Biggest Loser Fall 09

[minpinmom 2]

Awesome! Thanks for the info - I will HAVE to watch it!

[minpinmom 2]

I wanted Liz to go home yesterday - but its all good - can't wait to see everyone in the finale and also see who has kept the weight off in the special episode! Hope you guys have a fab Thanksgiving!

[georgia girl 35]

Well, I was a little surprised that Amanda made it to the finale. I was sad to see Allen go though. I am rooting for Danny or Amanda (although I really don't think Amanda has much of a chance at winning).

Jillian hit the nail on the head when she was talking to Rudy. Like she said, they should be looking out for themselves and be proud of it. Rudy knows he was playing the game. Why lie about it? What a wuss!! I've lost respect for him and I hope he doesn't win! I think it will come down to him and Danny in the end. GO DANNY!

[kiz 1]

I watched Allen last night on the Leno show. He totally held his own in a cooking segment with Jay and Charles Barkley (who admittedly needs to lose at least 50 lbs). My husband, who doesn't watch BL, commented that Allen was very confident and comfortable directing Jay and Charles. He also looked terrific.

[georgia girl 35]

I'm really looking forward to the special show tonight too! I've been saying for years now that need to do a special like this. I'm anxious to see Tara. I know it was only last year that she was on the show, but she's my favorite contestant of all-time! The Green Machine!!

[kiz 1]

November 25, 2009

On ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Health Can Take Back Seat

By EDWARD WYATT

LOS ANGELES — When more than 40 former contestants from “The Biggest Loser” gather Wednesday for a reunion television special, the winner of the program’s first season, Ryan C. Benson, who lost 122 of his 330-pound starting weight, will be absent. Mr. Benson is now back above 300 pounds but he thinks he has been shunned by the show because he publicly admitted that he dropped some of the weight by fasting and dehydrating himself to the point that he was urinating blood.

Now in its eighth season, “The Biggest Loser” is one of NBC’s most-watched prime-time programs besides football, drawing an estimated 10 million viewers each week, according to Nielsen. It has clearly tapped into the American obsession with losing weight, as more than 200,000 people a year submit audition videotapes or attend open casting calls for the program.

It also has spawned a licensed merchandise business that will generate an estimated $100 million this year.

The series also highlights the difference between the pursuit of engaging television and the sometimes frenzied efforts of contestants to win, perhaps at the risk of their own health. Doctors, nutritionists and physiologists not affiliated with “The Biggest Loser” express doubt about the program’s regimen of severe caloric restriction and up to six hours a day of strenuous exercise, which cause contestants to sometimes lose more than 15 pounds a week.

At least one other contestant has confessed to using dangerous weight-loss techniques, including self-induced dehydration. On the first episode of the current season, two contestants were sent to the hospital, one by airlift after collapsing from heat stroke during a one-mile race.

New contestants are entering the show more out of shape. Each of the last two seasons has broken the record for the heaviest contestant ever, at 454 and 476 pounds.

Medical professionals generally advise against losing more than about two pounds a week. Rapid weight loss can cause many medical problems, including a weakening of the heart muscle, irregular heartbeat and dangerous reductions in potassium and electrolytes.

“I’m waiting for the first person to have a heart attack,” said Dr. Charles Burant, a professor of internal medicine at the University of Michigan Health System director of the Michigan Metabolomics and Obesity Center.

“I have had some patients who want to do the same thing, and I counsel them against it,” Dr. Burant said. “I think the show is so exploitative. They are taking poor people who have severe weight problems whose real focus is trying to win the quarter-million dollars.”

Dr. Rob Huizenga, the medical consultant to “The Biggest Loser” and an associate clinical professor of medicine at U.C.L.A., said that the program was safe. “This is not only a major amount of weight loss, it is a totally different kind of weight loss compared with surgery or starvation diets,” he said.

In interviews, the show’s trainers and producers acknowledge that unsafe practices can occur.

“If we had it to do over, we wouldn’t do it,” Dr. Huizenga said of the recent one-mile race that resulted in hospitalizations. “It was an unexpected complication and we’re going to do better,” he said, adding that “that challenge has changed a lot of the way we do things,” including more closely monitoring contestants’ body temperatures during exercise.

JD Roth, an executive producer of the series who created its current format, said that while the show was extreme, “it needs to be extreme in my opinion.”

“For some of these people this is their last chance,” he said. “And in a country right now that is wrestling with health care issues and the billions of dollars that are spent on obesity issues per year, in a way what a public service to have a show that inspires people to be healthier.”

Some contestants have claimed that dangerous weight loss techniques were common among contestants. Kai Hibbard, who lost 118 pounds and finished as the runner-up in Season 3, has written on her MySpace blog and elsewhere that she and other contestants would drink as little Water as possible in the 24 hours before a weigh-in. When the cameras were off, she said, contestants would work out in as much clothing as possible.

Ms. Hibbard, who weighed 144 pounds at the show’s finale, wrote that she added 31 pounds in two weeks, most of it simply by drinking water. That experience is not isolated. Including Mr. Benson, the winners of the first four seasons of the show each have added at least 20 percent to their weight at the end of the show.

Jillian Michaels, one of the two trainers who supervise contestants’ workouts on the series, said the experience of Ms. Hibbard and Mr. Benson was evidence of “the dark side of the show.”

“Contestants can get a little too crazy and they can get too thin,” she said. She said contestants are medically checked and disqualified if they are dehydrated or are found to be taking drugs or diuretics. “That is the worst part of the show,” she said. “ It’s just part of the nature of reality TV.”

Contestants are required to sign releases that stand out even in the waiver-intensive world of reality television.

One such release, which was provided to The New York Times by a former contestant who did so on the condition of anonymity, says that “no warranty, representation or guarantee has been made as to the qualifications or credentials of the medical professionals who examine me or perform any procedures on me in connection with my participation in the series, or their ability to diagnose medical conditions that may affect my fitness to participate in the series.”

The current season started with five contestants of more than 400 pounds. Yet contestants have been required to sign a document certifying that they believe themselves to be “in excellent physical, emotional, psychological and mental health.”

Mr. Roth said that those “standard release forms” are similar to those used “on any reality show.” He added that the show’s medical professionals had “appropriate qualifications and credentials.”

Getting contestants to talk openly about the environment of the program is difficult. Shortly after a reporter started contacting former contestants to interview them about their experiences, a talent producer on the series sent an e-mail message to many former contestants reminding them that “serious consequences” could ensue if they ever talked to a reporter without the show’s permission.

To do so could subject them to a fine of $100,000 or $1 million, depending on the timing of the interview, according to the e-mail message, which was obtained by The New York Times. The show’s producers did provide an opportunity to interview several former contestants, but the interviews were conducted with an NBC publicist listening in.

Ali Vincent, a fifth-season contestant who became the first female winner of “The Biggest Loser,” said she believed that her involvement in the show was “definitely worth it.”

“I went from a life of nothing to being active every day, six days a week,” said Ms. Vincent, who started the program weighing 234 pounds and finished at 122. She now weighs about 125 pounds, she said, and is a spokeswoman for products and ventures related to “The Biggest Loser.”

Ms. Michaels and Bob Harper, the other trainer, as well as Mr. Roth all say that at least half of the contestants stay close to the weight levels they achieve on the show for several years.

Mr. Roth said he happily accepted a 50 percent success rate — noting that only a handful of former contestants regained all or most of the weight they carried before joining the show. “Getting 100 percent to keep the weight off has never been the goal,” he said. “The goal is can we inspire people in America to make a change in their life. In that, we’re batting 1,000.”

The New York Times > Log In

[Liftingchic 0]

I wanted to see liz go home too... I am want amanda to win!

[Padanelle 2]

I was sad to see Allen go. I rooting for Danny.

[btrieger 21]

I honestly don't think that either of the remaining women has any chance of winning and I don't care much for either of them.

The only women that stood a chance of winning were Shay and Rebecca.

[btrieger 21]

I just watched the special and it was a real eye opener to see that kid that lost over 200 pounds put 175 of it back on in no time flat.

It has to be screwing up their metabolisms losing weight as fast as they do.

[xavier 153]

I was sorry for the guy who gained it back too but I was happily surprised to see so many that have kept it off and really made a new life/lifestyle for themselves and their loved ones!

I'm usually cynical but I thought this was very inspiring and I think the show is helping a lot of the viewers get motivated too!

[Liftingchic 0]

I didnt get a chance to watch it yet... Its on dvr so i will have to watch it on saturday when i am off...

[Angelyco 0]

Lots to talk about from this week's shows.

I just noticed that there weren't many Temptations this season. I only remember a few at the beginning of the season.

Bob and Amanda are getting a little too touchy-feely in front of the cameras. It was almost sickening to see them fawning over each other this week. Amanda has lost the least amount of weight, started out the smallest (I think) so I don't really see her as a "hero" and so high on a pedestal like that.

I also noticed that, unless I missed it, they haven't shown the overall weight loss percentages like they have in previous seasons, which they usually show a few weeks away from the final so everyone knows roughly where they stand.

This week they also revealed that Liz is having marital problems when she was talking to Suze Orman. That just makes me feel creepy when I see her and Danny getting so mushy over each other, and when during the elimination someone said they were "more than friends." It makes me think at least Liz might have other feelings for Danny, which even we were talking about here how close they were being a bit too much for married people.

I'm sad that Allen got sent home. I wanted Liz to go home, but I also didn't want Amanda in the finale either, because I don't feel like she earned it as much as the others, she's mostly had small weeks and hasn't really lost that much. I really thought Amanda would send Liz home for Liz having written her name down 2 weeks ago.

I'm glad they finally did a special "Where Are They Now" episode. The only thing I didn't like is they didn't really showcase each person's story, which is what I was interested in, they were focused more on one aspect, like their new career as a personal trainer, or marrying someone from the show, etc.

I don't blame Eric for wanting to avoid Bob, if I won the Biggest Loser and gained all the weight back, I'd hide too. Especially after Ali (I think it was her) said that Eric's finale was what really motivated her to come on the show.

[btrieger 21]

Lots to talk about from this week's shows.

Bob and Amanda are getting a little too touchy-feely in front of the cameras. It was almost sickening to see them fawning over each other this week.

I didn't notice it and doubt it is for real. Bob is gay :Yawn:

[Manatee 3]

I didn't notice it and doubt it is for real. Bob is gay

Maybe 'Amanda' is a dude...that would be a twist!:confused: