Posted on May 02, 2018 by Emily Forbes

Val was one of my first personal training clients after starting at motive8 back in September. I think she may have had some apprehensions initially with me being a new personal trainer. But I too felt some pressure to do a good job and not let her down. Luckily, we built a great relationship and with Val’s hard work, she smashed her goals. Val followed our Do-It-In-12 package; this is her success story.

personal training

Val’s Story…..

What were your main goals/motivations to start Do It In 12?

I started Do It in 12 mainly because I wanted to kick start a good exercise regime again. But mostly because I got engaged and wanted to be in better shape for the dress shopping! I have always been a very active person, I used to row for Leeds Rowing club at Senior level and we trained in the gym and on the water 7 times a week. After I stopped rowing I found it hard to motivate myself to go to the gym without a goal, and I knew having a personal trainer to help and motivate me was the best thing for me.

I had done some personal training at Motive8 once before during my rowing training to get stronger and it definitely worked. I knew weight-loss was a little harder to achieve through personal training, because it also relied on my willpower to eat healthy and put effort into meal planning, food shop, etc, so Do It in 12 made sense as a programme to guarantee results.

What was your biggest achievement?

The weight loss itself, I lost 10kg overall from start to finish, which I never thought was possible. Since being a teenager, the lowest weight I ever managed to hit was 64kg, and I am now just below 60kg again!

What was your biggest challenge?

The biggest challenge was finding the right recipes to fit in the calorie counting on Myfitnesspal. I had been using a recipe book by a famous fitness “expert”. I thought the recipes were good for weight-loss, but soon realised they were very high in calories! After the initial shock, Emily helped me think of ideas for recipes to have or where to find them. I had to do a little bit of research online but I definitely managed to find tasty and filling meals. Emily suggested a calorie range of 1200-1400 to achieve a greater amount of weight loss in a shorter time period. Those low calories were also very challenging at the start, but probably by week 4-5 I didn’t feel it as much.

How did you find the training programme?

I loved the training programme. It was varied in terms of exercise types. Emily would push me at the right times, checking if I felt like trying a heavier weight every session. I definitely finished the session feeling like I had accomplished my task for the day (in a sweat!).
What is the difference having a personal trainer?
For me the main benefit of having a personal trainer is the motivation of simply “getting out of bed”, because you know someone is doing the same for you, getting up early, putting effort into drafting those training plans, and waiting for you at the gym. Seems simple, but it’s effective! I would never let my personal trainer down just because “I don’t feel like it”, or “I am having a bad day”. But besides that, obviously the person helping you has got a wealth of experience, they motivate you during the session by making you work a little harder every time (something you might not do yourself), and I feel like I get more out of a PT session from the fact that all the exercises are set up for you, so you can go straight from one set to the next and work harder.
A wonderful success from Val. Proof that with hard work it can be done. Val was a star client to train to be fair and I look forward to training with her again in the future (we’ll buff her up again before her wedding next year).
Find more information on Do-It-In-12 here.