Has traditional strength-training equipment started disappearing from your gym? In the past year and a half or so, many clubs have started to replace fancy weight machines in favor of creating open space for more functional training. Learn how this new trend may be offer huge benefits to both fitness professionals and their clients.

Tragic and senseless acts such as the Boston Marathon bombings can leave many people feeling traumatized and stressed, even if they have no personal connections to the incident. If you find your clients are struggling to deal with these recent events, Dr. Michael Mantell explains how you can help them utilize wellness tools to cope with the emotional aftermath of this horrific tragedy.

Are those New Year’s fitness resolutions already a distant memory? Did you get tired of slogging through the cold and ice only to wait in line for a piece of equipment or fight your way into an exercise class? Don’t worry—there is still time to get cranking with a workout program that will banish winter blahs and have you ready to bare those arms once the first flowers start poking their way up from the soil.

When it comes to making a workout more enjoyable, nothing quite matches the power of music. And the science proves it—from increasing intensity and reducing how difficult exercise feels, to enhancing explosiveness and lactate clearance during recovery, music improves nearly every aspect of working out.

When it comes to fitness, doing the same workout over and over again is not only boring, it may even lead to burnout. The beginning of the year is the perfect time to avoid this common trap by setting new goals and challenging yourself to new things. Here’s some great inspiration from top trainers on how you can switch things up in your fitness routine in 2013.

The BOSU® Balance Trainer is an ideal tool for helping your clients develop ideal dynamic balance. Here are five innovative exercises that require the body to work in a coordinated fashion for efficient and effective movement.

The energetic connection is the piece that is often missing when trainers work with overweight clients. Learn how to create a winning environment that will help your clients move out of a cycle of failure, feel more engaged in a size-friendly environment and develop a deep sense of trust with you and their bodies.

Check out these 5 great tips from Jonathan Ross that will keep your clients engaged and inspired to work out, even when time is tight this holiday season.

Trust. Honesty. Values. These are the building blocks for building a strong and effective relationship between trainers and clients, particularly those who are struggling with the complex issues related to being overweight or obese.

We’re fast approaching that time of year when all resolve and willpower seem to go out the window. Learn how to motivate your clients to stay on track by helping them make SMARTER health and fitness goals that give them the greatest chances for success.

With the dramatic increases in the rates of obesity and overweight, chances are high that you work with clients who are dealing with the unique challenges that come with a larger body size. Learn how to be size sensitive by seeing beyond the fat, anticipating the physical and emotional challenges that often come with being overweight, and designing movement that creates a pleasurable experience.

Are women really at a disadvantage when it comes to muscle development and fat reduction? ACE Exercise Physiologist Pete McCall weighs in on a research study that looked at women’s ability to do pull-ups after following an upper-body strength training program.

Metabolic conditioning has become a popular buzzword in the industry, but is this type of training really only about gut-busting workouts and pushing your clients to their absolute limits? Not necessarily, according to ACE Exercise Physiologist Pete McCall, who explains how to effectively—and safely—progress you clients’ programs to maximize the benefits they can achieve from metabolic-conditioning workouts.

Understanding a client’s unique personality is essential for establishing rapport, and to help our trainers, ACE has created a Fitness Personality Quiz that determines and assess clients’ predominant personality styles. Check out what ACE Senior Fitness Consultant Dr. Michael Mantell has to say about his personal experience while taking the quiz, and how it can serve as a useful tool during your ACE-based assessment.

Knowing how to connect with your clients in a way that caters to their personal styles can build the foundation for a healthy, lifelong relationship. Learn from ACE Senior Fitness Consultant Dr. Michael Mantell as he discusses the importance of rapport and the role it plays in career success.

Only about 3% of people set goals for themselves and follow them through to the end. Don’t underestimate the value of goal-setting – for yourself and your clients. Determine what your clients want to achieve, have them write it down and help them take steps to turn it into reality.

With “runner’s knee” accounting for up to a quarter of all running injuries, chances are you’ve either had a client recovering from knee soreness or you will have one soon. Check out some ways you can tailor an exercise regimen to clients overcoming Patellofemoral Pain Syndrome (PFPS) and specific exercises you can do to help them avoid re-injury.

The weather is getting warmer, the sun is staying out later, and it’s more pleasant to spend time outdoors enjoying various recreational activities. If you’re like me you may cringe a little bit during this time of year because in my experience when clients start picking up their favorite outdoor activities after a long winter indoors, more often than not they jump right back into their recreational pastime at the same intensity as when they left off in the fall.

Due to their versatility and effectiveness, kettlebells are becoming more of a staple for trainers working with clients of all abilities. While they’re a great way to incorporate whole-body movement, trainers who’ve never used them before should make sure they know what they’re doing before they whip them into client programs. Here are a few things to keep in mind before you begin incorporating kettlebells into your workouts.

In part 1, I discussed how the first two faces of the ACE IFT™ model — Stability and Mobility, and Movement — related to yoga. This time, we’ll take a look at P90X and Crossfit, and how the Load and Performance phases of the ACE IFT Model are related to the popular workout trends.

Small group training has been gaining popularity because it’s an affordable, fun way for clients to take advantage of a trainer’s expertise at a lower financial investment — all while keeping the fun and competitiveness of a group dynamic. How does it differ from one-on-one personal training, and how can you effectively design programs? Find out.

Increase the intensity of your workouts by training like a mixed martial arts (MMA) fighter. Doug Balzarini shows you his top five favorite exercises that he uses when training elite athletes. With upper-body pushing and pulling, lower-body and rotational core movements, these exercises will make you sweat.

Trends come and go in our industry, but one recent trend that has some staying power is small group training. If you’re looking for a way to increase your business in the new year, consider adding small group training to your service options. The January rush might be a great time to start a new small group program. Learn more about it.

With nearly 40% of adults not exercising sufficiently, and 50% of those who do begin an exercise program discontinuing within the first six months, obtaining and keeping clients can be a major business hurdle for fitness trainers. Become a fitness professional, however, and that hurdle might not be so challenging. Find out what that entails.

Whenever I go into a studio, independent gym or corporate health club, I pay close attention to details such as the equipment, available space for movement, and organization. What are important considerations fitness facilities should take when creating a space that accomodates customers' individual workouts and personal training sessions? See a list of places that do it well.

In the fitness world there are two widely different tastes of a 1-on-1 personal trainer and a group fitness instructor. In many health clubs these two worlds very rarely collide yet they are a magical recipe of success for fitness professionals interested in reaching a new audience of potential clients while simultaneously creating a way to provide additional services to existing ones.

When I was training and teaching group fitness fulltime I was a big education junkie and would always be reading the latest industry literature to learn strategies and techniques for helping clients to achieve goals or design fun and challenging classes. Rather than spending down time in the gym where it might be perceived that I was slacking off during work (even though I was only paid while training clients) it made more sense to me to would use a local Starbucks as my office to catch up on wh