The Rise App: Nutrition experts in your pocket

Aside from moonlighting as a fitness and nutrition writer, I own a gym and act as a personal trainer and group fitness coach. My clients come to our gym for a number of reasons, including strength building, endurance training, weight loss, and general fitness. As a result, I try to stay up-to-date on tools that will help our members with their personal goals.

When weight loss is the goal, aside from prescribing a diet filled with lean meats, vegetables, fruit, nuts and seeds, and no sugar, I encourage clients to keep a food diary, either manually in a notepad or with an app (e.g. My Fitness Pal or My Plate), to track and monitor their daily food intake. The hope is that together, my client and I will begin to notice patterns in their eating habits – where overeating occurs and what foods can either be reduced or taken out entirely, for example. While I provide my professional opinion to my clients when viewing their food diaries, not everyone has access to fitness and nutritional help on an everyday basis – until now.



A new app called, Rise, provides users with a nutrition expert at their fingertips. The app pairs the user with a coach, who is works with them one-on-one to help them reach their fitness and weight loss goals. The app is simple to use, affordable (costing as little as $15 a week), and provides a human element that simple calorie trackers cannot.

When signing up for Rise, you enter in the typical data such as your height, current weight, gender, activity levels and goal weight. However, Rise, takes the “getting to know you” data a step further and allows you to post your real reason(s) for seeking nutrition health – ranging from general weight loss to help with marathon training. Not only that but it also allows you to identify and distinguish how you generally eat to pair you with an appropriate coach: whether you are vegetarian, vegan, follow a Mediterranean diet, or in the Paleo camp, they have a coach well suited to your needs.

Aside from being paired with coach that understands your needs, the app is simple to use. Instead of typing in food items and searching for them in other calorie tracker apps, Rise, lets you simply take a picture of your food and submit it for review. The coach then offers his advice on each meal and offers suggestions based on what he sees. The end result something calorie trackers cannot provide – human accountability. You receive real feedback from a real person to keep you on track and your eating habits in line with your personal goals. You can even choose the type of feedback you receive, ranging from encouragement to tough love, whatever type of motivation you need to keep you on track.



Having a coach, whether face-to-face or via online, can help keep you accountable and motivated as you work towards your weight loss goals. However, the service provides you with more than accountability and motivation; it assists you in establishing healthy eating habits. Establishing good eating habits not only sustains weight loss but also provides you with better overall health. So give Rise a chance – the only thing you have to lose are a few extra pounds you have been holding onto.