Meet Roy Belzer, the iconic body positive fitness coach!
We spoke with Roy Belzer, the iconic body positive fitness coach making waves on social media and real life!
Roy Belzer is the body positive fitness coach to know about. He’s been blowing up on Instagram and Tik Tok for being a bigger man in the fitness space giving tips and advice just being himself.
He’s made quite a name for himself too, racking up over 119k followers on Tik Tok and over 10k on Instagram. One quick scroll through his content will show you just how much he lives confidently and authentically free while giving fitness advice.
Through his travels and commentary on life, he’s become a mogul of his own for us big boys as an influencer and fitness coach. Beyond the social media content, he brings body inclusive travel retreats around the world that help people heal that relationship of fear many of us have when traveling related to food and what we are capable of doing on a vacation.
As a successful personal trainer, he also offers an online membership program that provides advice on multiple workouts per week, recipes for managing a diet that isn’t intimidating and as limiting as the standard advice you’d find on Google, and accountability challenges to keep up with your personal goals. He gives you all of this while providing a nonjudgemental space!
I had the chance to ask Roy a few questions about his journey into the fitness space, his content, and more! Check it out below.
Bryce Quartz: Hey there, Roy, thanks for taking the time to speak with me today! How have you been doing lately?
Roy Belzer: Hey! I’ve been doing really well. I am so excited that the weather is finally nice enough to move some of my workouts and clients outside. I have been taking FULL advantage of it.
Bryce: Let’s get right into the good stuff. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself? How long have you been a personal trainer and fitness coach?
Roy: Absolutely! I have been working in fitness for almost a decade at this point. Most of my work in fitness is in post physical therapy rehab for my one on one clients, then advocacy work in body diversity inclusion in the fitness world.
Bryce: If you feel comfortable sharing, can you tell us how you got into the fitness space?
Roy: Of course! My journey into fitness started with working toward my own weight loss when I was in high school. I grew up as a bigger kid and struggled with bullying and harassment. Kids in high school could be cruel with their words and don’t know the impact that they can have on others. I spent months dropping weight and changing myself for the approval of others.
Unfortunately this spurred me down a long and arduous road of Eating Disorders and unhealthy habits. It took years of therapy and recovery. After getting to a good place with my mental and physical health, I vowed to be the representation that I personally needed when I got started. I wanted to show people that you can be healthy at all sizes and that the size of your body is not equivalent to your value.
Bryce: I saw one of your most viral videos about being a fitness coach as a bigger guy, and it helped me change my perspective on what fitness can be for different people. Can you tell us what a fitness journey can look like beyond just weight loss?
Roy: I love that you took that away from seeing one of my videos! Fitness is SO much more than the size of your body. It’s how you move the body you’re in, it’s feeding it nutrient dense foods to function best, it’s being able to participate in your favorite activities without physical barriers.
There’s a myriad of ways to personally measure fitness in your life. It all depends on the life you want.
Bryce: I was very happy to see that you do receive a lot of support and positive comments on your pages, but I also saw hate comments too. How do you manage this hate publicly and privately, and what do you have to say to those who post ignorant comments on your pages?
Roy: I will always celebrate the supportive comments because it shows me that the work that I am doing is making a difference in peoples’ lives. I’m so grateful that I have opportunities to touch so many people and inspire them to live their lives more fully.
On the other side, I do get a lot of hate on the internet for doing what I do. People can’t stand to see someone in a larger body doing what they find difficult to do themselves in the gym.
I will occasionally use one of their awful comments on a video of me doing an outrageous exercise to stoke the fire a little because the algorithm loves conflict, then my videos get pushed to the people that will benefit from my content.
At the end of the day, the haters are helping me grow online.
Bryce: You have several great tips and advice on your pages that I think all of our readers should check out. Would you mind sharing 2 or 3 of your favorite tips with us here?
Roy: The first tip is to just ‘start’. Whatever that means to you, do it. You don’t have to wait until new years, don’t have to wait until the start of the month, you don’t even have to wait until Monday. Just ‘start’.
Second tip is to not overcomplicate it. You don’t have to have a perfectly laid out workout and meal plan to be successful. It can be as easy as starting with a walk around your neighborhood and adding in more vegetables to what you’re already eating.
We make it so hard in our heads, but it doesn’t have to be. Fitness is for everyone.
Bryce: Following up on the last question, what advice would you give our readers who are hesitant to start their own fitness journey?
Roy: If you’re hesitant to get started, then start with writing down your ‘why’. Why do you want to pursue health and fitness? What about your current life you’re living is something that you want to live differently?
Diet is often a big focal point in weight loss journeys, and it’s part of the reason I personally have a hard time losing weight for my own health reasons. I love food like most of us do! Do I have to give up my favorite foods to lose weight or can I still enjoy some of them while trying to lose weight?
I don’t often talk about weight loss as a rule because I work a lot with clients in Eating Disorder Recovery, but I think this is a safe question. You can absolutely change your body composition without fully letting go of the foods that you love!
When thinking about diet, I like continue to having the foods you enjoy while adding rather than subtracting from them.
Find places in the food you’re eating where you can add in more colorful vegetables and fruits. You’re having pasta tonight? Maybe we can add in mushrooms or peppers to it. Orange Sorbet for dessert? Let’s add on some actual oranges too.
Eating like this, you’re having the same quantity of food, but a portion of that food will be more nutrient dense and will help on your goals without sacrificing the foods you love.
Bryce: Just because I am curious and it’s one of my favorite questions to ask everyone, what are some of your favorite dishes or restaurants?
Roy: Love this question! It really depends where we’re going out, but if there is option for Burrata, I’m immediately ordering it for the table.
Bryce: Thanks for taking the time to speak with me today! Anything you’d like to leave our readers with?
Roy: I appreciate you taking time to interview me! I’d love to share a tiny bit about the retreats I host if that’s ok!
I host group retreats focused on community and empowerment for all bodies. Typically 5 days of sightseeing, introspective work, and mobility coaching to leave feeling better than when you came. They’re all an opportunity for people to see that travel and fitness can be accessible, and that you’re on your fitness journey with so many others and you’re not alone. Feel free to reach out to join one of the upcoming trips!
Thank you again!
Be sure to follow Roy on social media and give his content some love, consider booking one of his retreats, and leave a friendly comment or two on his posts!
Roy Belzer’s Links
Website – TikTok – Instagram – Facebook – YouTube
