Football fans get FFITer and lose weight

The Lancet : A gender-sensitised weight loss and healthy living programme for overweight and obese men delivered by Scottish Premier League football clubs (FFIT): a pragmatic randomised controlled trial BMC Public Health: Do weight management programmes delivered at professional football clubs attract and engage high risk men? A mixed-methods study FFIT website An initiative that helps male football fans feel better and live a healthier lifestyle by losing weight, taking more exercise, and improving their diet has been a resounding success, according to new research published in The Lancet and BMC Public Health . The Football Fans in Training programme* (FFIT) has run for three seasons at Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL) clubs. The research, led by a team at the University of Glasgow, UK, shows that FFIT has proved extremely popular with men, and its effectiveness and value for money have now been clearly demonstrated in one of the world's first randomised control trial (RCT) of a health programme delivered through professional sports clubs. Professor Sally Wyke, one of the two Principal Investigators from the University of Glasgow said: "We now have 'gold standard' evidence that the FFIT programme can help men lose weight and keep it off. After 12 months, the difference in weight loss between men who did the programme and men in a comparison group, who did not do the programme, was 4·94kg." The study, which was funded by the National Institute for Health Research Public Health Research (NIHR PHR) Programme, began in June 2011 and it involved 747 men.