Having previously played rugby for many years, the bodybuilding stage is the next challenge for Jack Ako after his remarkable weight loss story.
Jack’s efforts to get back into shape began when he hit 47 stone and, after much hard work and determination, he’s now getting set for his first bodybuilding show as well as building his own personal trainer business.
We caught up with him to find out the full story about how he went from a difficult time in his life to being set to compete in a public forum.
Looking back to the start of your journey, how did you find yourself at 47 stone and what was the trigger that made you start your weight loss efforts?
I don’t think anybody wakes up one morning at nearly 47 stone. It happens gradually, and for me food had become a massive part of how I dealt with life. My relationship with food was completely wrong, my portions were out of control and over the years my weight just kept increasing.
Eventually I got to the point where I was sick of looking in the mirror and being disgusted with the person looking back at me. I couldn’t believe I’d allowed myself to get to nearly 47 stone before realising something seriously needed to change.
That was my tipping point. I realised nobody was coming to do it for me. I could either continue down the same path or accept that changing my life was going to be difficult and start doing something about it.
At that size, losing over 30 stone seemed almost impossible. So I couldn’t think about the full journey. I had to concentrate on making the next better decision and then doing it again the following day.
Eventually those small decisions completely changed my life.
What were the hardest parts of that journey from where you were to where you are now?
People see a before-and-after photograph and it makes the whole thing look very straightforward. They don’t see the years between those two pictures.
The hardest part wasn’t one particular diet or exercise. It was changing behaviours I’d built over years and accepting that this couldn’t be something I did for a few months before going back to my old life.
There were setbacks, plateaus, hunger, days when I didn’t want to train and times when the scales didn’t give me the result I thought I’d earned.
Then there are things that come with extreme weight loss that aren’t talked about enough. Losing the weight doesn’t automatically fix your confidence or the way you see yourself. I also had a huge amount of loose skin and eventually went through skin-removal surgery.
Your body can change much faster than your head catches up with it.
I’ve had to learn that this journey isn’t about perfection. It’s about consistently making better decisions and being able to recover from the days when you don’t.
What mental health benefits have you found along the way?
The biggest change for me has probably been the belief I have in myself.
When you’ve taken yourself from nearly 47 stone to where I am today, difficult things don’t seem quite as impossible anymore.
Training has also given me structure. Having goals, getting up and doing something difficult even when I don’t necessarily feel like doing it, and seeing myself continually progress has massively improved my confidence.
But I think it’s important to say that losing weight doesn’t magically make every insecurity disappear. I’ve had to work on the mental side alongside the physical transformation.
What I’ve gained is a sense of control over the direction of my life. I’m a husband, a dad, I’ve become a personal trainer and I’m now preparing to compete in bodybuilding. Those aren’t things the version of me at nearly 47 stone would have imagined I’d be doing.
What parts of your experiences do you share most often with your clients?
Probably that you have to change your relationship with food, not simply change the amount of food you’re eating temporarily.
I don’t want somebody to follow a perfect diet for 12 weeks, lose some weight and then have absolutely no idea what to do afterwards.
I’ve been the person who has a huge amount of weight to lose. I understand how overwhelming it can feel when somebody tells you where you ultimately need to be, because that finish line can seem miles away.
So with my AkoTrainz clients I talk a lot about smaller achievable goals, consistency, accountability and building habits around their actual lives.
I’m also very open about the fact that I haven’t done everything perfectly. That’s important because I don’t want clients thinking one takeaway, one bad weekend or one missed gym session means they’ve ruined everything.
You don’t need a perfect day. You need enough good days repeated for long enough.
How have you managed to maintain that healthy weight and what tips around food and nutrition would you think are most important?
The biggest reason I’ve maintained the change is because I stopped viewing healthy eating as something I was temporarily doing to lose weight. Nutrition is just part of my lifestyle now.
Protein and whole, minimally processed foods form a big part of what I eat, alongside fruit and vegetables, but I don’t believe somebody needs to live on chicken and broccoli to lose weight.
Understanding portions and overall energy intake is important, but so is finding foods you genuinely enjoy. If you hate everything you’re eating, eventually you’re probably going to stop eating that way.
Planning is also massive for me. Meal prepping means that when I’m working, busy or hungry, I’ve already got an appropriate option available instead of relying on whatever is most convenient.
One of the biggest lessons I’d give somebody starting out is: don’t try to completely overhaul your entire life on Monday morning.
Start making better choices that you can realistically repeat. Learn about your food, increase your activity, prioritise protein and nutritious foods, but leave room for actually enjoying your life. The best nutrition plan isn’t necessarily the most aggressive one. It’s the one you can consistently follow.
How has the world of bodybuilding helped you keep that focus and what are the best parts of being involved in that environment?
Bodybuilding has given me a completely different goal.
For years, everything was about losing weight. Eventually I didn’t want my entire identity to be about making myself smaller. I wanted to see what I could build.
That’s one of the reasons competing means so much to me. I’m preparing for my first bodybuilding show, and standing on that stage will have nothing to do with whether I come home with a trophy.
I’ll be able to stand there knowing that at one point I weighed nearly 47 stone.
Bodybuilding has taught me another level of discipline because progress comes from doing fairly basic things consistently—training, nutrition, recovery, cardio and then doing them again and again.
I’ve also loved being around people who are constantly trying to improve themselves. Everyone might have different starting points and different goals, but there’s a shared understanding of the work involved.
For me, bodybuilding represents the next chapter.
The first part of my journey was about losing over 30 stone and getting my life back. Now I want to find out what I’m capable of building with that life. And if standing on a bodybuilding stage after once weighing nearly 47 stone makes one bloke who’s struggling with his weight think, “Maybe I’m not too far gone either,” then that means far more to me than where I place.
Want to follow Jack’s story?
You can see how Jack gets on at his bodybuilding event and look back at his story on his Instagram feed – good luck, Jack!
