Strength Coach BY: JACOB WILSON

Education

You want to have at least a BA degree with Kinesiology for your ideal major.

Experience might be equally as important as preparation for a career as a conditioning coach.

There is really only one widely respected certification for strength and conditioning coaches.

Skills And Abilities

Strength coaches must be good motivators.

Because of the diversity of their clientele, coaches must be organized in how they administer each conditioning program and be detail oriented in terms of record keeping.

Much like a personal trainer, a conditioning coach must be a good teacher because he will be trying to educate athletes on how to execute weightlifting and other exercises correctly.

Strength coaches must be perceptive.

The strength coach requires above-average interpersonal skills.

Compensation Package

Strength coaches vary on what type of work they are doing.

Generally the salary is in the same range as personal trainers.

Typically in the $40,000 to $60,000 (U.S.) range depending on experience and qualifications.

Setting

In ideal environments, athletic departments hire one conditioning coach for every 10 to 20 athletes who use the conditioning facility.

The University of Notre Dame has 9 full-time coaches who work with about 750 student-athletes.

Iowa State University has 4 full-time coaches for about 450 student-athletes.

Future Outlook

Some strength and conditioning coaches hire assistants who have a good pedigree, meaning they have worked with well-known conditioning coaches in the past.

On the other hand, strength and conditioning expertise is becoming more sought after by performance-enhancement companies and fitness clubs. In a recent survey of worldwide fitness trends, the American College of Sports Medicine found that demand for strength-training experts was one of the top five most promising employment trends over the past few years.