[BlogEntry] Biggest Loser 10/9/2007 : Jamaica

Last week they teased that the campus would be closing for a week, and I speculated that the contestants would have to live out in the real world and see what they've learned.

Almost. They actually all got a trip to a Jamaican resort, with their trainers. So it wasn't quite "real world", but the idea was still the same – deny the temptations, find some time to exercise, that sort of thing.

Jillian continued to beat on her team, taking them to a beach section to continue working in the sand (something they did during their first hidden weeks in the desert). Bob went the other way, and had some nice quality yoga time with his team. Kim may have had the best idea of all, getting her team in the pool. Nothing like working a large number of muscle groups while still giving the team the feeling that they get to relax.

The interesting philosophical question, though, came regarding the temptations. Jillian watched over her team like a hawk, telling them exactly what to eat and yelling at one of the players (Jez? is that how you spell it?) for even thinking about taking a drink. Her attitude was, "My goal is to keep all of my team here, you have the rest of your lives to drink. If you can't fight temptation for one week how are you ever going to do it in the real world?" Bob had a similar philosophy, though we did not see as much of it. Kim, however, went the opposite way – "You're adults, and if you want to drink, go ahead."

The challenge had the teams sitting out on a big raft and then one by one pulling themselves and each other back to shore. This one wasn't even close, as the black team made it all the way (on the shoulders of the little short twins with the low center of gravity), and the red and blue teams never even made it off the starting raft.

That's the only good news for black, however, as they come up the shortest in the weigh-in. This time it's actually red that wins the whole thing, so I think that pool strategy paid off. The team says that Jillian is visibly upset, but I think she's more upset at what she considers a personal defeat, rather than a sadness for whoever goes home. At this point the black team gets ugly, and the women immediately start scheming to break up the twins. "I don't want to go home, I can't do this by myself" one of them keeps saying. So Jim goes home. And in the "where are they now" segment he's lost so much weigh he looks like he might be sick, honestly. If I read the graphic right, he's lost a total of 123 pounds? And he did not start out as a big 400lb guy.

Next week…well, who cares. Blah blah, trainer goes over the line…they always sensationalize so we'll watch, but it's never really all that exciting.