You wouldn't think being called The Biggest Loser is a good thing until you consider that it means losing 122 pounds and winning a quarter of a million bucks. That's exactly what Ryan Benson did over the course of 8 months in the first season of TBL. Initially the premise is two teams fighting to lose more cumulative weight and avoid having to vote out one of their players. Surviving that led to the merging of the teams. At that point the two remaining players who have lost the lowest percentage of body weight are subject to being voted off if they can't win immunity.

When it boiled down to four, the original heaviest contestant Maurice (opening weight 436 pounds) was sent packing. That left Gary Deckman, Kelly Minner and Ryan Benson who were then told they would be on their own for the next four months, left to lose weight while at home before their final weigh in.

At the finale it was revealed that percentage of body fat lost would also be a contributing factor. Unfortunately, Kelly Minner suffered an injury that definitely hurt her chances to win. Still, she lost 33% of her body weight and 17% of her body fat although it is worth noting that women have a much more difficult time with the latter than men do. Gary Deckman went as far down in weight as he could really go at 156 (down from 227) and wound up with a total score of 54 (31% weight, 23% fat). Ryan had more weight to lose, and wound up with 37% weight loss and 18% fat loss for a 55.

It was later sprung on the 9 previously ousted contestants that they would get a chance at a $100,000 consolation prize. Dave, the biggest prick on the show, chimed in at a solid score of 53 to take that money home. Obviously they should have given Gary $100,000 for finishing second since the show got relatively excellent ratings and then threw $50,000 or $75,000 to the consolation winner, but whatever.

The Biggest Loser 2 is still casting and will debut in the spring. Actually I think there should be more shows like this where personal achievement is emphasized. These people take away a lot more from their experience than they would had they appeared on Survivor or Big Brother. Perhaps they will expand the field to 20 for future seasons.