The Biggest Loser Episode 4: Abandonment Issues

Another week, another gallon of weight loss. So what have we learned this week?

• You never know who’s going to emerge as a leader;
• Drink lots of water, and use a Brita filter;
• If you make exercise fun, you’re more likely to do it.

Hostess Cupcake informs everyone that the trainers are visiting the kids all week, so the contestants will be on their own. The contestants immediately descend into Lord Of The Flies, only everyone is Piggy. Wait, no, that’s just my imagination. In reality, we still have about two hours of television ahead of us.

Bob learns that Bingo’s mother lost 27 lbs by being on the same food and workout program. And, when the junk food disappeared from the home last week, it was replaced with fresh fruit, milk, water and pinecones. Bob brings Bingo to play baseball. Oh boy! This is kind of cool because Bingo’s weight has been holding him back from the game. Hopefully this will motivate him to keep on moving.

Sunny shows Jillian around her house and they have a little girl chat. She explains that she stress eats from her busy school and after-school schedule. But the problem is something more like she doesn’t pursue her dreams because she’s afraid of failing and she blames it on her weight rather than her parents. This confuses me, because I’ve never known a teenager to miss an opportunity to blame their parents. Jillian signs Sunny up for rowing. Crew is pretty nifty looking, but practice didn’t go so well because rowing is really, really hard. But, she gets Sunny to open up to her mother, so that’s good.

Dolvett has a heart-to-heart with Lindsay, who talks about being mocked by the other middle school cheerleaders. There are a lot of Mean Girl experiences floating around in middle school and, even though it is wrong, mocking a somewhat-less-than-perfect-bodied girl on a squad comes with the territory. To motivate her, Dolvett brought out the high school cheerleaders to do a cheer for her.

Back at the Red Team, goals are pretty high but spirits are kind of low. They barely lost any weight last week, and now Dolvett’s gone. Oddly enough, Jackson steps up as the team leader. The White Team is also in freak-out mode, trying to push each other to work harder, while the Blue Team just sort of slacks off.

Challenge! They’re running a 5K, which sounds far.  Oh, and the winning team gets to split $15,000, which makes the White Team, with only two contestants, pretty excited. The team with the average fastest time wins.  Running running running, sweating sweating sweating, sun blazing, thighs jiggling, and contestants start to cross the finish line. The White Team comes in first and third, so it was a good day for the White Team as Pam and Danni finish a 5K with 15K in their pocket.

Jillian learns that her team won the challenge and is super duper excited for them. Bob rejoins his team and finds them…a little flat. They look depressed and panicked, so Bob quite literally works their butts off during the Last Chance Workout. Dolvett’s enjoying Jackson’s new attitude, but he’s concerned about Joe, who hasn’t really pushed himself yet.

Jillian dives in to give the Blue Team the business. They’ve been slacking all week, and she’s demanding more out of them than they’re prepared to give. Jeff is especially annoyed with Jillian’s aggressive technique. He’s pushing back a little too much, and after an extra dose of sass, Jillian kicks him out of her workout.

At the weigh-in, the Red Team beats the Blue Team by a pound of flesh, but the White Team brings up the derriere. Despite her running and jumping and lifting, Pam only lost three pounds and gets to take that long, lonely walk into the sunset. Since leaving the show, Pam has lost over 50 lbs,  so good for you, Pam.

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