In an attempt to get more Saudi Arabian women to stay in shape, the Kingdom has relaxed its rules on allowing women to hit the gym. Exactly one year ago, and after a report issued by the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) stating that Saudi women are 39 per cent more likely to be obese than men, Princess Reema bint Bandar – daughter of a former Saudi ambassador to Washington – supported the licensing of female-only gyms and sports clubs and announced that the country planned for every district and neighbourhood to have a gym.

While Saudi Arabia didn’t send any women to the Olympics until 2012 and female gym-goers are still banned from participating in competitive sports, the local gyms opening around KSA are empowering women to lead a healthy lifestyle through exercise. But where are the trainers getting their certificates? Enter Empiric, an award-winning Emirati fitness training provider, which headed to the Kingdom to train more fitness professionals and raise the bar for fitness training and coaching in the kingdom.

WARM UP

Founder and managing director Cara Standley’s started when she opened her very own personal fitness studio in the UK in an old garage.

“The people I met and trained along the way inspired me to study further until I became a tutor for the UK’s largest personal training provider,” she says. “It was in this role that I was given an opportunity to teach in the UAE.”

After moving to the UAE in 2010, the fitness guru soon became a National Academy Manager for Fitness First Middle East, and slowly but surely, her network began to grow.

“I got to know the Middle East very well, delivering courses in the UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and Jordan. In all cases, it was my responsibility to ensure that our courses met international standards.”

Empiric was born a few years later, with Standley explaining that her extensive work experience brought her into contact with Ben Gittus, an international sports consultant, and Naser Al Tamimi, CEO of Register of Exercise Professionals. That was when the real push began for regulation of the fitness industry in the Emirates circa 2013.

She elaborates: “As a big advocate of industry regulation, I could see that the UAE needed to develop a pipeline of knowledgeable trainers to deliver courses to international standards, rather than relying on overseas talent. That’s really how the idea for Empiric was born.”

MOVING TO KSA

Empiric now comprises a team of ten dedicated, A-grade fitpros who have trained 300 fitness professionals from the all over the region.

The shortage of qualified female fitness instructors in Saudi Arabia created a big market gap that encouraged Empiric to provide internationally recognised fitness courses for women trainers there.

Says Standley: “The law change means that women in Saudi now have proper access to structured, sustainable, safe and sociable fitness. These are key factors for the success of any fitness programme and the benefits are so far reaching – better physical and mental health and improved all-round well-being.”

Empiric launched their first course at NuYu, a home-grown chain of boutique women’s fitness centres founded by the daughter of Saudi’s Crown Prince and is one of the kingdom’s fast-growing gym operators. Standley adds that penetrating the market was a delightful experience: “We regularly received enquires from people in Saudi asking if we were running courses there, so when we finally got the opportunity to, we jumped at the chance.

“Women’s gyms are really taking off in Saudi with group classes soaring in demand.”