SUCCESS-STORIES: A HEALTHY HEART IS A TRAINED HEART
STEEL Team
April 25, 2024
Even though the idea of personalised training is not new, the Vietnamese fitness industry has been slow to fully adopt it. The #Success-events series of articles by STEEL is based on real events and aims to show how personal trainers and clients with different physical issues, personalities, and ways of life can work together and communicate. It mostly has to do with how we find the best training environment, meet the needs of every customer, and make sure that everyone has the most success possible. Since no two people are exactly the same, there is no one solution that works for everyone.
Can someone with a certain medical condition exercise? Undoubtedly, a lot of people are curious about that. For those with cardiac problems, exercising, lifting weights, or doing high-intensity resistance training may seem unattainable. Mr. Hung, a 31-year-old who resides and works in Saigon, is an example of how people with chronic and congenital diseases can still engage in physical activity if their physical condition is assessed. Use caution and adhere to an exercise regimen that is suitable for your level of health.
Coach Nguyen Thai Minh has been Mr. Hung's companion during his nine-month STEEL customer relationship. He has a history of cardiac issues and is underweight with slow muscle growth. Today’s blog post will feature an interview with coach Thai Minh, who would take you through the exercise and nutrition plan that was customised for Mr. Hung's physical condition. It will also highlight the mental and physical accomplishments that Mr. Hung achieved after over six months of regular practice.
Customer Profile:
Mr. Hung has a congenital heart condition. Although the symptoms have no significant influence on his daily life, they do limit his capacity to engage in strenuous physical activities or exert a lot of pressure on his body.
He lives a sedentary lifestyle and eats minimally, thus his physique is slender and his muscles underdeveloped. He admitted to me that he had tried going to the gym before, but his workouts were useless. That led to him giving up and not practicing for a long period before deciding to try again.
Mr. Hung is also interested in nutrition, but due to the nature of his job and hobbies, his diet is variable and does not follow strict norms. He frequently skips meals, which is one of the major reasons he struggles to gain weight.
Mr. Hung's major goal when going to the gym is to acquire weight and muscle, which brings about better health.
When arranging workouts for clients with medical histories like Mr. Hung's, I always advocate extreme caution. To strengthen the muscles, I ask for three low-intensity workouts per week, rotating between upper-body, lower-body, and full-body training. I need to keep an eye on Mr. Hung at this early stage to guarantee he completes the programme. This slow-paced process will also determine whether it is the optimum method for his current physical state.
Regarding his food and nutrition, I pay attention to his meals and provide constructive feedback throughout the day. I advise Mr. Hung to eat less processed foods and less fat. My long-term goal is to provide the client with enough information to make informed nutritional choices.
I noticed during the first month of instruction that Mr. Hung was attending just two training sessions each week, contrary to the three that were originally planned. I tailored the timetable to fit his routine and concentrated on three full-body exercises. Even if you don't go to the gym, the body would have been well-trained twice in this way. This strategy reduces the amount of exercises for each muscle group in a training session and distributes them evenly throughout three sessions. This method of training is also more beneficial than working out a single muscle area intensely in a single session and then taking a week off before repeating the exercise, according to many studies. This is especially valid for those with severe health needs, such as Mr. Hung, and busy people.
Mr. Hung's main difficulty is that abdominal pressing movements strain his heart. Exercises that strengthen the lower body, such as squats, usually require you to tighten your abdominal muscles, producing pressure inside the body. For Mr. Hung, he suffered a heart compression due to his physical conditions. After noticing this reaction, I switched the primary leg workout to Leg Press to strengthen the load-bearing capacity of the leg muscle group. For squats, only lighter weights are used to exercise solid squat abilities without jeopardising the heart condition.
In addition, as a golfer, Mr. Hung favours one side of his body over the other, resulting in a little discrepancy in posture. To ensure that he is able to complete the movements correctly, I suggest warm-up activities to restore his body's balance.
In my opinion, personalising exercises requires taking into account the body's training ability and response. It also involves determining the best, simplest, and safest approach to exercise with high loads, hence encouraging muscular development.
After nine months of training at a frequency of roughly two sessions per week, with one month off for personal reasons, Mr. Hung's weight increased to 6 kg. His muscles were more developed, and his body structure was larger. He saw a significant improvement in his heart health in particular. He used to need a break in the middle of exercises like the Leg Press and his body would wear out if he skipped a stride. After the training, he can now push extremely large weights without risk to his heart. Additionally, Mr. Hung shared that he was unable to squat without holding onto something since he was a little boy due to insufficient ankle flexibility. At the moment, his squatting ability has significantly improved and his ankles have become more flexible after several months of therapy.
After working out, he felt like a good appetite, so he was able to eat more and stopped skipping meals as often. He can also regulate and change the kind and amount of food he eats each day relevant to his body weight.
Currently, Mr. Hung and I frequently establish objectives that he is eager to accomplish, like 10 consecutive pull-ups or a 100 kg chest push. The progress of the training makes me quite delighted as Mr. Hung is able to feel the joy of exercising. Mr. Hung’s progress proves his effort and my attempt to achieve such targets in the near and far future.
Thank you, Coach Thai Minh, for sharing your valuable insights.
“For the time being, I am really pleased with STEEL. With his boundless energy and willingness to lend a hand, Minh—THE coach—is an invaluable asset. In any setting, he is not only highly knowledgeable but also a joy to be around. The fact that his program was able to adjust to my requirements even though I have physical restrictions is proof of his competence. In response to problems, he offers brilliant, workable solutions and has a fresh take on things.
With the help of everyone at STEEL, but notably my coach, I've had an amazing time and am beginning to see real progress.”
