Please help me out...is she trying to rip me off??

I lost 1.1lb of fat over the past 7-8 days without losing any muscle (I had my body fat checked today)...my body fat went from 30% to 29.4% in a week. I was ecstatic...until a trainer at my gym told me that my progress is considered 'slow' compared to other gym-goers. I was suprised because being at a normal weight (I'm 135 pounds and 5'5), a 1.1 pound fat loss in a week is pretty damn good for me! Is she trying to get me to hire her as a personal trainer? She keeps telling me that the exercises I'm doing are 'not intense/good enough'  (the resistance training part) and I should be doing more. What do you think? Is it even possible for me to lose anymore than a pound of fat in a week without losing any muscle? Or should I just ignore her? Or sould I hire her...she said she wants to put me on a circuit training program...I'm confused....

she wants money... that's what trainers do... don't be fooled... those are pretty impressive results considering your stats.

yep ^^

Get the new rules of lifting book for $15 on amazon and train yourself and tell that person to take a hike. 

You could also do some research on circuit training.  I know some folks love it but if its mostly using machines instead of free weights don't go there. 

Keep up the great work and don't waste your money on a personal trainer.

I would not trust them.

I have a very thin friend who has always taken really good care of herself and works out consistantly and eats very well.  She recently moved and started up with a new gym that gives you a "free fitness evaluation" and they told her her body fat % put her in the overweight range, ***no need to worry, hire us as a personal trainer and we'll get you in shap***

This girl is like 5'9, wears a size 2 and is toned. 

PS- 1 lb in a week at 135 is great progress!

trainers are def in it to make money.. but at the same time 1lb in 8 days is not the max possible.  You could healthily lose 2-3 lbs per week.  Chances are if you just started a program you still have a lot to learn so, either take advantage of a trainer or do some research on your own if you want to be as efficient as possible with your workouts.  

There's good and bad personal trainers, and then there's the trainers at the big commercial gyms who have been given sales training and scripts to work from designed by used car salespeople.

 The sales script doesn't care what your actual stats or progress is, it's designed to produce the maximum number of sales for the person using it and statistically telling people that they're fat, not doing it right, and need help will produce more sales than telling them that they're mostly doing it right but could use a litte extra oomph in your workouts. You wouldn't wanna risk killing a sale by meeting a fairly self-motivated person who just listens and then goes off to push him/herself harder, yeh?

 Circuit training is a tool that fits some situations, but it tends to be overused and devolve into CrossFit where they give elite athletes and 80-year old cardiac patients the same workout with no regard to individualization, performance needs , current trainee skill or injury history.

 Compounding the problem can be the big box gyms where the trainers aren't employees, they're independent contractors - if they want to eat this month, they'll do their best to hard sell you. I find that kinda abusive but there you go - if you want to work at 24hour Fitness, they'll pay you minimum wage for the time you spend on the gym floor, plus a percentage of the fees made for every hour of personal training sold. You think trainers there are motivated to sell you on packages you don't need, in order to make more than they'd make flipping burgers at MacDonalds?

Sorry, morgan, but I disagree that a person at a healthy weight can lose 2-3 pounds of fat per week.

desert_rose, sounds to me like you are doing fine, keep it up! One thing to keep in mind is never assume anyone is looking out for your best interest, unless it is in their best interest. Of course, except (ideally) friends, family, SO and such.

she's not necessarily trying to rip you off.  she's trying to convince you that you need what she's selling.  that's what salespeople do.

Well I just wanted to say congrats on the 1.1 Ibs! I'm also 5'5 and 132 pounds and I know how hard it is to lose weight at this stage.

Personal Trainers can be good to show you new ways of training, and certainly to push you beyond what you think possible.....BUT, I think this one is definitely trying to manipulate you.

Your weight loss is great, if you hit a plateau, maybe do some research and find some new moves/exercises to incorporate.

Just a quick question, seems we're nearly the same stats, how many cals are you eating to lose? Just thinking I need to up mine seems my weight will not budge.

Good luck,

nealy123

As a personal trainer myself we are not all in it for the money! Yes, a lot are. I am a part time trainer as well as full time student and it is nice to have a part time job that I enjoy and get to work with people to help motivate them!

Yeah they taught me all those sales pitches but I think I have only sold one package, it's not my thing. I know I hate being pushed to buy so I don't push a sale. All my clients are from our sales guys and I don't pitch my clients renew their training packages once they see I'm worth their money. If someone doesn't renew, I ask if it's because of my training so I can learn to be a better trainer but most of the time it's the money because our club's rate isn't the cheapest and I understand and never push it.

So don't stereotype pleaseeee! I love to workout and I love people and this job is helping pay for my books, I work hard and do my best to help!

Thanks for your input everyone, I totally appreciate it, and thanks again Melkor, you've helped me out more than you realize because I've been posting on this forum for quite a while now and it's a joy to be getting your well written and super-informative replies...I've read up on tons of online articles on fat loss, resistance training, different work outs etc, and I use Veuto's 'BFFM' as my guide, so I know what to do (I just need guidance on my form and stuff like that), and I know that I should start changing my routine when I start to plateau...and yeah, it's been really difficult for me to get below 130lb...I'm at 133lb (not 135 :p typo...that was my weight 2 weeks ago) now...I'm not ready to start high intensity cardio since I'm doing well enough now (losing 1 pound of fat a week) with the kind of exercise I'm doing...I do plan on slowly upping my intensity over the next few weeks, this way my body won't adapt to the exercises too quickly (as a trainer she should know this, instead of pushing me to do more and go faster?). I tried doing a circuit taining workout and it's pretty damn tiring!!! (in a good way), but I'll save that for later...like for when I start to plateau...there really is no point in making myself do extra work when I'm doing fine with my current program.

Original Post by nealy123:

Well I just wanted to say congrats on the 1.1 Ibs! I'm also 5'5 and 132 pounds and I know how hard it is to lose weight at this stage.

Personal Trainers can be good to show you new ways of training, and certainly to push you beyond what you think possible.....BUT, I think this one is definitely trying to manipulate you.

Your weight loss is great, if you hit a plateau, maybe do some research and find some new moves/exercises to incorporate.

Just a quick question, seems we're nearly the same stats, how many cals are you eating to lose? Just thinking I need to up mine seems my weight will not budge.

Good luck,

nealy123

 

Thanks, and yeah it's been really tough for me the past few weeks and I'm only starting to see results recently...here's what my calorie intake looks like:

Weight training days (3 days a week): 1500kcal

Cardio only days (3 days a week): 1400kcal

Rest day (1 day a week): 1300kcal

Around 30-35% of my daily calories come from protein (chicken breast, tuna, non-fat milk, eggs)....maybe you can try upping your protein?

I also have to add that a couple weeks ago I was eating around 1600-1700kcal per day and was seeing no results., so I lowered my calories a little but kept the protein grams the same..I was actually told that 1300-1500kcal is too little for me, but according to my results, it's just fine...you can experiment around...