The initial assessment you can actually repeat in eight weeks
A complete physical assessment protocol in 30 minutes. 6 standardized tests, a printable registration sheet and the normative values for each test. No special equipment: a tape measure and your phone's stopwatch.
Free. For trainers, strength coaches and physiotherapists.
No spam. No commitment. Just the protocol.
"I'll think about it and let you know"
Translation: they won't let you know.
A trial class doesn't close anyone. The prospect already knows what training is like - they've known for years. What they don't know is what state they're in.
And neither do you.
You start programming based on what they tell you: that they run "about 30km a week", that their shoulder "sometimes bothers them", that they lift "two or three days". Eight weeks later you have no way of knowing what's changed, because there was never a starting point.
And that's exactly where the renewal is lost: if you can't show them what changed, training with you is worth the same as training alone. No reason to keep paying, and none to refer you.
A baseline isn't paperwork. It's the only way that, two months from now, you can answer something other than "you're doing fine".
A protocol, not a list of exercises
The difference is standardization.
Anyone can time a plank. The hard part is timing it in a way that the number eight weeks from now actually means something: same position, same warm-up, same footwear, same finishing criteria, same test order.
Without that, you're not measuring your client's progress. You're measuring noise.
That's what the person notices on the other side: the difference between someone who improvises and someone who follows a protocol. You don't need a logo on a PDF to look professional - you need a real protocol, applied in front of them, in the first session.
The Baseline Protocol defines all of that. Which test, in what order, with what criteria, what voids a trial, and what to record so the retest is comparable.
What you get
All 6 tests, with the full protocol
Exact position, number of trials, rest periods, void criteria and stop criteria. Four fixed and two you choose based on the person's profile.
Safety screening and consent
The questions you need to ask before requesting a maximal effort from someone you just met, and the criteria that advise against continuing.
Standardized warm-up
Five minutes, always the same. It's the part that gets skipped most often, and the one that contaminates the retest the most.
Printable registration sheet
One page. Fits on a clipboard.
The normative values that exist - and the ones that don't
This is the part you won't find anywhere else. Keep reading.
Every test carries a label that tells you how much to trust it
This industry has normative tables floating around everywhere. Most have no verifiable provenance.
A real example: a broad-jump table in a well-known reference manual placed the 90th male percentile above the world record. It stayed published for years.
We went test by test to find out what data actually exists. And the result is uncomfortable: for half of the tests everyone uses, there are no valid norms.
So instead of hiding it, we turned it into the protocol's structure. Every test carries one of these four labels:
Published data exists. We can say where this person stands relative to others of the same age and sex, with each study's caveats.
No reliable norms exist. This number only means something compared to the same person's own number in eight weeks.
The reference is the other side of the body. No population data needed.
Qualitative observation. Not scored, not predictive, useful for choosing exercises.
Knowing which category you're in is more useful than a made-up percentile - especially at retest, when you need to decide whether a two-second change is progress or noise.
What you'll measure
Fixed
- Standing broad jump - lower-body explosiveness🔵Self-reference
- Single-leg hop - side-to-side asymmetry⚖️Symmetry
- Isometric wall sit - knee extensor strength-endurance🔵Self-reference
- Side bridge, both sides - lateral trunk endurance and asymmetry🟢Population reference⚖️Symmetry
Modular - pick two
- Single-leg heel raise - plantar flexor endurance🟢Population reference⚖️Symmetry
- Push-ups to technical failure - upper-body endurance🔵Self-reference
- 30-second chair stand - alternative when jumps aren't viable🟢Population reference
- Push-up plank hold - alternative to push-ups🔵Self-reference
For runners and endurance sports. It's the test with the best normative data in the whole battery.
The order is not negotiable: explosive first, failure last. Reverse it and you measure fatigue instead of explosiveness. The protocol explains it and the registration sheet enforces it.
What this protocol doesn't do
We'd rather you knew before downloading it.
It doesn't predict injuries.
No screening test does so reliably, and the field's systematic reviews are fairly clear on that. Detecting an 18% asymmetry is a reason to look, not a forecast.
It doesn't measure force in kilograms.
Everything is seconds, centimeters and reps. You're measuring the consequence of force, mixed with technique, leverage and tolerance for discomfort.
It's sensitive to body weight.
If the person loses 4kg in eight weeks, they'll jump farther, hold the wall sit longer and do more heel raises - without gaining a gram of strength. This protocol can't tell the two apart.
It has noise.
Time-to-failure tests vary quite a bit between sessions. It takes a large change to be sure it's real, and the protocol tells you how much.
None of this invalidates it. It's the best information you can get with a tape measure and a stopwatch, and it's far more than you have now.
But you should know where the limits are before showing someone a number.
Who it's for
- ✓Personal trainers who want a first session that closes the deal
- ✓Strength coaches running groups who need a common starting point
- ✓Sports physiotherapists who want to quantify before discharge
- ✓Anyone tired of saying "you're doing fine" without being able to prove it
Who it's not for
- ✕If you're looking for a 5-minute protocol, this isn't it
- ✕If you want a single score that sums up the person in one number, this isn't it either
- ✕If you need to measure force in kilograms, this doesn't do that, and we're telling you now
Download the complete protocol
6 tests · Registration sheet · Normative values
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Frequently asked questions
Thirty minutes with all six tests: two for screening, five for warm-up, fourteen for the tests, and about eight to walk through the report. If you're short on time, the Express version uses just the four fixed tests and takes twenty.
A tape measure, your phone's stopwatch and a smooth wall. Only one modular test, the heel raise, additionally needs a 10° wedge and a metronome - we have a free metronome ready on our site.
Yes, and many trainers do. It also works very well as a free first session: the prospect leaves with their results sheet and a concrete reason to come back in eight weeks.
Partially. The tests can be run over video call with supervision, but standardization suffers and measurement quality drops. It's designed for in-person use.
That happens about half the time, and the protocol includes how to have that conversation. Finding out at eight weeks instead of six months is exactly the point.
The protocol works entirely without any of our products, and there's no page pushing you to buy anything. On the last sheet we explain the limits of measuring in seconds and centimeters instead of kilograms, because it's information you need. What you do with that is up to you.
Stop assuming. Start measuring.
We don't promise your clients will improve.
We give you a way to know.
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