Category: biggest loser 17

O’Neal Hampton Jr.
Age: 51
Height: 5’11”
Hometown: Minneapolis, MN
Occupation: Station Manager, US Postal Service
Partner: Sunshine (Daughter)

NBC Bio
O’Neal is a very competitive person. His competitive drive no doubt comes from his love of sports. “Big O’Neal” (as he is affectionately known) has been coaching and playing football for over 35 years. Recently his oldest brother had a severe asthma attack and died before his 58th birthday. His brother’s untimely death has served as a wake-up call to O’Neal, and he is committed to becoming healthy and losing the weight for good.

Ashley Johnston
Age: 27
Height: 5’5″
Hometown: Knoxville, TN
Occupation: Spa Manager/Esthetician
Partner: Sherry (Mother)

NBC Bio
Ashley started out as a normal healthy child but developed sleep apnea early. When she was six, she had her tonsils and adenoids removed and began growing quickly. By the time she was in high school, she wore a size 14-16. Ever since then, she has continued to gain and has put on over 100 pounds. Ashley hates to run into old friends and classmates because she feels embarrassed about her weight. She feels like she is stuck in a body that does not allow her to live life, be herself, and dress in the fashion she desires. Ashley finds it hard to work at a spa that concentrates on well-being because she feels that she projects a negative image to clients.

Sherry Johnston
Age: 51
Height: 5’1″
Hometown: Knoxville, TN
Occupation: Admin, Non-Profit
Partner: Ashley (Daughter)

NBC Bio
Sherry was the thinnest child in her family up until the age of 30. While successful in maintaining her weight after two children, she let it spiral out of control after the death of her husband. Sherry is embarrassed to meet new colleagues at work because of her weight. She wants to regain control of her life and needs to lose the weight to be healthy and to be around to see her daughters give her grandchildren. She knows things must change immediately to live the full, long life that she knows she deserves.

Rudy and Danny finished on top in The Biggest Loser Season 8 Episode 12, which leaves the fate of Amanda and Liz in America’s hands. Once America’s vote has been revealed, it’s on to the final three and a battle to be The Biggest Loser 8 winner.

Amanda has won America’s vote to enter the final three.

Now that we know that, the other players will weigh in to compete for the title of at home winner.

Alexandra: 309 pounds (-91, 29.45%)

Antoine: 215 pounds (-152, 41.42%)

Antoine has managed to set a competitive mark to beat.

Sean: 289 pounds (-155, 34.91%)

Julio: 227 pounds (-180, 44.23%)

That puts Julio in the lead.

Mo: 263 pounds (-92, 25.92%)

Dina: 174 pounds (-79, 31.23%)

Abby: 147 pounds (-100, 40.49%)

Tracey: 132 pounds (-118, 47.20%)

Tracey takes the lead with a percentage could be tough to beat.

Shay: 304 pounds (-172, 36.13%)

Daniel: 201 pounds (-111, 35.58%)

Rebecca: 140 pounds (-139, 49.82%)

With that, Rebecca, who’s gone blonde for some reason, takes the lead.

Allen: 209 pounds (-116, 35.69%)

Liz: 176 pounds (-91, 34.06%)

Rebecca is The Biggest Loser At Home winner and is now $100,000 richer.

Shay has been invited back to the season 9 finale. For every pound she loses, Subway will offer her $1,000.

Antoine invites his girlfriend from the season Alexandra on the stage so he can propose. Seems like they’re rushing, but I give them better odds than someone on The Bachelor.

Over 3.5 million pounds have been pledged in the Pound for Pound Challenge, which has resulted in that amount of food being donated to a local food bank.

Amanda: 163 pounds (-87, 34.80%)

As expected, it’s going to come down to a battle between the guys.

Rudy: 208 pounds (-234, 52.94%)

In any other season, I’d say that Rudy’s already won, but I’m expecting Danny to give him a run for his money.

Danny: 191 pounds (-239, 55.58%)

The Biggest Loser Season 9: Couples 3 will premiere Tuesday January 5, 2010 on NBC.

After a strong performance throughout the remainder of his time on the ranch, Allen fell below the yellow line in The Biggest Loser Season 8 Episode 11, and the others took the opportunity to get rid of him.

The final four contestants are told they’re going home for 60 days. No trainers, no Biggest Loser gym, and surrounded by temptations. Then they will come back to face the scale one more time.

When they go home, they use the time to confront the things that got them there.

Liz has an additional problem to overcome. She’s had marriage problems for a long time because she has been so bitter.

Of course, they’re not going home without hearing from the producers. A video is delivered to their homes with a message from Bob and Jillian. Bob tells Liz to ask for help. Jillian tells Rudy to take the opportunity to practice how he’s going to live the rest of his life. Bob has packed Amanda an Extra gum commercial and tells her she’s got it, whatever it is. Then, Bob tells Danny’s kids their father is a hero.

Wait a minute. Is that it? That can’t be it. Phones start ringing. By the way, the final four will be running a marathon. Surely this is not a surprise to them.

Since Danny was the biggest loser last week, he gets a visit from Curtis Stone. They prepare turkey chili with fresh vegetables, which is then put into a baked potato with nonfat yogurt. This is a drop from a standard 850 calorie baked potato down to 290 for the revised version.

After a few weeks, Bob and Jillian pay a visit to the contestants. Liz is out in the sticks. Her husband comes home on the weekends. She seems isolated. How’s she going to solve her problems like that? Liz wants make sure that she’s leaving something on the table for herself so that she doesn’t end up the same as she was before.

Amanda finds it exhausting and frustrating. It’s too easy to lapse without noticing it.

Jillian suggests that Danny bring his family into the fold more, rather than trying to do his own thing. His wife is getting insecure about their relationship.

Rudy says he doesn’t have time. Combining the 12 hour work day, commute, and time with his family, he’s barely getting six hours of sleep a day. Lack of sleep is counterproductive to weight loss. He feels uncomfortable going to the gym when his daughter asks him why he’s going. He’ll just have to find some way to get her past that and stop using it as an excuse because a dad without a lot of time beats a dead one.

Liz plans to train by running from the front door to her mailbox. That’s 1 mile each way.

Following two months of training, the day of the marathon has arrived. They will run 26.2 miles through farmland, mountains, hiking trails, and the Pacific Ocean coastline. Each person who crosses the finish line will get $10,000 toward the charity of their choice. Rudy and Amanda quickly separate from the pack, as brown team partners Liz and Danny run together in the rear. Rudy’s goal for the race is to keep running (or at least jogging) the whole way. At the 3 mile mark, Tara from season 7 joins Liz and Danny. Rudy’s opened up the gap on the rest of the field, and he meets up with his old partner Dina at the 13 mile mark. Amanda’s greeted by her best friend Brian at 13 miles. At 6 miles, Danny starts struggling with his hip, leading Liz to wonder whether she may have to do this on her own. At mile 17, Amanda breaks down and finally decides to start walking. Liz and Danny meet up with their spouses at mile 13. At 22 miles, Rudy’s still jogging. Danny approaches mile 15, but he’s still having trouble with his hip. With the assistance of Brian and Tara, Amanda is picking spots throughout the race to run. Bob joins Rudy at 25 miles. He’s still jogging.

Rudy’s the first one to reach the finish line, as he completes the race in 5 hours and 12 minutes. Amanda is the next across, finishing the race in 5 hours and 28 minutes. Not too far behind Rudy. Certainly not as dramatic as it was painted with the crying and whatnot. At mile 16, Danny looks over at Liz and tells her he’s hit his wall. After he and Liz ice up their knees and grab a bite, they head back to the road. They both complete the journey, crossing the finish line together at 6 hours and 55 minutes.

It’s time to see how they did at home during the course of 60 days. The two people with the highest percentage of weight loss automatically advance to the finale. The two others will be competing for America’s vote.

Liz: 182 pounds (-16, 8.08%)
Season Total: 85 pounds (31.84%)

Amanda: 170 pounds (-16, 8.60%)
Season Total: 80 pounds (32.00%)

Danny: 229 pounds (-59, 20.49%)
Season Total: 201 pounds (46.74%)

Rudy: 253 pounds (-43, 14.53%)
Season Total: 189 pounds (42.76%)

Given the success Rudy and Danny have had, that leaves Amanda and Liz below the yellow line. Whoever America picks, it doesn’t seem like it will matter. The men will be difficult to catch and have proven they can lose substantial weight at home. Liz hopes to be the oldest contestant to make it to the final three. Amanda hopes for a repeat performance of her previous vote win over whoever it was she competed against in last season’s finale.

Stay tuned to dingoRUE for another live recap of The Biggest Loser 8 Episode 13, where we will find out who The Biggest Loser 8 winner is, which airs Tuesday at 8/7c on NBC.

Ever wonder what happened to people after they leave The Biggest Loser? Fact is that most of them gain some of the weight back. Some of them even gain all of the weight back and then some. At least there are more success stories than The Bachelor can claim, though. After eight seasons and 206 contestants, tonight, in a special Wednesday edition of The Biggest Loser, we visit more than 40 former contestants, some loved and some hated, to find out where they are now.

Jerry Skeabeck from season 6 was Dr. H’s biggest surprise throughout all the seasons. He wasn’t sure he could make it through this alive. Today, Jerry is down from his starting weight of 380 pounds to 262 pounds now. His rude awakening came the day he found out his internal age is 76.

Mallory Bray from season 5 started at 217 pounds, a heavy weight but pretty tame by contrast to many of the contestants. For over a year, Mallory has been a personal trainer.

Pete Thomas from season 2 started at 401 pounds. Now, he weighs 238 pounds. He wants to pay it forward and has developed a local 10 week series of classes.

Drea from season 1 is down from her starting weight of 215 pounds to 160 pounds today. She is now the director of Healthworks Fitness Center for Women and Children, a non-profit organization that works with inner city women who may not otherwise be able to afford this kind of a program.

Mark Kruger from season 5 is down 100 pounds from his starting weight of 285 pounds. His brother Jay is down from 293 pounds to 207 pounds today.

At the start of this post, I mentioned The Bachelor. Yeah, we all know about how Trista and Ryan are still together and, well, that’s about all the news there is from that show every single season. By comparison, The Biggest Loser has had more marriages than any other reality show.

Those couples include Matt and Suzy from season 2. He is down from 339 pounds to 237 pounds now. She is down from 227 to 175 now, after having had two kids. They have gained some of their weight back, but they intend to change things so that their kids never end up having to work at losing weight.

Nicole and Damien from season 7 came to the show looking to lose their weight as they prepared for their wedding. Damien is down from 381 pounds to 253 pounds; Nicole is down from 269 pounds to 155 pounds. They are now fitness instructors at 24 Hour Fitness.

Nicole Michalik from season 4 started off at 279 pounds but has kept all the weight off since then (105 pounds). She suggests good music, a hard workout, and hot trainers.

Jerry Hayes from season 7 started off by collapsing on day 1. From there, he went on to beat all the younger people and take the at home prize. He currently weighs 193 pounds, down from 369 pounds. His message is that it’s never too late.

Mike and Ron Morelli wanted to inspire the younger brother Max to follow in their footsteps. In addition Ron’s weight loss (430 pounds to 251) and Mike’s weight loss (388 pounds to 230 pounds), Max has dropped from 405 pounds at the finale down to 300 pounds now after he went to Fitness Ridge, The Biggest Loser Resort.

Tara Costa from season 7 won more challenges than any player in Biggest Loser history. She’s down from her starting weight of 294 pounds to 165 pounds. Since the finale, she has decided to do something for the community, so she planned a health fair and run.

Jaron, the at home winner from season 3, is making his dream of being a triathlete a reality. He’s down from 323 pounds to 200 pounds and decided to do an ironman triathlon (2.4 mile swim, 112 mile biking, and 26.2 mile run). Likewise, Matt from season 2 also did an ironman.

Julie Hadden from season 4 was unable to have more children due to her weight. Now she’s down from 218 pounds to 128 (only 7 pounds above her finale weight). It all comes down to wanting it. “I don’t have the time” is an excuse, not a reality. She’s willing to put in the 1-1.5 hours to workout 5-6 days a week. Rather than having another baby, she and her husband have decided instead to adopt.

Vicky Vilcan from season 6 was quite possibly the most hated contestant ever. Most people hoped she would fall flat on her face. So far, that has not yet happened. She’s down from 246 pounds to 150 now. She does have a message to future contestants: keep your mouth shut. Had she been sitting at home, she would have hated herself, too.

Filipe Fa and his cousin Sione are still determined to change the Tongan community. Filipe is down from 364 pounds to 242 pounds; Sione is down from 372 pounds to 239. They have a weekly exercise class where they invite everyone from their community.

Dan Evans and his mom Jackie from season 5 are taking on the country music world. Jackie is down from 246 pounds to 160, up only slightly from her finale weight. Dan is down from 310 pounds to 194.

Michelle Aguilar, winner of season 6, is working to get a bill passed to redefine physical education in the state of Texas.

Ali Vincent, the first female winner ever, remains the poster child for The Biggest Loser success. She’s down from her starting weight of 234 pounds to 125 pounds now. Her mom Bette-Sue has actually improved over her finale numbers, having dropped to 160 pounds from her starting weight of 261.

Twins Bill and Jim Germanakos won both the grand prize and the at home prize. Bill is down from 334 pounds to 209 pounds; Jim is down from 361 pounds to 223 pounds. They have become certified spinning instructors.

Bernie Salazar, the at home winner from season 5, is down from 283 pounds to 160 pounds. He hopes to help with the problem of childhood obesity and has put out a book for kids to try to get them active.

Carla Triplett, previously the heaviest woman ever, is down from 379 pounds to 251. Renee Wilson (Michelle Aguilar’s mom) is down from 267 pounds to 175. They participate in a half marathon with other contestants, including Helen from season 7, Amy and Shellay, Pete from season 2, Damien and Nicole, and Coleen from season 6.

Phil Parham from season 6 is down to 195 pounds from 331. His wife Amy is down to 137 pounds from 229.

Bob outed Erik from season 3 last year. Erik, who dropped from 407 pounds to 193 to win the third season, has since gained back over 175 pounds, almost all the weight he lost. Now Bob has the task of confronting him. He suggests finding some balance between the excess of the show and the excess of the eating whatever you want. He invites him to weigh in at the season 9 finale and see how far he’s able to get in that time.

David Griffin is down from 368 pounds to 224, a slight improvement over his finale weight. He’s helped train 5 people to cross the 100 pound lost mark.

Neil from season 4 started at 421 pounds and is now at 228 pounds. He has taken the next step with his girlfriend and finally gotten married, which he didn’t want to do when he had so many health problems.

Rebecca was the next member of the young person alliance to be sent packing in The Biggest Loser Season 8 Episode 10.

That leaves Amanda all alone. She backed a weak alliance, and now she’s left without them.

Jillian wants Rudy to admit that he voted Rebecca out because she’s his biggest threat. He doesn’t want to admit that because it’s not true. She probably was a bigger threat than Liz, but ultimately she was on the wrong side of the house and played the game as hard as she accused everybody else of playing.

Suze Orman, someone from the financial world, is the special guest. Uh. Huh? Her message is that obesity is a very expensive disease. Valid point, although I’m still not seeing why Suze Orman’s on a weight loss show. Ultimately, it turns out that the competition is to answer questions while on a treadmill. For every question they get right, $1,000 will be deposited into an account at TD Ameritrade. For every question wrong, the treadmill will get one level faster and one level higher.

Research shows that obese employees earn less money than their fellow workers. On average, how much less do they make?
$7,000. Everybody is right.

If a family of four swapped one meal at a restaurant for one meal at home every day for a year, how much money would they save?
$8,760. Rudy, Danny, Allen, and Liz are correct. Amanda is incorrect.

How much do Americans spend on gastric bypass surgery every year?
$4.4 billion. Allen is the only one correct. 220,000 people get the surgery each year at a cost of approximately $20,000 each.

How much do Americans spend on obesity-related health issues every year?
$147 billion. Everybody is right. If only the government could find a way to wipe that out instead of rushing to dump trillions of dollars into a health care overhaul. By comparison, cancer spending is $90 billion.

How much money will you save over 40 years by going from obese to an ideal weight?
$1 million. Everybody but Allen is right.

Everybody ends up with an extra few thousand dollars, and that’s about all there is to that. Yeah, this all still seems pretty pointless to me. Apparently, the point of this was to promote Suze Orman’s show on CNBC. They do know that The Apprentice is coming in midseason?

Once we get through the portion of the episode where everybody’s saying goodbye to everyone, they head to the football field for a challenge. They will carry their lost weight one last time. They will be harnessed to barrels filled with 10 footballs. Each of those footballs represents the amount of weight they’ve lost each week. With each trip down the field, they will drop off the ball that represents the weight they lost for the corresponding week. The winner will get a vacation package for two to the 2010 NFL Pro Bowl. The special guest is Rod Woodson, who was a pro football player at some point. He is there on behalf of NFL Play 60, which will donate $5,000 of athletic equipment to the school of the winner’s choice.

Allen starts off in the lead. Amanda and Rudy are behind him. As the challenge progresses, it’s looking like this is how things will remain. Allen eventually extends his lead to a field length over Rudy. Allen wins the challenge.

Going into the weigh-in, Amanda feels as if she’s got to stay above the yellow line in order to remain in the game. I’m not so sure about that. She is a lot less threatening than any of the guys, which would be a good reason to drop this young/old thing now that there’s only one younger person left.

The winner of the weigh-in will get Curtis Stone to come to their house and show them how to cook healthy meals.

Liz: 198 pounds (-5, 2.46%)

Rudy: 296 pounds (-12, 3.90%)

Allen: 230 pounds (-8, 3.36%)

Danny: 288 pounds (-16, 5.26%)

With that, Danny has set a new record, losing in the double digits seven weeks in a row.

Amanda: 186 pounds (-7, 3.63%)

As the biggest loser of the night, Danny will be getting a visit from Curtis Stone.

Allen and Liz have fallen below the yellow line. The choice here is obvious. Allen’s the clear threat. However, Allen suggests to Amanda, the person likely to decide the outcome here, that he’s not going to be able to get down to the percentage needed to win this whole thing, despite the fact that he’s lost a higher percentage than Liz thus far 29% to 25%. I’d say he’ll have an easier run down to 170 than Liz would have to 140. Granted, either of them would have trouble keeping up with Danny or Rudy, who keep tossing up double digit numbers.

Votes
Danny: Allen
Rudy: Liz
Amanda: Allen

Amanda says she kept Liz, who’s fallen below the yellow line four times now, around for the challenge. With two votes, Allen is not The Biggest Loser. Having won the football challenge, he gives the check to his daughter’s school. He has also gotten 275 people at his gym to start a Biggest Loser competition, and they have lost 2368 pounds in six weeks.

Stay tuned to dingoRUE for another live recap of The Biggest Loser 8 Episode 12, which airs Tuesday at 8/7c on NBC.

The Biggest Loser Season 8 Episode 9 brought us a double elimination. First, Daniel fell below the red line and was automatically eliminated, then his partner Shay was voted out, dealing a crushing blow to the young people’s alliance.

Each person will be giving a speech. To help them get ready, Tim Gunn is there. It’s makeover week. Rudy normally wears jeans and T-shirts. He considers a flannel shirt to be dressed up. He wants to retain his beard in order to hide his face, but that’s not happening. Rebecca also wants to hide her face behind long hair (except it’s really not long). Before they give their speeches, they’re surprised by their families. Well, they act surprised anyway, even though this is how it goes every season. Now that they’ve done that, they’re ready to give their speeches in attempt to inspire people, promising that they’re going to finish their journey.

With that bit of glamour out of the way, it’s back to the ranch for some cables going across a canyon 200 feet in the air. They will use pulleys to go from one side to the other side, a distance of 700 feet. The winner will get a two week trip to The Biggest Loser Resort in St. George, Utah. Liz is excessively afraid for her life, while Rebecca flirts with the guy strapping her in. Rudy gets off to a clear lead, with Amanda trying to catch him. Rudy keeps his lead throughout and wins the challenge. Liz keeps her eyes closed the whole way. She just wants to finish, one way or another.

Bob wants to talk to Allen, who he thinks should be winning every challenge. Allen responds that he’s been playing the game.

Rudy revealed during his speech that his sister died of cancer when she was 14. Funny. Jillian didn’t know about that. How’s he been keeping that inside for three months? She pushes him to try to realize his problem, which she is not surprised to find out that he’s an emotional eater.

They haven’t had much time to workout this week, but that’s not going to prevent them from having to head to the scale.

Danny: 304 pounds (-12, 3.80%)

Rudy: 308 pounds (-16, 4.94%)

Allen: 238 pounds (-5, 2.06%)

Allen is disappointed with his weight loss for the week, which has the trainers concerned. They don’t want him doing anything crazy to try to win at all costs.

Rebecca: 206 pounds (-3, 1.44%)

Liz: 203 pounds (-3, 1.46%)

Amanda: 193 pounds (-9, 4.46%)

Liz and Rebecca have fallen below the yellow line. The choice is obvious here. Rebecca’s the bigger threat, and the silly young person alliance is not going to be able to save her. They both hope to swing Rudy and Allen. Rebecca’s pitch is that she’s never been below the yellow line, whereas Liz has been there three times now. If I’m hearing that plea, I’m thinking keep Liz around because she’ll probably fall again. Liz’s pitch is that she’s older and doesn’t have much time to get her act together.

In the event of a tie, the person with the lowest weight loss will be eliminated. By a margin of .02%, that would be Rebecca, meaning she needs the support of both Rudy and Allen.

Votes
Amanda: Liz
Danny: Rebecca
Rudy: Rebecca

With two votes, Rebecca is not the biggest loser. Rudy says he doesn’t like how she tried to play both sides of the fence. She acknowledges that she played the game, even though she was one of the most vocal people against people playing the game. Down 107 pounds from her starting weight of 279, she runs a half marathon.

Stay tuned to dingoRUE for another live recap of The Biggest Loser 8 Episode 11, which airs Tuesday at 9/8c on NBC.