Topic 1: Sports and Fitness

Local Organisations provide Fitness Facilities
People exercise at local fitness facilities, like leisure clubs and football clubs. Some of these facilities are provided by local authorities (paid for by taxes) but others are privately run (paid for by the members).
Leisure clubs provide:
Fitness Equipment (e.g. weights and cardiovascular machines)
Personal Trainers (e.g. devise a fitness plan to follow and help motivate them)
Fitness Classes (e.g. aerobics or yoga provide different ways of working out)
Football clubs provide:
Training sessions (players practise their football skills)
Coaches (work with a team of players to help them play better)
Matches (players complete in teams to win games)
Having fitness facilities nearby means people may be more likely to exercise regularly, which has lots of health benefits (e.g. losing weight, lowering blood pressure, getting rid of stress). Regular exercise can also be important in rehabilitation after illness or injury (e.g. patient who are recovering from surgery). Leisure and sports clubs also provide jobs and social events for local people.

Coaches and Personal Trainers
A coach generally works with a group of people to make them better at a specific sport or skill. A personal trainer usually works with an individual to improve their fitness. The types of scientific and technical skills that coaches and personal trainers need to do their jobs are similar, for example:
They must be able to carry out basic test to assess a person’s fitness
They must understand how the human body works
They must be able to develop and modify a fitness programme
They must be able to monitor a person’s fitness.
They must understand health and safety.
Personal Trainers
Coaches
Leadership skills
Supporter
Determination
Demonstrator
Enthusiasm
Enthusiastic
Patient
Advisor
Motivated
Assessor
Inspiring
Mentor
Organisation skills
Instructor
Knowledge of anatomy
Facilitator
Knowledge of physiology
Personal skills
Knowledge of nutrition
Organiser
CPR Qualifications
Leadership skills
NVQ level 2 gym Qualification
Certificates from their skills

A personal trainer is a fitness professional who teaches people how to exercise correctly, lose weight, develop physical strength and adopt a healthier lifestyle. They work with their clients to help them reach their personal goals, by developing nutritional guides and individuals exercise programmes. An exercise programme might include aerobic fitness exercise such as jogging or swimming, muscle- building exercise using weights and flexibility training.
By law, coaches and personal trainers must follow regulation (rules) to help keep themselves and the people they work with safe and well. These health and safety regulations affect their day to day job, for examples:
They must check that any fitness equipment is safe to use, to prevent injuries.
They must be able to show clients how to carry out exercises correctly, to prevent injuries.
They might need a first aid qualification to be able to treat any injuries that occur.

Monitoring and Improving Performance
Coaches and personal trainers make up fitness programmes to improve a person’s fitness and performance. They need to monitor clients on their fitness programmes for a variety of reasons (e.g. to check they’re making progress, to modify (change) the plan if necessary and to provide encouragement).
Fitness Programmes improve General fitness:
A personal trainer may make up a fitness programme to improve a person’s general fitness.
To do this they may include muscle- building exercises and aerobic exercises in the programme.
You need to know examples of these exercises, such as:
Muscle- Building exercise – Lifting up weight for about 8-12 repetitions (times) to build up the muscles in the arms.
Aerobic exercise – Running for 20m minutes with your heart rate increased