Become a Personal Trainer
Planning A Safe Session On The Level 3 Course Means Five Short Lists, And Each One Is Easier Than It Sounds
From the FASTER syllabus: this article is taught in full in The honest route from scratch to qualified →
In short: Criterion D/617/8592 5.3 on the Level 2/3 personal training course asks a learner to plan how to minimise any risks relevant to the programme. The course text breaks it into five short lists: pre-workout checks (client readiness, venue, equipment), a warm-up (a cardiovascular machine and whole-body mobility exercises), a progression, regression or alternative for every exercise, and a cool down (a cardiovascular machine and static stretching). The last step is the one that makes it a plan: adaptations for each exercise, so the session can change with the client's state on the day. It is a worksheet a new trainer fills in, and every line of it is something they will use in a real session.
The worksheet that sits between the course and the first paying client
Somebody about to leave a job to become a personal trainer tends to worry about the written side, and about being asked to produce something they have never seen before. Criterion 5.3 is one of the moments people picture. Its title reads "Plan how to minimise any risks relevant to the programme", which sounds like a legal document.
On the page it is a list of five short lists.
One of the things you learn on our CIMSPA-recognised personal training course is how to build a session that holds up when the client turns up tired, late or having had no sleep. The course text for it is plain. Once you have the exercises for the main programme, the next step is to make sure they are safe and the workout carries as few risks as possible.
The five lists, in the course's own words
The worksheet asks you to build:
- Pre-workout checks. Client readiness, the venue, the equipment.
- Warm-up. A cardiovascular machine, then whole-body mobility exercises.
- A progression, regression or alternative for each exercise.
- Cool down. A cardiovascular machine, then static stretching.
- Adaptations and alternatives for each exercise, which is what shows you are planning for changes based on your client's state on the day of training them.
Four of those are lists a person could write on the back of an envelope. The fifth is the idea underneath all of them: the plan expects the client to be a different person on Tuesday than they were on Friday.
Why it is easier than it sounds
Each list is short, and each one is a habit rather than a theory. Checking the venue means looking at the room before the client arrives. Checking the equipment means looking at the kit. Client readiness means asking how they are today and listening to the answer. A warm-up with a machine and some mobility is something most people have done in a gym already.
The alternative for each exercise is the part that feels new, and it is the part that makes the plan useful. If the main exercise is a split squat and the client arrives with a tired day behind them, the plan already holds a version that suits it. Nothing about the session has to be invented in the room.
How FASTER teaches it
FASTER courses are visual and interactive. You can read a lesson, listen to it, write your answers or dictate them, so a person who left school glad to leave can still finish and pass. The worksheet is a place to put things in order, and nobody is waiting for an essay.
PT Manager opens the moment you sign up with FASTER, and adding real clients unlocks when you pass a course. It is free, and nobody takes a cut of your sessions. Today's third post shows the part of it that puts a preparation first and a cool down last, which is this same worksheet turned into a screen. Core & Pelvic Floor is where the day's second post comes from, and it looks at how the spine moves.
Where to go next
The honest route from scratch to qualified sets out each step in order, and the Level 3 Personal Trainer course shows where this worksheet sits.
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Also worth a look: Level 3 Personal Trainer, where the programme worksheet lives.
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Frequently asked
What does criterion 5.3 ask for?
To plan how to minimise any risks relevant to the programme. In the course it is a section of the programme worksheet with a fixed set of lists to build.
Do I need to have worked with a real client to complete it?
No. The worksheet asks for a plan, built after the main list of exercises is chosen. The plan is the skill, and you practise it on paper before a client is involved.
Is the warm-up the same for every client?
The course asks for adaptations and alternatives for each exercise so the plan can change with the client's state on the day, so the structure stays and the contents move.
Where does PT Manager come in?
PT Manager's programme builder lets a trainer place a preparation before the main work and a cool down after it, and shows the order the client will see.
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