Last week’s Biggest Loser provided us with a whiff of impropriety and a scent of scandal, which combined kind of smells like burnt cheese. Someone had done somebody wrong and would face penal sanctions, and please note ‘penal’ doesn’t mean what some of you are thinking it means. “Who was it?”, ”What did they do?”, ”What will happen to them?” we all wondered aloud on trains and in crowded lifts, drawing stern glares from strangers and transit police. Soon enough, though, the veil of secrecy was lifted in scenes that were in no way comparable to the coming down of the Berlin Wall, other than that we got to see what was on … [Read more...]

We picked up where we left off with the combined girls team and the combined boys battling each other and near death racing up a geographical feature alternately referred to as ‘Hell Hill’, ‘Murder Mountain’ or ‘The Dune of Doom. Later on, Margie would have her own near death battle with the ‘Dunny of Doom’. But before that, the girls had the lead and Ryan was attempting to make it up the hill for the sole purpose of coming back down again. Being the heaviest contestant and gravity being such a defining factor in these events, Ryan struggled to get up to the top. He also struggled to get back down again, his arms flailing … [Read more...]

The week began with contestants lying about in the mud as a medically ordered treatment for a strange but virulent virus that had spent the week rampaging through the camp like a bull in a travel book shop that mainly stocks titles describing trips to China. The mud also formed part of an obstacle course that two from each team had to overcome in order to once again love themselves. When we left them last week, black and blue were battling it out for last place. Graham struggled to extricate himself from the bog, while Luke struggled to extricate himself from Hamish. Alas it was not to be for blue. The ‘penalty’ for coming last was an … [Read more...]

When we last met our intrepid adventurers, red and black team were rounding up sheep in a challenge that would make a New Zealander weak at the knees. The object of the exercise was to get as many sheep into a pen in twenty minutes. This task was designed to prepare the contestants for many hurdles they would face in the outside world, such as how to select lean meats at the butcher, being able to tell wool from other fabrics, and, this being Biggest Loser singles of course, how to force recalcitrant prospective dates into the back of your van. At many stages it was neck and neck, though this early in their weight loss journeys necks … [Read more...]