Guest Author, Tim Henriques, Owner and Head Instructor of NPTI Virginia
The National Personal Training Institute (NPTI) first opened its doors to students in 2001, and I was excited to be a part of the teaching staff at that time. The idea seemed pretty simple: Let’s actually have a school for personal trainers instead of having them learn everything through self-study which is then assessed by one simple written test. But at the time it was a radical idea, nothing like it had been done before. Who knew if it would work or not? Luckily 13 years later what started with 4 schools and 50 students is now closing in on 40 schools and graduating thousands of students each year.
About a year or two after I began teaching the program, I started to get the same request repeatedly from students. It usually went something like this: “This material is so cool, I love to learn about the body and how it works, you should write a book based on this stuff” or “I love your lectures, I never liked regular school but I love this school, you should put all of your lectures in writing”. Those ideas stuck with me.
I had always aspired to be a writer and it did seem like there was a need for a certain type of book. There were a lot of self-help style fitness books but they were pretty simple and basic and usually left the reader wanting for more. Then there were the textbooks. They were full of good information but it was often hidden amongst the not so useful information and written in such a way that they didn’t draw the reader in. I felt like NPTI had selected good textbooks to use with its students but the bottom line was a good portion of the students weren’t reading the books and no matter what a book says, if it doesn’t get read it isn’t of any value to anyone.
I believed, I hoped, I could put together a book to fill that void. A book that would go into much more depth about how the body worked, how it responded to exercise, and what kind of workout programs one should create, but the goal was to write it in a such way as to be engaging and enticing to the reader. To write it more like online fitness related articles instead of mimicking the stuffy textbooks that weren’t being read in the first place.
I am very excited to announce that after over a decade of hard work by NPTI and myself (and our publisher, Human Kinetics) that book is now available! NPTI is proud to present NPTI’s Fundamentals of Fitness and Personal Training, 1st edition. This book was created to be the textbook used by NPTI for future classes and it was created so that former NPTI students, along with personal trainers and serious fitness enthusiasts, could have a condensed resource packed full of interesting, useful, and practical information. For those of you familiar with the NPTI program, it is like the NSCA’s Essentials book, the Nutrition book, and the Anatomy book all packed into one book, written in a conversational tone and including some unique aspects.
Some parts of the book I particularly think you will enjoy are:
- A specific chapter on how to conduct a personal training session
- Detailed and up to date legal information for personal trainers including how to avoid being sued
- Anatomy written by and for trainers with a slant on the practical, in-the-gym aspect of understanding how muscles work
- 7 chapters devoted to various aspects of program design, including much more information on intermediate and advanced programs and philosophies
- Sample workouts, created by me, that have already been proven and battled tested in the gym
- 3 chapters devoted to nutrition with the goal of educating trainers to build muscle, burn fat, and improve body composition and health
- Tons of charts, tables, photos and figures to highlight key information and to serve as reference guides for the future
- Over 3000 references to scientifically validate the information as best as possible
The book is now available through Amazon as a hardcover book or an eBook. If you liked your time with NPTI, if you wish you had a resource that had all of your lectures condensed into a single source, if you want to brush up on your knowledge of personal training, I feel confident in saying you won’t be disappointed with this text.
