Two one-to-one coaching places open on the block starting Monday 12 October. Send an enquiry to hold one.
Personal training · Third Cove studio
Third Cove runs strength in blocks, not drop-in sessions. You get an assessment, a written plan, coached lifts twice a week and a progression you can see on paper — so every session has a reason for existing.
How a block works
Every client moves through the same four phases. What changes is the loading, the exercise selection and the pace — decided from your assessment rather than a template.
A sitting-down conversation about your training history, what you want at the end of twelve weeks, and the hours you can realistically give it.
45 minutes · before you commitMovement screen, loaded carries and a working set on the main lifts. This sets your starting weights and flags anything we coach around.
Week one · one sessionTwo coached sessions a week on a written plan: one lower-body led, one upper-body led, with conditioning attached to whichever leaves you fresher.
Weeks two to sixWe review the log at week six, keep what is moving, replace what stalled, and push the last six weeks toward whatever you named in the consultation.
Weeks seven to twelveWays to train
All three run on the same twelve-week structure and the same written plan. The difference is how much coached floor time you get and what it asks of your schedule.
Full studio time with a coach on the floor for every set. Best if you are new to barbells, coming back from a long gap, or want technique corrected as it happens rather than afterwards.
Two people training the same block side by side on shared equipment. Suits partners, friends or colleagues with similar schedules who want the accountability of turning up together.
You train at your own gym on a plan written for the equipment you actually have, with a coached check-in session at the studio at the start and middle of the block.
Inside a session
No guesswork on the day and no queuing for equipment. The plan is on the board before you arrive, and you leave with the numbers written down.
Weekly availability
Coaching runs in fixed windows so the studio stays quiet and equipment is never shared unplanned. You keep the same two slots for the whole block.
Consultations and assessments are booked into the Friday afternoon window. If none of these times work, say so in your enquiry — a small number of early slots open between blocks.
Questions
No. Roughly half of each intake starts with no barbell experience. The assessment session exists to find a starting load you can control for the full set, and the first two weeks are deliberately light while the pattern is being coached. You are taught the lift before you are asked to load it.
Bring the details to the consultation, including anything a clinician has told you to avoid. We coach around a restriction by changing the range, the implement or the position rather than skipping the movement entirely. Coaching is not rehabilitation, so where something needs clinical treatment we will say so and work alongside it.
Tell us as early as you can and we will move it inside the same week where a window exists. If the week cannot absorb it, the session becomes a written home plan so the block keeps its shape. A twelve-week block has two make-up slots built into it for exactly this.
You need reliable access to a barbell or a pair of adjustable dumbbells, something to press from and somewhere to pull. Send a photo or a list of what is available and the plan is written for that equipment — not for a studio you cannot get to.
Only in general terms: protein at each meal, eating enough around training days, and sleep. Prescriptive meal plans and clinical dietary advice are outside a coach's scope, and we will refer rather than improvise if you want that level of detail.
Yes. Blocks are commitments of intent, not contracts you are locked into. If you need to stop, you keep your written plan and your log so the work is not wasted, and you can rejoin at the start of any later block.
Enquiry
Send the form and you will get a reply with the consultation windows still free, plus a short note on which format looks like the right fit from what you have described.