Last night’s episode of “The Biggest Loser” began with trainers Bob and Jillian talking about how Week 2 is historically a “plateau” week on the show, and that the average contestant loses just 2 % of their weight the second week as their bodies adjust to the sudden change in lifestyle.
With that, host Alison Sweeney brought the teams together and each had a colored ping pong paddle to match their team color. Alison offered $10,000 to anyone who gambled that they could lose a certain percentage of weight, but it was done auction-style….meaning one team bid 1 %, the next 1.2 % etc. It went all the way up to 2.4% for the yellow team of Colleen and Jerry. So, if they were able to lose that percentage, or 14 pounds between them, they would win 10 grand. If not, they would automatically be below the yellow line this week. They were fired up, but their trainer Jillian was pissed. She knows the plateau all too well, and she vowed to work Colleen extra hard (Jerry still has to limit his activity for health reasons).
Then came the challenge, which was a water slide game. Each team had to slide down a slip and slide on a hill and walk or run back up the hill, taking turns between teammates. They had 2 minutes to do it or they would be eliminated, and then that time was cut to 1:30 after a few rounds. Colleen and L.T. had to participate solo while their dads sat out for the health restrictions. Ed and Heba won the challenge, which allowed them to call home, and Amy and Phil, who came in second also were allowed to call home.
Then they brought in chef Rocco DiSpirito, who was going to teach the teams how to cook healthy meals. He asked the better cooks on each team to go to step aside, and then proceeded to tell the worse cooks on each team that they would be the ones cooking. He took them shopping and gave them each a dish to make. Some of these folks had never cooked a meal in their lives, so it was pretty funny to watch. Then they had to present their dishes to the rest of the contestants, who voted on them. The winner was Amy (the younger Amy), for her turkey meatball soup…..and she won a year’s worth of groceries.
Then for the weigh-in…..and let me tell you….this took about a half hour with all the talk and commercials, almost between each team’s weigh-in. It was agonizing. I swear, next week I’m TiVo’ing this show. Amy and Phil had the best results, losing 2.30 % of their weight. Jerry and Colleen lost 1.93 %, which would have ranked them third, but since they had to lose 2.4%, they did not win the $10K and also were automatically on the chopping block. The other team below the line was Tom and L.T., who lost zero pounds….Tom lost 3 and L.T. gained 3. This was not gameplay…the dude was clearly angry at himself.
So it came down to the gray and yellow teams. The field saw the gray team as a bigger threat, especially with zero weight loss this week, and a big number likely coming in Week 3. So with the first three teams with votes choosing the gray team for elimination, that’s who went home.
They showed Tom and L.T. and together they have lost over 140 pounds since leaving the show. Those are some big boys, so hopefully they continue on that path.
Next week everyone is taking a road trip to the Grand Canyon…..with six teams left and 12 contestants in all, I sense change coming soon…..breaking up the teams or adding more teams or something….that’s just how this show operates. But you won’t know if you don’t watch the show!
