Man v Fat: The soccer league shrinking waists and changing lives
Soccer is usually about putting the biggest number on board but with scoring only part of the goal and a set of scales on the sidelines, in this league you really have to pull your weight.
SA News
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The teams have names like OB City and FC Lardalona, and the banter is as quick as the on-field play, but there’s a serious side to the Man V Fat Soccer league that meets in Gawler on a Thursday night.
The players are united against a common enemy – the kilos that tend to pile on as blokes become dads and head into their thirties and forties.
Man V Fat Soccer, a concept brought to Australia from the UK by the University of WA, uses a unique scoring system that sees both goals scored and kilograms lost contributing to the league ladder.
Players are weighed and measured before every game, and if they’ve been cheating on the chips and chockies then the whole team suffers.
Rather than create a competitive atmosphere, organisers and players say, the opposite is true with the aspiring Ronaldos and Messis encouraging each other to lose weight and keep it off.
And the results have been startling, with all but one player in the first season losing weight. One player managed to shed 22.3kg in the 14-week period, while seven players managed to drop 10 per cent of their starting weight.
One star, Williamstown police officer Matt Hale, is now even training for a gruelling desert marathon.
“I was 88.8kg,” Mr Hale says.
“I found myself near the wrong side of 90kg, having less energy, and age beginning to catch up with me. I’d seen that this program was operating in WA, so when it came to SA I just couldn’t wait to get on board.”
Mr Hale, who now weighs in at a trim 73kg (you don’t get relegated for hitting your goals), says Man V Fat Soccer was about much more than regaining fitness.
“This is a real highlight of the week for me,” he says.
“My job can involve a lot of working on my own, and this job gives me the opportunity to mix with people from all walks of life in a team environment, sharing a common goal.”
Mr Hale says he was now looking forward to getting back into his hobby of scuba diving and had his sights set on the Great Kanku-Breakaways Marathon at Coober Pedy in May.
Chris O’Brien drives all the way from inner-suburban Magill to Gawler for his weekly kick with Man V Fat.
“We’re all in the same boat, all feeling the same way, and all encouraging of each other,” Mr O’Brien says.
“In the first season I lost 11kg, and then I was 4kg down at the start of the second season before I broke my foot. This season I’m aiming to lose more than 10 kilos.”
Craig Stevens, of Virginia, is in his second season and says it was as much about fun as fitness.
“We’re all adults and all a bit past it, so we don’t take it too seriously,” he says.
“We have people of all different standards, from beginners to people who’ve played at a high level, and all levels of fitness too. I guess we’re all in shape because … well, round in a shape.”
John Mundy, the futsal and soccer co-ordinator with STARplex, said obesity was a major issue in Australia and that the northern suburbs of Adelaide had the dubious honour of being mentioned among the nation’s weightiest postcodes. Mr Mundy said he’d seen Man V Fat do wonders for players confidence and self-esteem.
“There’s a WhatsApp group where everyone engages, and there have been instances where people have been a bit reluctant to come and have a kick and the rest of them will rally around and convince them to come out,” Mr Mundy says.
“At the end of the day everyone’s in the same boat.”