Well last night was the finale of this seasons version of the Biggest Loser and it was a night of celebration and motivation not a night to watch challenges, gameplay or workouts and not very many tips either. I taped the show as always becasue two hours is too long for any TV show and they use lots and lots of commercials for filler.

The show was broken into two parts, first all of the kicked off players did a weight in to see who would win the $100,000 for the also rans and then the last four did their weight in to see who would be crowned Biggest Loser and wind $250,000.

As they introduced all of the players except the last 4 we were amazed at home at how much weight everyone seemed to lose. There were many ways that these people could have just given up and then not attended the final show but everyone was there and everyone lost a ton of weight. Read the rest of this entry »

Thanks for visiting. To get started why not subscribe to the 21 day fitness plan at the top of this page. Look in the red box, it is right there.. Thanks Bill

I hope that I am not going to be spoiling the Biggest Loser episode from last night for anyone, and if I am please please do not click the read more (until you watch the Biggest Loser on tape or PVR). Read the rest of this entry »

I know that I was mad at Neil and was boycotting the Biggest Loser because of the way that he gamed the game but last night I sat down with my wife and we watched the Biggest Loser. Last nights episode was the makeover episode and the biggest losers went onto the set of “Days of our Lives”. It was fun to watch since some of the people on the show really do follow that soap but I have never seen it at all except Allison Sweeney on a commercial one day for the show.

I was shocked at how much weight these guys look like they have lost. They are all looking really slim and Neil (who I still hate for the water drinking incident) seems to be now losing more than anyone. One of the big changes that I always notice on the Biggest Loser is how all of the people look younger every week the more weight that they lose.

Kay got kicked off the show and I think it was kind of ineveitable but i am not really sure how the strategies work on the show. As we know she has lost the most weight percentage-wise but she would not be losing much each weight anymore I think. Last night they brought Kay back and after 3 months at home she lost another 18 pounds. That is fantastic! She is really slim and healthy looking and espeically when you compare how she looked when the show started.

I guess I will be back on the Biggest Loser bandwagon now. The show is fun to watch and it seems that no one is holding any grudges for game play.

One other thing that I did notice last night was the stupid product endorsements. Jillian is walking and talking and out of no where she says

“Sometimes you don’t need a snack, Just have a piece of Wrigleys Gum” and she pulls out a pack of gum.

Drives me crazy.

I wrote this article in anger a few months ago during season 4 of the Biggest Loser after Neil, one of the contestants gamed the Biggest Loser by cheating and drinking a couple of gallons of water right before the weight in. I am now again watching the Biggest Loser. But in reading this post you can see the anger that i had about the cheating and I certainly hope that the people that run the Biggest Loser do not let it happen again.

————————————————————————–

Well after three almost four seasons of watching the Biggest Loser as well as blogging about it I have now decided to boycott the show for good.

Anyone that saw tonight’s episode of the Biggest Loser was a horrible farce and hurt most of the contestants and I expect most of the viewers.

So, what happened tonight on the Biggest Loser, horrible gamesmanship. One of the teams conspired against everyone else but in the end one of the players, Neil, cheated by retaining water and gaining 17 pounds and instead of getting kicked out of the game he actually got what he wanted and that was for someone on one of the other teams kicked out.

There are of course no rules against trying to gain weight on the Biggest Loser but going this far is a terrible way to try to play the game.

NBC has always tried to plug the Biggest Loser as a motivational show where people come together and support each other to try to lose weight and change their lives but then they have allowed this to happen.

I know that there is no way to change this as the show is taped ahead of time so the next few weeks have already been taped but with falling ratings you have to think that NBC has conspired with the people on the show to create a ridiculous controversy that does nothing but piss of the viewers that still support the show.

for most people it is hard to lose weight and losing 1 or 2 pounds is all that most people really expect. For this show to inspire people with 10 pound weight losses and then to allow one person to game the show with a 17 pound weight gain is absolutely terrible in my eyes

Boycott the Biggest Loser by not watching it anymore.

I don’t want to go into too much detail about last nights episode of the biggest loser, instead I just want to dwell on the lack of weight loss over the last two weeks on the show.

If you remember the first week of this season of the Biggest Loser, everyone lost big weight and now over the last two weeks just about everyone is losing 3-5 pounds per week. This is very disappointing to the people on the show I can imagine because they have gone from a basically sedentary lifestyle with unlimited food to a very regimented 3-4 hours a day (I am guessing) of exercise and a very strict diet.

So, this of course begs the question, “Why are the biggest losers ont losing a lot of weight?”. Well the reason that everyone lost a lot of weight during the first week of the Biggest Loser was due in a large part to exercise and eating change coupled with a lot of water weight loss. You only get the chance to lose weight these ways once per diet so they will not work for very long.

Now over the last two weeks the biggest losers are now going through the pases of tougher and tougher exercise while keeping their diets clean. The losses from all of those workouts should obviously be helping them lose weight but the bodies of the players are at this point probably going through the turmoil of the changes and everyone is having some kind of metabolism problem.

One of the things that we are really seeing is the sleep problems that people are having. With all of the exercise and injuries these guys are needing a lot of time to heal but with all of this exercise and changed diet the regular circadian rythym that would have them sleep deep is all screwed up as well.

So lets say that over the next couple of week everyones bodies will start to adjust, metabolisms will rise and the weight loss will start to really mount up. What should these guys do to make sure that they feel good and don’t go into a depression over the lack of weight loss.

First, remember the changes that are taking place in their bodies are temporary - know that as lifestyle changes your body needs to slowly catch up.

Secondly, make sure that you don’t look for shortcuts - starving yourself or doing an extra couple of hours of cardio or weights in the short term will scare your body into preserving fat and in the long term will lead to discouragment in the process.

Thirdly, make sure that you have the end in mind - Changing your life for the better is a process and change in habits. As long as the players trust that they are going to lose the 100 pounds or whatever eventually and that the plan will work. Lifestyle changes (exercise and better eating not crazy amounts of exercise and not eating) are going to be permanent and therefore the weight loss will be permanent.

None of us know what next week will bring but sometime over the next couple of weeks we are going to see these guys lose a lot of weight again, 8-12 pounds in a week at their level will be more normal but of course it all depends on the outside and internal influences to the eating and exercise.

The second episode for the Biggest Loser this season was a two hour episode just like the first episode was. We get a bit of a recap and then watched as the two main teams worked out and the Black Team headed by Jillian Michaels had their first weight in. These guys are all working out really hard and in fine Biggest Loser form we are getting to see punishment.

One of the great things about the Biggest Loser is the little short tips that you run into during the show. One of the guys was eating next to nothing and got beat up for it. If you do not eat your body goes into a starvation mode and you will not be able to raise your metabolism to lose weight. Kim Lyons also brought up the idea of eating ground turkey instead of ground beef. Turkey is high in protein and very low in fat so it is a great alternative whether ground up or just cooked instead of steak or chicken.

I want to skip the other stuff for now from the show because I think the real highlight in the two hours was the read and blue teams finally seeing the cast-offs, the black team coached by Jillian Micheals.

“strong like a tidal wave” I have no idea who used this line as it came so fast but one of Jillian Michaels people used this term to discribe one of his team mates. This was the day that the red and blue teams got to meet the black team. As happened last season the read and blue teams did not feel that the black team deserved to be there but just because they did not see them does not mean that the black team was not working hard. The problem last season was that all of the bonding that went on meant the the people working out from home were looked at as infiltrators and were never really accepted…we will see how this season goes as there are now three pretty evenly matched teams.

Read the rest of this entry »

The new season, season 4 of Biggest Loser is now underway. I am again excited at the prospect of a new season and glad that they did away with and introduced some changes to the format of the Biggest Loser.

Of course the big change was to bring back Jillian Michaels as the trainer and coach of the new Black team, a team that the main group knows nothing about. Jillian has a bit of an edge in that she is playing on the emotions of her team as the castoffs that were not chosen while the other teams duke it out at the new non-ranch location.

Another change this season is the integration of the teams with the trainers. Bob Harper and Kim Lyons were both in the room for both the initial and second weigh ins and you could see their excitement and disappointment when members lost more or less than they had hoped.

Finally the Biggest Loser changed the format in that they do not have a few people on and kick off most of the people to workout at home by themselves, I did not like this last season and made it quite clear a few times in previous posts.

So now finally on to the show – the first of two two hour episodes with next week being two hours as well.

The Biggest Loser season 4 started with an almost 15 minute preview of this coming season, I guess this was OK even though it felt a bit like a commercial but the thing is that over the first few weeks we do not have a chance to get to know the people on the show very well and that is really to me what the show is all about.

The show starts with 18 people racing to Bob Harper and Kim Lyons with the two winners picking a team of 6 and having 6 people sent home, waving as the two team busses leave….or so they think, in rides Jillian Michaels to secretly take this team of 6 outcasts to become her new black team that will not show up in the game until after the second week.

More…

So the teams are now set, Bob Harper is working with the Blue team, Kim Lyons is working with the Red team and Jillian Michaels is working with the Black team. All the teams have six members and at this point seem pretty evenly matched as far as we could see.

The challenge this week was to load all of the weight that the teams want to lose individually into a private jet and then push and pull the jet across a finish line. Impressive to say the least with the red team winning the challenge and getting to read letters for home. Both my wife and I thought it was a little early for the letters at home type of reward, when did they see their families last? Last week? Anyway they could have waited 4 or 5 weeks for that one I thought.

Jillians black team is still working away in secret…

Finally in the weigh in the Blue team won. At the end of the weight in the captain of the Blue team, 62 year old Phil (an IT Project Manager) had to lose more than 5 pounds for his team to win and ended up losing 31 pounds.

So the Red team had to kick off one of their own, Amber, who tried to give up early seemed almost relieved to be kicked out of the game. I think that sometimes people are excited about being on a reality show and when they actually get there have trouble with the pain and interpersonal relationships that they had not really though through.

That’s it, the first episode of the Biggest Loser Season 4 is over but I am going to add some posts this week about the tips from the show as well as the people and what they seemed like.

Tonight the Biggest Loser Season 4 starts with a two hour season premiere and I know that my family anyway are eagerly awaiting the new season including my seven year old daughter. Last year I encouraged people that watch the show to do something to follow along, perhaps start a group at work, or at least go on your own intense diet and exercise program.

One of the great things that we learn on the Biggest Loser is the relationship between eating, exercise and weight loss. All three of these are related but not in the way many people think. The people on the Biggest Loser will lose a lot of weight every week but they are in a very controlled environment where they can see how their body is reacting to the amount and kinds of food they eat as well as the crazy exercise that they are getting.

 When someone says don’t try this at home in this case they really mean it. It is healthy to lose a couple or five pounds in a week but losing 10 or 20 pounds a week for weeks on end is very difficult and needs to be monitored by doctors. Most often when people try cutting and cleaning their diet and start to exercise 2 or 3 hours every day they will get great results but after a few weeks those results stop dead as their body scrambles to hold onto fat and lowers the metabolism.

If this season of the Biggest Loser lasts 15 weeks and you are looking to lose 30 pounds then why not challenge yourself. Clean up your diet, exercise once or twice six days a week and make sure that you stay on track. If you lose 2 pounds a week then you can be down 30 pounds by Christmas.

So I hope you as well will be joining in to watch Bob Harper, Kim Lyons, Jillian Michaels and a whole new group of people trying to make up for some bad decisions in the past.

I will be sure to update tonight after the show.

One of the things that came up on the first episode of the Biggest Loser a couple days ago was fitness tips from the pros. Alison Sweeney, the new Biggest Loser Host asked Kim Lyons and Bob Harper what their top tips would be for losing weight.

Kim Lyons said that her number one tips would be to stay away from diet soda. The diet soda fools your body and the caffiene will retain water.

Bob Harper said that the inner mind part is the most important part of weight loss and keeping it off. He said that Yoga and meditation are great ways to keep your mind focussed so that you do not get distracted from your goal of losing weight.

Jillian Michaels was not on the show as I guess they are still trying to keep her as a surprise so no tips from Jillian this week.

We watched yesterdays Biggest Loser episode tonight and it was nice to see the people that we liked and did not like over the last three seasons of the Biggest Loser.

The show was basically just a precursor to the season that will be starting next week with a two hour premiere of the Biggest Loser Season 4. We got  lots of weight ins and stories and a little bit of a preview of the season and I am again excited.

First the weigh ins. I am not sure what we expected but it seems that all of the people gained weight from when they left the show which I guess we should expect. It is not often in life that you get to take a couple of months off and just eat well and workout all day long and as tough as that task would be it must be even harder once you are back home with all of your friends, vices and bad eating and exercising habits. Almost everyone though still looks great so it is nice to see these people as role models for those that have a lot of weight to lose and do not know where to turn.

Just to add another feel to the show there was a clip about Matt Hoover and Suzy Preston who got married after being finalists in the second season and about how they are now proud parents…Matt seems to have gained a lot of weight back but the knowledge of how to get the weight back down never goes away. The other little piece that we got to see was the engagement on live TV of Marty and Amy from last season.

Lastly there was a few minutes of clips of the new teams saying how tough it is and Jillian Michaels riding in on a motorbike as the surprise third coach for this season.

The Biggest Loser Season 4 all starts next Tuesday night