Let’s get straight down to brass tacks here. No messing. Your clients don’t like doing mobility work. There, I said it. Now before you start thinking that your clients are different and that they absolutely love it…they don’t… even if they know that it’ll help with their low-level aches and pains.
Yes, they will tolerate it – but given the choice between regular fitness training and mobility training, mobility will never win. Let’s face it, some clients won’t even do it on their rest day – when they’re not even doing any other type of training!
So why do they hate it? Well, a few reasons really:
- It’s time consuming – whether they have to do it before training, after training, at home by themselves or even all three, it’s EXTRA time they have to find in their day or week and even a few minutes here or there can add up
- It doesn’t seem relevant – the idea that resting, stretching, doing an entirely different type of fitness (like yoga), or even doing tiny movements can be helpful to their performance somehow seems counter-intuitive and therefore just a bit odd. They don’t believe that something so effortless can be much help at all
- It seems a bit wishy-washy – The industry has become so focused on EXTERNAL stimuli (data, previous performances, equipment, etc) that anything INTERNALLY focused (how the body feels) can be seen as inferior
- They’re frightened of doing more harm than good – One of the most common questions we hear as trainers is “Am I doing it right?”. If there’s any doubt at all, your clients would rather do nothing than risk doing it wrong or causing themselves more harm
- There’s too much to remember – One of the down sides of most mobility methods is that there’s a lot of teaching points to remember… and if it feels like too much information, many clients simply won’t do any of it.
And of course, if you’re using methods like stretching, they’ll complain that they don’t feel like they’re getting anywhere even when they’ve spent ages doing it.
So, with all this stacked against you, it’s no wonder that mobility training is always the FIRST thing to get dropped from a busy schedule – because our clients simply don’t WANT to do it. But you and I both know how important it is, so, what can we do about it?
One option is to just insist that they do it the way we know…and many trainers will do that, but that instantly makes your clients feel like you’re putting obstacles in their way, which is NOT good for your client/trainer relationship, engagement or retention.
Let’s be realistic here. You wouldn’t just insist that they did push-ups in every training session if they didn’t like them would you? It’s not your clients’ fault if you don’t know of any other way to give them what they need, so don’t punish them!
The other option is to explore different ways of getting the results you’re looking for that are quick, relevant, and most importantly of all… EFFECTIVE!
As a trainer, it’s your job to do all the background work, dismissing the bad stuff, keeping the good stuff, so that your clients can just focus on their training.
That’s why I created the “Back Pain Buster! Success Map & Training Bundle for Introverted Personal Trainers”, so you can do more to help them with their low-level aches and pains, while they simply focus on their training – no injury knowledge required!
Grab your FREE copy here: https://kickasspt.com/backmap