What a session is actually like
An hour. One trainer, one room, nobody else in it. This is how it goes, from the door to the end.
- When you arrive
- The door is locked between sessions, so whoever you're training with lets you in. There's no one else in the room and there won't be. The first few minutes are talking: how you slept, what's sore, what you fancy doing today and what you'd rather not.
- The first ten minutes
- Moving, gently. A walk across the floor, some easy squats down to a box, a bit of work for hips and shoulders. Nothing you'd call a workout. It's so your trainer can see how you're moving today, and so you can stop thinking about the drive over.
- The middle half-hour
- The strength work. Two or three movements: usually a squat or a lift from the floor, a push, a pull. The weight starts light enough to feel almost silly and goes up only when the last set looked easy. Your trainer stands beside you for every set. Between sets you sit down, drink some water and talk. Resting is part of the hour, not a break from it.
- The last ten minutes
- Something easier to finish on: a carry across the floor, a stretch, and a note of what you lifted so next week starts where this one left off. You leave knowing exactly what you did, and that next time it will be a little more.
The hour is paced to you. Turn up tired and it's a lighter hour. Nobody is timed, filmed or shouted at, and there isn't a mirror in the building.
One-to-one
I didn't want anybody watching me get it wrong. It turns out there's only Rory, and he's seen it all before.
Her first session was free.£50 a session, or 10 for £450.
One-to-one is most of what we do. An hour, you and Ailsa or Rory, once a week or whenever suits your life. The session is built around you on the day: how you've slept, what's sore, how much time you've got.
You learn to squat, lift from the floor, push, pull and carry, with weights that start light and go up when you're ready and not before. Your trainer is beside you for every set, so you never have to wonder whether you're doing it right.
It suits people who want the room to themselves, people with a history to work around, and people who simply don't want an audience while they learn.
£50 a session, or 10 for £450. The first one is free. What it costs, in full.
Training in pairs
She wanted a reason to see me every week. I wanted somebody there who'd laugh at me kindly. We both got what we came for.
Their first session was free.£35 each per session after that.
Two of you, one trainer, one hour. You take turns: while one of you lifts, the other rests and watches, so each of you still gets your trainer's whole attention for every set.
You don't need to be the same age or the same strength. A mother and her grown daughter can train together because the weight on the bar is set for whoever is holding it. Bring your partner, a friend, a sibling, a colleague who's also been putting it off.
Pairs suit people who would never walk into a room like this on their own. Having somebody you know a yard away makes the first few weeks a good deal easier, and most pairs find they turn up more often because the other one is counting on them.
£35 each per session. Your first session together is free.
Strength after forty
Most of the people who train here are over forty, and most had never lifted a bar before they walked in. That isn't a specialism for us. It's the ordinary case, and the one the place was set up for.
Strength is learned the same way at fifty-five as at twenty-five, with a bit more patience about the first few weeks. We begin with a squat down to a box, a lift from the floor with a kettlebell, a carry across the room, and we add weight over months rather than days. You're never asked to do anything fast, and you're never asked to do anything you can't see the point of.
The point, for most people, is stairs, gardens, grandchildren, suitcases and feeling steady on your feet. Being strong for ordinary life is a perfectly good reason to train, and here it's the usual one.
One-to-one or in pairs, at the same prices. More people who started after forty.
Nobody ever told me you were allowed to start at forty-seven. I'd have started sooner.
Her first session was free.£50 a session, or 10 for £450.
Coming back after injury or a baby
Rory asked what the knee would do before he asked what I wanted to do. Nobody had put it that way round before.
His first session was free.£50 a session, or 10 for £450.
Nine months after my son, I needed somebody to tell me what was sensible. Ailsa did, and then she let me get on with it.
Her first session was free.£50 a session, or 10 for £450.
Coming back after an injury, or after having a baby, is the same job done carefully: find out what's fine today, start there, and build. The first session is mostly questions, and the answers set the pace of everything after.
We are personal trainers, not physios or doctors, and we don't treat anything. If you've been seeing a physio, your GP or a health visitor, we work alongside what they've told you, and we'll ask you to bring their advice with you.
After an injury we work around what hurts, not through it. Nothing we ask you to do should hurt, and you'll be asked how it feels every set, which changes what comes next. After a baby we start gently with the floor, the middle and the breathing, then build back the carrying, lifting and getting-up-off-the-floor strength you use all day without noticing.
Always one-to-one to begin with, at £50 a session or 10 for £450. Coming back after injury and after having a baby, in people's own words.
Nutrition basics
We talk about food the way we talk about lifting: plainly, and only as much as is useful. There are no diets, no points, no powders to buy and nothing is banned.
Over your first few sessions we'll cover the basics that make training easier: eating enough, getting a reasonable amount of protein, drinking water, and what a sensible week looks like for somebody with a job, a family and a Friday night. It's part of the session, at no extra cost.
If you want more than that, we'll say so honestly. We're trainers, not dietitians, and we'd rather tell you where our knowledge stops than pretend it doesn't.
Nobody here will weigh you, measure you or photograph you. We're interested in what you can lift and how you feel, and that's all we keep track of.
Try it free first
Whichever of these sounds like you, the first hour costs nothing. Fiona's did, and Morag and Eilidh's, and Claire's. Yours does too.
Come in, meet Ailsa or Rory, move about a bit, lift a few things that feel manageable and see how the room suits you. It takes about an hour. If it isn't for you, that's the end of it, and nobody will ring to ask why.
£50 a session after that, or 10 for £450.
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What it costs
- First session
- Free, no commitment
- One-to-one
- £50 a session
- Ten one-to-one sessions
- £450
- Training in pairs
- £35 each per session