Fighting the kilos

Weight loss coaching: krone.at does the self-test

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Get rid of your belly in a short space of time and finally get fit again? And without spending hours sweating it out in the gym and painstakingly sacrificing your diet? krone.at wanted to find out and carried out a six-month self-test. In our multi-part series, you can find out what is behind the promise that coaches use to lure customers in the growing market for weight loss coaching and fitness, and whether long-term results can actually be achieved.

Health, fitness, sport, weight loss: The trend towards self-optimization is entirely in line with health promotion and prevention, which are also at the top of the political health agenda. The aim of the policy is to reduce people's risk of illness and prevent unhealthy behavior.

More than half of all Austrians are overweight
Background: Currently, just over half of adults and around a quarter of children and adolescents in Austria are already overweight (body mass index/BMI 25 to 29) or obese (BMI 30 and over), the Austrian Health Insurance Fund (ÖGK) sounded the alarm in March. According to the report, men are affected more frequently in all age groups and the incidence rises sharply with age.

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Prevention, as well as improving health literacy in terms of diet, exercise and mental health, are therefore extremely important. More and more people are realizing this: Diets are not the way to success and are not suitable for losing weight sustainably. If we want to achieve a long-term improvement in our quality of life, we need a different approach.

Today, the desire for positive change is also reflected in the growing interest in weight loss coaching and fitness programs. For example, Philipp Jelinek, the nation's leading gymnast, has recently been successfully enriching the lives of many Austrians with daily exercise sessions on krone.tv with "Philipp bewegt".

Increasing demand for weight loss coaches
The demand for coaches who specialize in long-term weight loss and fitness is also steadily increasing in Austria. There are now estimated to be several hundred such coaches offering their services in the country. They promise tailor-made programs that are adapted to the individual needs and lifestyles of their clients.

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Their promise: Help not only with weight loss, but also with feeling healthier overall and improving fitness. Methods vary, but often include a combination of nutritional advice, personalized training plans and mental coaching to achieve sustainable results.

In general, since the coronavirus pandemic, there has been a boom in online coaching in all areas of life - from finance to finding happiness or sport to time management. The proliferation is unavoidable and not all providers are reputable - you need to be wary of charlatans with dubious offers and full-bodied promises that end up throwing money down the drain. Or even damage your health when it comes to fitness and weight loss.

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Six months on the road to self-optimization
krone.at wanted to find out for itself and has been conducting the self-test since the beginning of 2024. For six months, I embarked on a journey of self-optimization. At 44 years old, I have struggled with being overweight and lacking fitness all my life. Despite my own efforts to do more for myself in recent years, I was unable to achieve satisfactory results in the long term - which was also becoming more and more of a mental burden for me.

That's why, based on positive customer reviews on Trustpilot and a personal recommendation, I opted for weight loss coach Laurenz Staindl, whose strategy has already helped over 200 clients achieve their fitness goals and lead a healthier lifestyle. His coaching combines individual nutrition plans, training programs and motivational techniques to achieve sustainable results.

On his website, the young weight loss expert, who himself took part in the show Ninja Warrior, promises personal support and tailored strategies that would "integrate seamlessly into a hectic working day". His customer reviews praise the effectiveness and sustainability of his methods.

99.9 kilograms on the scales as a wake-up call
So Laurenz and I arranged an initial non-binding consultation before the start of the coaching session to assess my current weight, diet and lifestyle in general. At the time, I was 188 centimetres tall and weighed 82 kilograms. In 2019, I had reached my maximum weight of exactly 99.9 kilograms - and swore back then that I never wanted to see 100 on the scales.

Since then, I have been able to reduce my weight on my own initiative with regular exercise, self-weight exercises and a few changes to my diet, but I still fluctuated between 85 and 90 kilograms. A far cry from my desired weight. My stomach in particular has always been my biggest problem area. Also because there are heart diseases in my family history that I simply can no longer ignore in my mid-forties.

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The goal: to be sustainably healthy and fit at 45
Before I decided to try Laurenz's coaching, I managed to reduce my weight to around 82 kilograms by the end of 2023, but the path I took to get there with intermittent fasting and irregular training sessions was simply not sustainable. The belly fat in particular stubbornly persisted and just wouldn't go away. Celebrating my 45th birthday in the fall of 2024 as healthy and fit as possible - and staying that way in the long term - was my self-declared goal. But without support, I had little hope of actually achieving this goal.

So much for the initial situation. In the next part of the series, you can read how I fared in the first two months of weight loss coaching with coach Laurenz Staindl - and what initial successes I was able to achieve along the way.