Friday, February 18, 2011

Day 49 - "The Biggest Loser" February Update

Today is all about getting caught up on The Biggest Loser. It has been one month since my previous post on the show, which means the contestants have gone through five more weeks on the ranch. Here is a short update on each of the episodes over the last five weeks:


Episode 3

Introducing new trainers
Cara - one of the new trainers. She is a competitive boxer. Won the golden gloves in NY 2x. Mom died when she was young and her mother just recently passed away. Wants to bring out the fighter in all the contestants.
Brett - fitness trainer and motivator. Martial artist who dabbled in all of the arts. Was originally an overweight kid but overcame it. If they can change themselves emotionally and mentally, the rest will follow.


During the first challenge, in which contestants balance an egg on the bottom side of a frying pan for as long as possible, the winner of the challenge of both teams (unknowns and ranch)will meet over dinner in order to compete for a  lb advantage at the weigh in. The Unknowns throw the challenge to allow the pink team, Denise to win the challenge. On the ranch side, Marcy took the win for the aqua team.


This episode, Dr. H got to talk to the Unknown team. Dr. H was able to show Q what the excess weight is doing to him in terms of his weight. The excess fat he has aged him from his actual 27 years of age to 51 years old. Justin got emotional when he realized that his weight has aged him by 20 years, bringing his body to be at the level of about a 59 year old. When Dr. H talked with Sarah, he revealed to her that she has the highest body fat percentage (58%) of all of the contestants and her metabolic rate was the lowest of anyone on the show. In order to change her life, she is going to have to put in over 90 minutes of exercise, six days a week, for the rest of her life. Moses, who is 47 years old, was projected to die in the year 2025… in fifteen years unless he drastically changes his life now. Moses vowed to change the date of his supposed death into a date where the family will celebrate his and his daughters changed lives. Brett tells us that the training is showing the contestants that there are comebacks in the game and comebacks in life. The unknown team were inspired to put in even more effort into their workout after their talks with Dr. H.

On the ranch, contestants worked their butts off in order to stay in the game. Bob and Jillian took time to pull aside some of the contestants to talk to them about why they came onto the show and to put fire back in them.  Jillian, took the twins aside to make sure they were still going to stay on the ranch. Jillian worries about Dan, hoping that he doesn't allow the tragedy of losing his son to cost him his own life as well. But Dan committed to working on himself.


The two challenge winners then met over dinner. They watched as Curtis Stone cooked them a dinner. Then after eating it, they had to guess how many calories were in the dinner. After the dinner, Marci has the closest guess to the right amount of calories and wins the 2 lb advantage!

In their next challenge, the players are pitted against each other to fill up their opponents buckets with water. Each trek from the water to the buckets is about a quarter mile. The winner is allowed to have the only vote in the elimination. The players allow Irene to win.

Before the Ranch team is able to start their weigh ins, they are first told the unknown's progress. One of the unknown members, Moses, has already lost a total of 64 lbs since starting the show!  During their weigh in, Ali reminds the contestants that if Irene can stay above the yellow line, she will have the only vote in the elimination. If she falls below it, though, she will automatically be eliminated. During the actual weigh in, the ranch contestants are all shocked by their weight loss. Arthur, the heaviest guy on campus only lost 4 lbs and the twins, Dan and Don, actually gained 9 lbs. Bob is furious, claiming that they threw the weigh in, hoping to leave the ranch. In the final elimination, Irene votes for Dan to go home. Dan leaves and encourages his bother Don to continue his journey of weight loss while Dan does so as well at home.


Episode 4

The players are extremely frustrated on the ranch team with Dan and Don's 9 lb gain each. They all worked to make it clear to Don that the weigh in looks badly on them all. Don went to bed feeling terrible.

To start up the week of training, Ali tells the contestants that one team is going to leave the ranch to train with the unknowns for an entire week. The challenge: to eat the most calories of their favorite foods in order to choose who gets to go train with the unknowns for the week. Arthur was the only contestant to eat. He tried to pick the food item that had the least amount of calories, and so he chose to eat one fried chicken leg. Arthur then had the ability to choose the team to go to the unknowns, so he chose the green team.

The green team was able to meet the new trainers and have a little while to bond with the unknowns. While they have the week to train with Cara and Brett, they still do not have immunity and will be up for the possibility of elimination. Cara and Brett were able to see that the green team was actually looking pretty fit and that the Ranch contestants might be a force to be reckoned with.

Back at the Ranch, Bob and Jillian ask to talk to Don. They are frustrated with Don and his unwillingness to feel and to engage. The ask him to be angry and to say what he feels. Don lets them have it, but Bob and Jillian still worry about whether Don will stay or go home.


Jillian also talks with Courtney about how to let people help her reach her goals. Jillian tells her that often times, children will take their parents attempts to help as discontent with them. Rather than viewing it this way, it is important to take their advice and be grateful for their concern.

The green team is experiencing a completely new atmosphere with training. Bigger facilities, cooked meals, and someone cleaning up after you. They just hope to work as hard as they can so they can return stronger and able to stay in the game, even with a different type of working out. In terms of the unknowns, the new trainers are working as hard as they can to prepare their team for next week, when their immunity is no longer there. The trainers worry about how the contestants will do when the fear of the yellow line is in their eyes.

In the next challenge, the green team is going to compete against the rest of the ranch team members as representatives of the unknowns. In this challenge, the contestants are given their favorite foods and are asked to guess the number of calories in all of the foods combined. Then they must hoist each individual number up into the air. If the buzzer dings, they guessed the number correct and can move onto the next challenge. The ranch team members are put at a level playing field with the green team by having their numbers weight four times as much. If the ranch team wins, they will get letters from home. If the green team wins, they will not only get their letters but also the letters of all the unknown teams. The Ranch team pulls away with a win and all get to enjoy their letters from home. The green team was sent back to the unknowns camp feeling especially bad that they lost at the unknown's expense and they don't even know it yet. They have to go back and let the other teams know what went down.

The Ranch team was able to read their letters from home and get inspiration from their families and friends. Don even heard from his son who had previously disowned him.  He claimed that it was all the inspiration that he needed.


Episode 5

For the first time, the Unknown team must face the fear of elimination. At the weigh in (the ending of episode 4), the green team came back to do their weigh in, losing a total of 15 lbs between the two of them. They still agree, however, that they made the right decision by staying on the ranch. When Dan and Irene (who were paired up since both had lost a team member) did their weigh in, Irene and Don gained weight. Irene tells everyone she did this purposefully in order to send Don home, since that is what he wanted. The players decide right on the spot to go ahead and send Don home.


When all of the contestants meet up again, Ali gives the ranch team a challenge. Since they previously lost 48 lbs in a week, if they can lose more than 48 lbs then they will automatically get immunity. The main challenge of the week between teams is to stack a pile of weights to get the total weight up to 500 lbs. The winners, the yellow team, get immunity. Their victory is short lived, however, because they begin to feel guilt over winning their first challenge as an individual team.


At the weigh in, the ranch team members lose a grand total of 63 lbs; saving them all from elimination. As the Unknowns begin their weigh in, they all put up very large numbers. Even though the red team put up double digits, they still fall below the yellow line and are both up for elimination. The Unknowns must then go and deliberate over who they are going to send home. In the end, Larialmy goes home, allowing her husband to stay on the ranch as he promises to give it all he has got.


Episode 6

Ali opens up this episode by letting the teams know they will be split into red (the Unknowns) and black (the ranch) teams. For their challenge, the contestants are brought into a room full of valentine's candy. Ali tells the contestants that the winner, the person who eats the most chocolates, will be able to decide if the teams stay the same or they can swap out two players if they choose. The twist is that the winner will not be revealed to everyone, they will be the only ones to know they won and their decision.


Without finding out who won, Deni and Sarah from the red team find out they will be swapped over to the black team, while Jay and Jennifer will go to the red team. Arthur decides to come clean, however, admitting that he wanted to trade Jay and Jennifer over because he didn't trust Jay. Bob and Jillian are quite upset with Arthur's decision, making Deni and Sarah feel like the sacrificial lambs of the black team if they were to lose the weigh in and putting a big target on Arthur's back.

In addition to being upset with Arthur, the black team is also upset with having to share their gym with the red team. The red team is purposefully loud and obnoxious in the hopes of disturbing the black team's workout. Jillian tells them they need to get over it and learn to be comfortable in their space. Jillian tries to work really hard with Arthur to help him get through the weigh in where everyone is upset with him. Cara also works with Jay to attempt to make him feel a part of the team.


When the teams met to face off in a new challenge, one they are told that involves endurance, knowledge, speed, agility, and strength. The team then divides up into their skill set and then Ali reveals what they will be doing. The winning team gets letters from home. As the teams are competing, the red team gets caught up in a calorie counting challenge while the black team moves ahead. The black team ends up winning and getting the letters from home.


During the weigh in, the red team is excited and nervous to do their first official on-campus weigh in. It is also intense because it will decide if Arthur's decision was well put or not. The black team is especially nervous when Jay puts up a loss of 17 lbs and Jennifer a loss of 14 lbs. Moses, the last of the red team to weigh in and sets a new record for the fasts speed in losing 100 lbs on the show. While the red team weighs in a total loss of 97 lbs (3.43%), the black team crushes them with a weight loss of 99 lbs (4.38%).

As the red team goes into the elimination, they decide to finally send home Q who promises to stay on track with his weight loss at home.

Episode 7

Arthur begins the episode with a one-on-one conversation with his father where he explains his decision to send Jay and Jen to the other team. He tells his dad that he knows he needs to just keep his head down and mouth shut this week. For their challenge this week, the teams are each tied together and are told to untie themselves. The first team to do this will win and have access to the gym all week while the other team will have to train outside. The red team, led by Justin, wins and gets the gym advantage.


When Bob and Jillian find out about the gym challenge, they are somewhat upset but sense an even bigger negative energy among their team. They call out Hannah for having a negative attitude, in saying that her team does not have as much team spirit and cost them the challenge win. The other players immediately get defensive.

Back at the gym, Cara notices that Rulon is not doing well. She takes him outside to have a discussion. Rulon admits that the last six years of his life have been all about giving up. Cara promises him that she will not give up on him.


For their big challenge this week, Ali tells the contestants that they will be required to push a 24 ton train 8000 feet. While pushing the train, the team will also have to answer some trivia questions. Each incorrect answer will take seconds off of their final times. The winning team will be able to make one of the opposite team member stand out when completing the team weigh in. The red team not only completed the pushing faster, but also got one more question right than the black team, winning them the challenge.

After the challenge, Arthur feels bad because he fell behind in the pushing. To help him feel better about himself, Jillian has Arthur push a 4x4 truck half a mile all by himself while everyone cheers him on. He is finally able to push the truck the whole way.


During the weigh in, Rulon finally meets his goal of losing 100 lbs. After the whole red team has weighed in, it turns out they lost a total of 63 lbs. The black team must then lose 59 in order to beat them. So the red team chooses Irene to sit out of the weigh in. The black team does not know if they won until the last individual weighs in: Arthur, who lost a total of 20 lbs during the week and wins the weigh in.


At the elimination, unable to eliminate one of their own, the red team decides to send Jay home.

Keep up with me in watching The Biggest Loser on NBC and look for my next update in March!

Exercise: Today I did a small swim workout because I had a major headache during my workout and couldn't finish it. So here's what I did. Feel free to add on some more sets and a good cool down.
200 freestyle warm up
50 Butterfly Kick
50 Butterfly Twitch
50 Backstroke Kick
50 Backstroke Twitch
50 Breaststroke Kick
50 Breaststroke Twitch
50 Freestyle Kick
50 Freestyle Twitch

Eat: For dinner today, Aaron and I made a wonderful batch of Macaroni and Beef. It is delicious. Just make up a batch of yummy Mac and Cheese, then brown up some ground beef with some seasoning, combine the two and throw in some crushed red pepper and tomatoes into it for some flavoring. Enjoy this easy to make meal!

Relax: Today I was super tired… So I took a small nap before work. It was so nice to get a few extra minutes of shut eye, while breathing in some of the fresh warm air from the open windows. I would recommend taking a nap sometime over your weekend!

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