Prior planning prevents poor performance.
And in the case of bootcamp instructors, a little bit of prior planning prevents late night, rushed session planning or falling back on the same old, boring workout.
In this week’s Monday Morning Live, Kyle Wood shares his simple, three-step method for planning amazing, fun and varied workouts in advance that will keep your clients coming back for more.
Watch the video in our Facebook group or read on for the highlights.
Nothing could be more fear-inducing or energy-draining than staring at that blank session plan at 10pm on the night before your 6am bootcamp. With this three-step method, you’ll be able to structure and organise your session planning to save yourself energy and time. It’s a great habit to get into.
Step 1: Brainstorm Ideas
You will firstly need to know what time-frame your bootcamp block works within – is it a four-week, six-week, two-month or three-month block? How many sessions/days will you have within that block? These figures are your starting point – in his example, Kyle ran three days per week over four weeks, so planning for 12 sessions.
Within that, you then just want to consider how many of each session style you want to have – ie. 2 fun/game-based sessions, 3 boxing sessions, 2 strength sessions, 3 HIIT sessions and 2 team challenge sessions. This range helps your clients to get the full breadth of training styles and helps ensure they are not burning out with only HIIT sessions every week.
With this overarching plan, you can then note the overview of each session. Be sure to note down any resources you may have used for the session idea (ie. a great boxing session you saw on BCI:Ask). Resource ideas are listed at the bottom of this article. This is still just at the brainstorming stage, so don’t spend too long on this!
Step 2: Create a Schedule Overview
Working within a table will be easier here – simply list down the left side the number of weeks your block runs for, then the days of the week you run sessions on across the top. It is important to note here that if you run multiple sessions on one day, then it is appropriate to double up the same session. This method is all about making things more efficient for you.
Now you can fill in the brainstormed session overviews into your weekly table. Ensure an even spread of session types here, so that if someone is only coming on a Monday, they will still get a great variety of workouts.
Working within this table also gives you the chance to plan for a technique-based session before moving onto a HIIT session of the same type (ie. kettlebells)
Step 3: Detailed Weekly Session Plan
Because of the work you’ve already done, the hardest part of your detailed, weekly plan is going to be finding warm-ups and finishers!
Simply sit down once a week and fill in the blanks to ensure enough detail in the workout for you to refer to when you’re running the session.
And there you have it! Using this method to plan your sessions is a great habit for you to get into. It really will help free up your time and energy, allowing you to give your clients an amazing experience at each and every session. If you’re not already planning this way, give it a go. It will take you a while the first few time you do it, but with time it will become easier. Aim to plan next month’s sessions after reading through this article!
Mentioned Links:
Some resources that will help you plan better sessions include:
- 21 Days of Bootcamp Ideas
- BootCraft <- our bootcamp baby that we made for you
- Bootcamp Workout Ideas
- Workout Design Club
- Fitness Games Zone (Use BOOTCAMPIDEAS20 to save 20%)
Theresa Prior has a mission to bring Mums and women together in a safe and supportive environment that just so happens to have fun fitness sessions at it’s core. She has been running her own personal training business since 2013. Theresa helps her clients understand that all aspects of their health are equally important.
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