they have home-gym setups or because their local gym is filled with meatheads and they don’t enjoy that kind of environment. I’ll build a programme for you which is based on the equipment you have ready access to.
For my clients who don’t have any equipment but don’t want to join a gym, I’d recommend some basic kit such as some dumbbells, resistance bands and an adjustable bench.
Ideally yes but this isn’t absolutely essential. If you’re able to track what you eat each day via an app such as MyFitnessPal then this gives me a really key piece of data in your quest to get results.
If you don’t track your food intake then we’ll need to make some estimates about what you’re eating and how many calories/macronutrients you’re consuming. That essentially means that there’ll be a greater level of guesswork involved which could mean you take more time to get to your end results as we might need to make tweaks as we go.
Food tracking doesn’t have to be totally life consuming, if you can track your calorie intake accurately the majority of the time then that’ll be good enough for me. I’m not going to ask you to sit in a restaurant with your partner and ask the waiter what the macros are in the dish you’ve ordered.
It depends on the proposition you sign up for but I check in with each of my clients at least once a week! Equally, my clients can contact me with their questions, concerns, hopes/dreams at any point throughout the week too.
Depending on your goals, we can track your progress in a number of ways. As a starting point, I like all of my clients to take photos at the start and end of each training block along with some body measurements which allows us to accurately track body composition. Alongside that, we can also track scale weight (if relevant), habits, nutritional adherence and also (crucially) training performance.
Tracking performance means monitoring things like the weight you’re lifting in the gym to see if you’re getting stronger over time or recording your cardio times to make sure your endurance/speed is improving. In summary, we’ll agree on the metrics which are important and track them closely to ensure you’re making progress in the areas which matter to you.
The first step would typically be for you to book in a consultation with me over the phone or via video call. In your consultation, I’ll essentially try to learn about you, your goals and objectives, what you want from a trainer etc. and we can see whether there is a good fit on both sides.
If you want to book in a consultation, either send an email to james@onsidept.co.uk or a message on the contact page.
ASAFP (as soon as feasibly possible). Likely within a couple of days of having your consultation and receiving all of the relevant information from you which I need to build you a genuinely bespoke plan.
A buzzword in the fitness industry seems to be “bespoke” – most online trainers position their services as being bespoke for the client but is that always the case in reality? I’d say it massively depends on the trainer!
I recognise that each client has their own unique set of circumstances which I’d consider before firing a plan at them. The list below gives some examples of the type of things I would consider when building a training plan for a client:
- Training age / experience
- Time to dedicate to training
- Priority muscles / muscle groups
- Exercise / training split preferences
- Previous injuries
- Caloric / macronutrient intake
The above isn’t close to being an exhaustive list by any means but gives you an idea as to some of the considerations I consider when building a custom plan for my clients. A plan from Onside PT is a genuinely bespoke plan which enables the client to reach their goals based on their individual situation.
If you follow my advice with total consistency, allow a decent amount of time and you don’t get the results you’re looking for then I’ll refund every penny you’ve paid!
Why would I want to be on social media?!
In all seriousness, each to their own and all that but I don’t enjoy social media and based on my experience, I don’t think it’s a great place for clients to spend a lot of their time. On average, people in Europe and the UK spend 1 hour and 48 minutes PER DAY on social media – to me that is absolutely mad and I don’t want to contribute to people being on those platforms even more!
You won’t receive a meal plan prescribing exactly what food to eat each day.
What I will give you is a completely personalised nutritional recommendation in terms of the number of calories you should aim to eat each day along with the amounts of protein, carbs and fat which should make up those calories. I’ll also give you initial feedback on your current diet, and advise you on what kind of foods you should be aiming to eat and which kind of foods you should look to avoid (the majority of the time).
We can also be more detailed and look at factors such as nutrient timings along with what and when to eat around training in order to increase performance and aid recovery.
I’ll also let you know which supplements I’d recommend for you based on your individual circumstances and goals. Supplements are unfortunately not a “quick fix” but there are some out there which are backed up by research and I do recommend to my clients!