Meet Fitness Wellness Students
Meet Macyn: senior fitness and wellness intern
Macyn Helmsing is a senior in the fitness wellness program. Her passion for fitness has landed her an internship at a privately owned gym, 480 Fitness in Chandler, Arizona. Read on to learn more about her hands-on learning experience and her plans for after graduation.
Why did you choose your major?
Exercise has helped me so much, and I’m really passionate about it. Choosing this major just made sense because I want to share the life-changing benefits, both physical and mental, of staying active.
Where are you doing your internship?
I am doing my internship at a privately owned gym called 480 Fitness located in Chandler, AZ. My internship focuses on personal training, the biggest service 480 Fitness offers. The clientele is incredibly diverse; it consists of young athletes, recreational athletes, general population, and older adults.
What is your role in your internship? What are some of your responsibilities?
My role at 480 Fitness is to take in as much knowledge as possible and help out in any way I can. I have the opportunity to shadow four personal trainers, and the experience is very hands-on. I get to instruct exercises during sessions, and I’ve been able to build relationships with the clients. My exercise library expands every day, and I’m gaining a lot of valuable experience. Additionally, I work the front desk, complete programming assignments, and help keep the gym clean.
What has been your favorite part of the internship?
My favorite aspect of this internship is the opportunity to learn different training styles. Each personal trainer at 480 Fitness has a unique area of expertise, allowing me to explore various programming approaches and understand how to train different populations, such as athletes versus the general population. This experience has also helped me identify the type of training style I want to adopt in the future.
What skills have you learned through this experience?
The most significant skill I’ve developed is leading with confidence. Initially, I found it intimidating to apply my classroom knowledge to real-world situations. However, 480 Fitness provides an incredibly supportive learning environment where everyone genuinely wants to see you succeed. This supportive environment has helped build my confidence. Additionally, I am learning the essentials of starting a career as a personal trainer, such as strategies for building and retaining a clientele. Another invaluable skill I’ve gained is rapport-building with clients, which is crucial in this field.
How do you feel this experience has prepared you for your future career?
This internship has really set me up for success—I have learned so much! My exercise library is rapidly expanding, my cueing has improved, and I have gotten a lot of experience watching sessions with many different types of clients.
What do you hope to take away from your internship?
I’m eager to put into practice everything I’ve learned, from marketing myself to leading personal training sessions. This includes developing my personal brand, understanding client needs, creating tailored workout plans, and building strong relationships with clients.
What do you want to do after you graduate?
Once I graduate, I want to be a personal trainer. I have been wanting to pursue this career for a while now, and this internship has solidified that decision!
Get to know Tyler Holmes, fitness wellness alumnus
Tyler Holmes, owner of 480 Fitness and NAU fitness wellness alumni, had a similar internship experience. Tyler began as an intern for the gym in spring of 2017. He was hired out of his internship and went on to become the owner of the gym.
It’s been a full-circle moment since you are an alum of this program yourself—what’s that like?
It definitely has been a full-circle moment for me. The benefit of going through the internship program to now being an owner is that I’ve experienced every part of the business. After my internship, I went right into personal training with general clients and athletes. I then quickly took on a facility manager role before becoming the owner. Being able to see the “ins and outs” of the business has allowed me to make better business decisions as well as relate to our whole staff.
What was your internship experience like when you were a student in this program? How did your internship prepare you for your current role?
I had a great experience as an intern! I felt that I was challenged to be better consistently by my site supervisor. Having that push made me fall in love with the process and excited to come in to work every day. Working in a large fitness facility, especially personal training, can be hectic at times, and I felt that my internship did an incredible job at preparing me for this.
What advice do you have for undergraduate students preparing for an internship?
My advice would be to stay open to all different roles within the industry. We have had interns come in thinking they wanted to become personal trainers and end up really loving the operations side of the business. This goes for training styles and approaches as well. You may think that you only enjoy training this one way with this one demographic, and you find you thoroughly enjoy working with another group. Being open-minded to the possibilities is key!
What do you like about being an internship site for NAU’s Fitness Wellness program?
I love seeing the young talent coming up within the program. Whether our site is a long-term spot or not for students, we feel like the interns sent our way come with a solid knowledge base and are eager to learn. It has been vital to our success in building our personal training and management departments.
Contributed by Business Administration, Marketing undergraduate student, Katie Fahy.