What Our Newest Coach Learned as an Intern at TrainSMART

Hi, I'm Matt and I'm a fourth year exercise science student at UB and I'm currently finishing my internship at TrainSMART. Here are my five biggest takeaways from this semester as well as three reasons why you should choose TrainSMART to complete your internship. My first takeaway is that fitness is not a one size fits all approach. Your patients and clients throughout the course of your career will have different needs, different injury history, different goals. So you'll need to be able to progress and regress certain exercises based on their abilities, and be able to choose the best exercise that works for them. My second takeaway is building a strong relationship with your patients and clients, whether it's in personal training or physical therapy, being able to build a strong relationships with the individuals that you work with will be very valuable asset will build trust, and it will improve their satisfaction, as well as yours. My third takeaway is to always be open to new ideas, whether it's learning a new exercise, learning a new different training methodology, or learning a new way to rehab, a different exercise that will keep you flexible and will make you a great practitioner. My fourth biggest takeaway is to be a hungry learner. Whether it's attending a workshop or a summit, or reading articles and watching videos, there's always potential to learn new things and grow as a professional. My fifth biggest takeaway is to not just talk the talk, but to walk the walk. Show your patients and clients that you can demonstrate the exercises. And not just that, but you also do them in your own training, and that you also live a healthy lifestyle that they want to achieve. The first reason you should choose to do your internship at TrainSMART is hands on experience. Throughout the semester, you'll get the opportunity to coach clients day in and day out. My second reason why you should choose to do your internship at TrainSMART is continued learning. Throughout the semester, we've had various guest speakers, workshops, videos and readings, Q&As, and many opportunities to learn new things that you may not learn elsewhere. My third reason why you should choose to TrainSMART to do your internship is because we have great coaches and clients here. The coaches at TrainSMART have helped all of us develop coaching skills, taught us all of the exercises that we need to know and give us tips on how to be a great professional in this industry. The clients here are very open to allowing you to train them, are very friendly, and great people to work with.