ACE recommends you spend three to four months studying for your exam. I would recommend that in that time you try to do something everyday for at least 20 - 30 minutes. Wouldn't you say the same about cardio for someone who wants to lose weight. If you are serious about your goals of writing the exam you should do a little something everyday towards that goal. There is a lot of information to cover in the ACE Personal Trainers Manual and it can often seem daunting for students, especially in the beginning. If you also are new to anatomy and physiology then The Exercise Science Manual can also be extremely daunting - read on for what is crucial within each book.

This is going to make up the majority of your exam and is a crucial book to read. Your ACE Exam is broken into 4 Domains and the information which comes from this book is literally a manual for personal trainers. Detailing how to communicate with clients, act as a professional, carry out   proper assessments and understand essential program design skills. This book also references many different high risk populations and their more medically related conditions, as well as injuries, business procedures, and legal aspect to the profession. This book does not contain any information on the anatomy and physiology of the human body, for such we can turn to ACE's Essentials of Exercise Science.

Be sure to check out the Free Demo Course for The ACE Personal Trainers Manual.

This book is a dense five chapters of information which often goes more in depth than is necessary and can take students years upon years to fully comprehend and understand. Is it crucial for exam success? No. Is it worthy of just completely ignoring? No. A good personal trainer is one who strives for knowledge and results. In my experience as a personal trainer and educator the more you understand the science of the human body, the more effective a trainer you are. How we put on muscle mass, lose body fat, increase flexibility is all biology, chemistry, and physics. This does not mean you must learn everything in this book immediately, or even before you write your exam. But this book teaches what any first year university anatomy course might teach but relates it to physical activity. If you purchase the book, do the quizzes and lessons at the end. Focus on the Personal Trainers Manual.

Be sure to check out the Free Demo Course for Muscles - 101, all essential muscle knowledge from the Exercise Science Book.