The Female-Client Programming Intake
The layer that sits before the program. Walk the 18 intake questions, mark what you flagged, and get the constraint profile: the autoregulation band to build at, the adjustment cases that actually apply, and the referral triggers you just raised. Nothing is stored — no sign-in, no client record, no answers saved.
The principles don’t change. The constraints do.
Run the 18 questions with your client, record what you flagged, and this gives you back the same thing the checklist would: a flag count, the band to prescribe in, the adjustment cases that apply, and the point where you stop coaching and refer.
What this is, and what it is not
This is not a program. It is the layer that sits before the program: the questions that tell you whether anything needs to change, the defaults that absorb variability without a rebuild, the four cases where you genuinely adjust, and the point where you stop coaching and refer.
The principles don’t change for female clients, the constraints do. Program the constraint, not the category.
This checklist is a coaching tool, not a diagnostic instrument, and nothing in it is medical advice. Section 5 defines the referral line.
Section 1 — the 18 intake questions
One tap per question. You decide what counts as a flag; this counts them and routes them. Leave a question untouched and it stays out of the count.
“These questions change how I build your program. Answer what you’re comfortable with. Anything you skip, we can come back to later, and nothing here is shared with anyone.”
Consent and control stated up front produce better disclosure than any clever phrasing. Ask all 18 of every client.
Nothing you tap here is saved, sent, or attached to a client. Close the tab and it is gone — so finish in one sitting, and keep the client record wherever you already keep it.
0 of 18 answered
Training history and load exposure
Why it changes the program: establishes the starting point for progression cadence and the client’s realistic recoverable volume.
Q1.How many years have you trained with resistance, and how consistently in the last 12 months?
Q2.What is the heaviest structured training block you have completed, and how did you feel by the end of it?
Q3.Have you ever stopped training for more than a month? What caused the stop?
Energy availability and fuelling
Why it changes the program: chronic low energy availability blocks adaptation. A client under-fuelling will read as a programming failure or an adherence failure, and responding to either reading makes it worse. Q7 is a referral screen, not an assessment.
Q4.Roughly how many meals or substantial eating occasions do you have on a normal training day?
Q5.Have you followed a restrictive diet, a prolonged calorie deficit, or a structured cut in the last 12 months?
Q6.Do you currently have a body-composition goal, and is it running at the same time as a performance goal?
Q7.Have you ever had, or been told you might have, a disordered relationship with food or exercise?(Optional — skip freely.)
Menstrual status and symptom load
Why it changes the program: symptom load is the variable that matters, not calendar phase. Q10 sets your autoregulation width. Q11 respects an individual pattern where one genuinely exists without imposing one where it doesn’t. Q8 and Q9 are referral screens.
Q8.Is your cycle currently regular, irregular, absent, or not applicable (contraception, pregnancy, menopause, other)?
Q9.If it has ever stopped or become irregular, when, and what was happening at the time?
Q10.Do you get symptoms that genuinely affect training? Which ones, and roughly how many days a month?
Q11.Have you noticed a repeatable pattern in how training feels across your cycle?(A “no” here is a completely normal answer.)
Life stage
Why it changes the program: Q12 triggers a staged return protocol rather than a normal build. Q13 is a referral, not a programming variable. Q14 changes what you expect from recovery and what you watch, and it is worth asking of every client over 35 rather than waiting to be told.
Q12.Are you pregnant, or have you given birth in the last 24 months? If so, how long ago and what kind of delivery?
Q13.Do you experience any leaking, heaviness, or pressure during lifting, running, jumping, or coughing?
Q14.Are you experiencing symptoms you associate with perimenopause or menopause — sleep change, joint symptoms, recovery feeling different, temperature regulation?
Injury, bone and blood
Why it changes the program: Q15 shapes selection and warm-up. Q16 and Q17 are referral screens with a low threshold. Q18 catches everything the previous 17 questions failed to ask, and in practice it is the highest-yield question on the form.
Q15.Any knee, hip, back or pelvic injury history? Include anything that required time off, not only anything that required surgery.
Q16.Have you ever had a bone stress injury or a fracture from a fall that didn’t seem bad enough to break something?
Q17.Have you had bone density, iron or ferritin tested? Do you know the result?
Q18.Is there anything else about your health, your history, or your life right now that would change how you’d want me to coach you?
Answer a question to build the profile
The profile updates as you go. You do not have to answer all 18 before it says anything useful — but the count only means what the source says it means once you have.
Get the full checklist as a PDF
The intake above stays free and needs no email. Drop yours and the rest of the checklist opens right here — the check-in that surfaces the truth, the escalation ladder, the remaining autoregulation defaults, and the referral network to line up before you need it. The full PDF downloads straight from this page.
- Right here: the four check-in questions, the two rules that make them work, and the escalation ladder
- Right here: the bad-day rule, the escalation threshold, and the progression cadence table
- Right here: the three professionals to line up now, and what to do after a referral
- The whole checklist as a 19-page PDF — downloads straight from this page, printable and greyscale-safe
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