The Health Guru

Facts, Hints, Tips, Advice and Inspiration on everything to do about health & weight loss.

The Biggest Loser Asia: Episode 3

Posted on | December 16, 2009 | No Comments

Hhhmmmm… I’m going to have another whinge about last nights episode. (Maybe I should give up watching) This time I’m going to have a whinge about the weigh in and scales.

There were a number of contestants that had much smaller weight loss on the scales from the previous week and one person unfortunately didn’t lose anything.  You can see it on their faces and I can completely empathise with how they feel considering they’ve worked their butts off all week for little to no results.

WHICH IS WHY – WEIGHT MANAGEMENT IS ABOUT MORE THAN WHAT YOU WEIGH ON A SET OF SCALES.

The questions I would like to ask is:

Where they educated by their trainers that they may have lost body fat but gained muscle ? (i.e. changed body composition)  I must say in the episode they did cover that muscle weighs more than fat, but perhaps the method of analysis should be more indepth so they don’t get disheartened.

Was their hydration the same as last week?  How much water your body is holding can affect the scales dramatically.  Have they been told that the body is about 70% water?

Did their body shape change?  It is completely possible that their waist, hip, chest, thigh, arm circumferences all could have dropped but their weight on the scales remained the same.

Did their clothes fit better?  Did they feel more energised?  Did they feel better about themselves? ???

So for me, I find it really disappointing that their success relies on a set of scales.

It’s also unrealistic to expect HUGE weight loss every single week.  Often when overweight people make drastic changes to their usual exercise and diet habits, the body will respond with large amounts of weight loss initially.  But then by about week 3, the body eventually returns to normal weight loss of about 1kg per week.  But of course these contestants are pushing themselves so hard with exercise that they will often see weight loss of more than 1kg.  They are potentially setting themselves up for disappointment, because if you lose weight too fast you have a higher chance of gaining it back on again.  When it comes to weight loss, slow and steady always wins the race.

If I were their trainer, I would be finding every possible method of analysis for them – and educating that it’s not just about the scales – it’s about your body shape, composition and function  (i.e. waist to hip ratio, circumferences, BMI, Muscle mass, body fat %, hydration, fat-to-muscle ratio, cholesterol & blood glucose function, blood pressure and body temperature) and most importantly, I would be pushing the fact that exercise should be the icing on the cake for weight loss – not the be all and end all reason weight loss occurs.

On a funny note – How hilarious was that rant that Goddess had at the end after she was kicked out.  Wow.  She certainly didn’t hold back.

I guess at the end of the day, I think shows like the Biggest Loser encourage people that it is possible to change your lifestyle and lose weight. I’m sure it’s inspirational for many.  However, In my opinion, I don’t think it’s the best way to go about it or will be successful for them in the long term.  But it certainly is changing lives.

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