fbpx

Are you willing to invest one evening per week to advance your fitness education? The 7-month Bayesian PT Course offers a comprehensive education about everything related to muscle growth and fat loss. You will learn the full Bayesian Bodybuilding methodology and become a Certified Bayesian Personal Trainer if you pass the exam. All online from the comfort of your own home.

Note: This page is for the original English language course.

 

Page overview

 

Who is it for?

The course is primarily aimed at personal trainers and other fitness professionals that coach clients or aspire to coach clients with the goal of muscle growth, fat loss or strength development. Health and psychology will also be discussed in detail. You don’t have to be a personal trainer to join the course: many non-professionals have already followed the course simply for the sake of self-improvement and their personal education.

Overview

The course is fully online, with the exception of a physical meet-up that will be recorded for those that can’t attend. The course covers the science and practice of strength training, muscle hypertrophy, strength development and fat loss. Health and psychology will also be discussed in detail.

  • Become an official Certified Bayesian Personal Trainer if you pass the exam. The Latin honors system is applied to the exam and your certificate.
  • Have your personal training services featured and promoted on Bayesian Bodybuilding (for free).
  • Videos and articles on a new topic every week (see course outline below).
  • Extensive recommended reading lists.
  • Q&A sessions.
  • Client case studies of Menno Henselmans’s clients, such as the full program of a national powerlifting champion and an IFBB Pro physique athlete. You can also submit case studies of your own clients or yourself to be analyzed.
  • Unlimited access to Menno Henselmans’s inbox for questions.
  • A Facebook discussion group where you can ask questions and discuss best practices with the other class members. Feedback shows most members experience networking with the world’s evidence-based fitness community as a major benefit to being in the course. However, if you want to remain anonymous, you can simply create an empty Facebook account to participate in the group.
  • A handy PT Toolkit with calculators for weak body part analysis, genetic muscular potential, 1RM, BF% and much more.
  • Ready-to-send guides and tips for your clients on sleep optimization, stress management, how to implement accommodating resistance, how to deal with cheat meals and social eating events and much more.

The next course starts on 1 September 2017 and is 7 months long (28 weeks).

Contents

Click here to see the full course contents

Week 1: 1 Sep

  • Do-it-yourself science & Bayesian reasoning
  • Optimizing macros: protein intake

Week 2: 8 Sep

  • Optimizing macros: carbohydrate intake
    • Dietary fiber
  • Optimizing macros: fat intake

Week 3: 15 Sep

  • Customizing the diet to an individual, including carb tolerance testing
  • Ketogenic dieting: a complete overview

Week 4: 22 Sep

  • Human metabolism
    • What is energy? Thermodyamics and energy balance
    • Determinants of energy expenditure, refeeds, set-point theory, metabolic damage, adaptive thermogenesis, reverse dieting and the yo-yo effect

Week 5: 29 Sep

  • Optimizing caloric intake: cutting, bulking and body recomposition
    • Cut or bulk?
  • Tracking progress
    • Weight vs. body composition
    • How to measure body fat percentage
    • How to track your macros

Week 6: 6 Oct

  • Nutrient timing I
    • Intermittent fasting & alternate day fasting
    • Meal frequency
    • Circadian rhythm effects

Week 7: 13 Oct

  • Nutrient timing II
    • Fasted training
    • Workout nutrition and the anabolic window

Weeks 8: 20 Oct

  • Nutrition case studies and Q&As (reduced study load for the holiday period)

Week 9: 27 Oct

  • Understanding how muscle grows
    • Neural and morphological adaptations to strength training
    • Mechanisms of muscle growth
    • Strength vs. size
    • Sarcoplasmic hypertrophy
  • Cardio for fat loss

Week 10: 3 Nov

  • Optimal training program design: volume, frequency and intensity

Week 11: 10 Nov

  • Interindividual variability: why there’s no one-size-fits-all program
    • Autoregulation & muscle-specific hypertrophy
    • Work capacity
    • Gender specific programming: including contraception, pregnancy, the menstrual cycle and other female specific topics
    • Age specific programming: the elderly and youth

Week 12: 17 Nov

  • The fitness lifestyle
    • Circadian rhythm control
    • Optimizing sleep quality
    • Stress management

Week 13: 24 Nov

  • Optimizing your exercise selection
    • Accommodating resistance: biomechanics, bands and chains
    • Exercise selection reference list
    • Counting volume: how much does a certain exercise stimulate a certain muscle?
    • Training in a home gym

Week 14: 1 Dec

  • Repetition tempo
  • Exercise technique
    • Internal vs. external cueing
    • The mind-muscle connection

Week 15: 8 Dec

  • Rest intervals
    • Active recovery
  • Optimizing your exercise ordering
    • Circuit training, (antagonistic) supersets and paired sets

Week 16: 15 Dec

  • Advanced training techniques for muscle hypertrophy
    • Training to failure, forced reps and drop sets
    • RPEs and autoregulation
    • Reverse pyramiding, cluster sets and myo-reps
    • Weighted stretching
    • Eccentric emphasized training/eccentric overloading
    • Post-activation potentiation
    • KAATSU/blood flow restriction training

Weeks 17-18: 22 Dec – 4 Jan

Note: Reduced study load during the holiday period.

  • Periodization and progression
    • Cybernetic/autoregulatory, undulating and linear periodization
    • Benchmarking and autoregulation
    • What is fatigue?
    • Overtraining, overreaching and deloading
    • Autoregulatory Volume Training and Reactive Deloading

Week 19: 5 Jan

  • Training program case studies and Q&A

Week 20: 12 Jan

  • Injury management and flexibility training
    • Injury diagnosis, treatment and active recovery
    • Pain science
    • Ice vs. heat, NSAIDs and RICE
    • Rehabilitative equipment: braces, sleeves, tape, etc.
    • Stretching
    • Foam rolling and massage
    • Chiropractic
    • Warming up and cooling down
    • Common injuries of each body part

Week 21: 19 Jan

  • Client compliance and program adherence: the psychology of how to stick to your diet and exercise program
    • Psychological effects of nutrition
    • Goal setting
    • Client empowerment
    • Cheat meals
    • Food cravings
    • Assessing client adherence and motivation

Week 22: 26 Jan

  • Ad libitum dieting: how to lose fat and gain muscle without tracking your macros
    • Hunger management

Week 23: 2 Feb

  • Training gear
    • Weightlifting belts
    • Footwear: what to wear in the gym
    • Knee wraps
    • Lifting straps

Week 24: 9 Feb

  • Health science and food choices
    • What makes a diet healthy?
    • Effects of food processing
    • Organic food
    • Cholesterol
    • Saturated fat
    • Low calorie sweeteners, sugar and dietary fiber
    • Food choices for health and anabolism
      • Meat, fish and poultry
      • Dairy and eggs
      • Grains, wheat and gluten
      • Soy
      • Fruit and vegetables

Week 25: 16 Feb

  • Supplements: a complete guide
  • Beyond macros: micronutrition
    • How to fill in your micros
    • Micronutrients in detail: which
  • An objective look at anabolic androgenic steroids: costs and benefits
    • Understanding hormones

Week 26: 23 Feb

  • Contest prep and peak week protocols: how to perfect your physique for a contest or photoshoot
    • Carbloading
    • Sodium and electrolyte manipulation
    • Diuretics and water cutting
    • ‘Shitloading’

Week 27-28: 2 – 15 Mar

  • Exam preparation time: Q&As
  • Ask Me Anything

16 March: Online exam

What does it cost?

The price is $199 per month.

Tip: You can declare the course as a business expense and save yourself a lot of tax money.

Group discount: When 3 PTs of the same gym register, each will receive 2 months of the course for free. Larger group discounts are negotiable. Please email BayesianBodybuilding@Gmail.com for group registrations.

Repeat course discount: If you followed one of the previous Bayesian PT Courses, you will receive a large discount so that you only pay for new contents. This will allow you to stay up-to-date with life long continued education. You will not be extorted by having to renew your certificate every X years like many other courses do.

Refund policy: You can opt out at any time yourself by leaving the course group and canceling your payment subscription. You then only have to pay for months you’ve received the materials of (rounded up with a minimum of 1 month payment in total) and you get a refund for any future months you had already paid in advance. There is no refund for months you have received any contents of.

How do I sign up?

You can fill in the form below and submit it to register. You’ll then be contacted by someone from our administration (BayesianBodybuilding@Gmail.com) to finalize your registration for the course.

Reviews

“I have learned so much… the astounding knowledge and advice has given me the platform to achieve great things.”

Nina Ross, IFBB Pro Bikini athlete, BSc (hons.), international title holder in Bikini, Figure and BodyFitness

“Best investment I’ve made to upgrade my own science-based PT knowledge.”

– Martijn Koevoets, silver placing Dutch powerlifter, strength coach, author, owner of FortiusFitness

“Superb and honestly worth ten times the price. I can’t think of a better form of continued professional development. Quite honestly I can say that this was the best learning experience of my entire life. […] The course has a fluid informal feel, whilst encouraging everyone to interact and benefit from each other’s questions and experiences. Menno is rare in that he interprets, implements and teaches a completely rational, evidence-based approach but with clear creativity and flair.”

– Steven Kemp, British Personal Trainer, Sports Nutrition student

“I could write a book on all the new things I have learned. It truly is the best thing I have done for my PT education. The material was very in depth with science to back everything up… Menno was always very quick to respond to any questions and very helpful in breaking things down.”

– Craig Lapsley, Scottish Personal Trainer, owner of LapsleyFitness

“I’ve read just about everything worth reading on the topic of nutrition and training in the last 15 years and have trained with almost a dozen of the Internet’s top physique coaches. Or at least I thought I had until I met Menno! I am astonished how much more I have learned in the short time since his course began. Not only that but Menno has a gift for being able to break down complicated topics into simple, tangible information that you can implement immediately in your client’s as well as your own programs. Bayesian reasoning at it’s best!

Menno’s PT course brought my coaching knowledge and skills to the next level, and I would highly recommend it to anyone else that’s seriously interested in doing the same.”

– Michael Bombard, Power Eng., Canadian physique coach

“I can’t recommend this PT Course highly enough! Menno is one of the most knowledgeable and inspiring people in the industry. If you want real science based knowledge that will make you stand out in this industry, this is for you.”

– Daniel Rimfjäll, Swedish personal trainer, author, owner of VarStudio4

Click here to read more reviews of the PT Course

“Great course! […] scientific and professional. Additionally, he impressed me by answering all the questions in a great way.”

– Fredrik Tonstad Vårvik, Norwegian Personal Trainer, BSc Sports Science & BSc Nutrition

“Sublime…”

– Michel Snoek, NASM PT, ex-sergeant with the Royal Netherlands Army, pro firefighter, personal trainer, owner of BodyResults

“Joining this course has been the best decision in my fitness life, period. I’ve applied the knowledge gained from this comprehensive course to my clients while learning and the results have been nothing short of amazing!”

– Richard Bell, Medical Personal Trainer, Dutch author

“[The Bayesian PT Course] will give you the knowlegde to design the most effective program for your clients, to give them the best results possible.”

– Jeanet Wolf, Dutch dietitian,  health- and fitness coach, fitness competitor, author, owner of WolfCoaching

“The Bayesian method is pieced together one topic at a time, in a well organized manner. Nothing is dictated arbitrarily. Instead Menno explains his reasoning pragmatically. The conclusions he draws are then backed up by very clear evidence from numerous studies. I highly recommend this course and the Bayesian Method!”

– Timothy Solomon, American PT, internationally competitive basketball athlete, competitive beach volleyballer, massage therapist

More reviews can be found at the bottom of this page. (And that’s still just a fraction of all the reviews.)

FAQs

Do I have to be present at specific times?

No, not necessarily. Attendees from time zones all over the world have followed the course. Any live materials will be recorded and uploaded.

How does this course compare to personal training certifications like those by the NSCA, NASM and ISSA?

For one, the Bayesian PT Course course is specialized in fat loss and muscle growth with a secondary goal of strength development. As such, the Bayesian PT Course course goes into far greater detail on these topics than the above courses.

It is also more geared towards the practice of personal training and online coaching. Part of the reason for designing this course was the widespread disappointment with the above courses in preparing people for professional coaching. The average personal trainer isn’t exactly known for its evidence-based practice. This course is designed to truly give you all the tools you need to understand how to help yourself or your clients lose fat and gain muscle.

For a list of reviews of people that followed the PT Course and another official fitness education, click here.

I’m going on vacation during the course period. Can I still follow the course?

Absolutely. You can follow the course at your own pace, though most people have found that they benefit from keeping up with the group. In principle, it’s exactly like following a part-time online college degree.

How intensive is the course?

The course is designed to be part-time, so you can follow it alongside your work or studies, but it will require a serious time commitment, such as in the evenings or in the weekends.

At a minimum you want to have one free evening per week and several days before the exam to follow the course. (Unless you’re not interested in the certification. Then you can of course work through everything at your own pace.)

If you don’t get around to studying all the materials before the exam, you can postpone the exam to the next course round.

How is the exam conducted?

The exam takes place online and is designed to mimick the practice of online coaching. You will have access to the course materials and the internet during the course, just like in practice. More information will be provided during the course.

Do I have to follow the exam?

No, you don’t. Many strength trainees have followed the course purely out of personal interest. Note that you won’t be certified if you don’t pass the exam.

If I fail the exam, can I take a resit?

No, just like in life, there are no resits. You can only take the exam once during a course you attend. You can, however, postpone the exam to a future course round.

How high is the bar set for the exam?

If you follow all the materials, you should pass the exam. The current pass rate for students that took the exam is 97% with 10% graduating cum laude.
Home » Education