Call it addiction if you must: Millions of us were glued to our sets every Tuesday night earlier this year to watch NBC’s reality program The Biggest Loser. The contestants on the show seem to shrink before our very eyes each week—who can resist? Especially when something so difficult and elusive—weight loss—seems downright possible from week to week?

The terrific irony of the show is that even those who don’t walk away with the title feel like winners. In April, the show wrapped its fifth season, The Biggest Loser: Couples, which featured duos from newlyweds to a mother and son and a divorced couple competing together as teammates to see who could lose the highest percentage of body weight. Hairdresser Ali Vincent became the first woman to clinch the Biggest Loser title and make off with the $250,000 prize. To hear the contestants tell it, though, the experience of learning to take control of their health is reward enough. We caught up with some of the competitors to hear about their experience of a lifetime.


As soon as Ali Vincent lined up for an open casting call with her mother, Bette-Sue Burkland, Vincent knew she would win it all. “From that moment, I felt it was meant to be,” Vincent says with a laugh. “It was my time. I just knew it with every pore of who I was.”

Even when she was eliminated from the show in week four, 33-year-old Vincent proclaimed in her exit interview that she would be the first female Biggest Loser. And it worked out. The show unleashed an unexpected twist this season: they brought back the male and female contestant who had lost the most weight at home, and Vincent triumphantly returned to fulfill her prophecy.

A former synchronized swimmer, Vincent didn’t struggle with her weight until age 18. “It started with 5 pounds,” she says. “As the years went by, I watched myself gain 5 pounds at a time. I was using it as protection; I would soothe my soul and find comfort through eating. It became my excuse. If I was passed up for a promotion, it was because I was fat. It wasn’t about me or my quality of work; it was about me being heavy. If a relationship was broken, it was because I was heavy. Not because they were leaving me—I’m too good of a person. It must be because I’m fat. So it became my excuse for not having the life, career or relationships I wanted. I didn’t know how to let go of it.”

Once on the show, Vincent learned to eat right and exercise, but she wasn’t prepared for the emotional journey she would take. Throughout it all, she did her best to remain positive. Every night, to help remain centered and focused on her weight loss goal, she would ring a meditation bell and repeat her mantra, “Believe it, be it.”

Because she had made herself feel so badly every time she’d gained weight in the past, she celebrated every pound lost. One of the most valuable lessons she learned was to put herself first. “I take care of people all day long and make them feel beautiful and I have to take care of myself,” she says. “I have to look out for me. If I don’t eat, it slows my metabolism and it’s important for me to keep it going. I have to make sure I schedule time to work out. I have to give to Ali, and that’s hard, I don’t know why, but it is … I have to say no to you so I can say yes to me on some occasions.”

By the end of the program, Vincent had lost a staggering 99 pounds. For those in the midst of their own weight loss struggle, she offers the following: “Be conscious. I think I lived unconsciously. I didn’t pay attention to what I put in my mouth. It’s not rocket science, but it is something you need to think about. You need to pay attention to what you’re eating. And if you screw up, choose again in the next moment. It’s OK.”

At age 21, Dan Evans was the youngest contestant on The Biggest Loser: Couples, but he had a long history of failed diets. “Me and my mom were the eternal dieters,” says Evans, who weighed 310 pounds when he began the show. “We had a joke; every Monday morning was the start of a new diet. All week long we’d overeat and say that on Monday morning, we would cut this out.” Evans tried everything “from cutting carbs, counting calories, every book, every fad,” he recalls. “At one time we got a personal trainer and I put on 5 pounds [while training] with him.”

Evans was almost a contestant in season four, making it all the way to Los Angeles for a callback before being cut. “It broke my heart,” he says. “I thought, “I’m not even good at being fat.’”

He swore off reapplying for the show, but last summer, a close friend of his died at age 28 from a heart attack. “We had been going down the same path of eating junk food and partying and doing our thing and I thought, ‘That’s all I have left?’” he recalls. “Somehow, in losing that friend, I possibly found myself a little bit. I decided to take what I’d lost and gain something back, which is my life.”

Evans and his mother, Jackie Evans, applied together for season five and made it. He was thrilled to share the experience with her. “We’re good friends,” he says, “so it was like another Monday morning diet we were going to try together and see if it worked.”

While on the ranch, Evans lost more than 100 pounds by exercising six hours a day and learning to eat right. But most importantly, he changed his lifestyle. “It’s not about just having the diet or just getting the personal trainer and exercising,” he says. “It’s about creating a plan that you’re going to live [by]. People can’t spend six to eight hours a day working out but they can find time to maybe get 90 minutes of cardio in three or four days a week and cut out the fast food and soda. It’s one step at a time in the right direction. You’ll find you can do a little more and a little more. It’s about stepping out of your comfort zone.”

For Evans, that included moving from Frankfurt, IL, to Los Angeles to pursue his music career. “When I got home after my elimination, I plateaued because my friends were calling me and I was going out. I quickly found myself skipping all my workouts,” he admits.

“The very thing that got me to be overweight in the first place was not prioritizing myself. I realized if I wanted to continue on this journey, I had to make some changes.”

He credits a large part of his new attitude to his trainer on The Biggest Loser, Bob Harper. “One thing Bob finally helped me understand was that this new person—this healthy 21-year-old guy—is who I am meant to be,” he says. “It wasn’t about looking better. It was about being the person I was supposed to be. He helped me come to the place where I realized I deserved to feel healthy and deserved to feel good about myself. That was a real turning point for me.”


At age 50, Jackie Evans (Dan’s mom) thought she was an expert on all things weight loss. Then she went on The Biggest Loser. “I used to say I was the professor of diets. I thought I knew everything about dieting,” she says. “But the truth of the matter is I knew nothing.”

The education she received from the show’s trainers and nutritionists changed that. “I woke up one morning and I thought, ‘I get it. I understood what we were doing, why I was losing weight and why I had struggled with my weight for the past 30 years.’ Once I got a total picture and awareness of this whole body science, I understood why I was fat,” she reveals. “It made perfect sense; there was no other way for me to be. And once I got a handle on that, a whole different understanding of my body and the way food works, I said, ‘If I ever write a book it’s going to be called What I Never Knew About Losing Weight.’”

Evans had tried everything from Weight Watchers to the cabbage soup diet with varying degrees of success. “One of the things I learned on the ranch was I had really skewed my metabolism from all the yoyo dieting,” she explains. “That was one of the main things my trainer Bob [Harper] worked with me on: getting my metabolism to a place where it just hummed.”

In addition to learning to adjust her calorie intake and her exercise output, Evans realized her struggle was compounded by age. “Once you hit my age bracket, it’s not easy to just cut out bread and lose weight like we used to,” she says. “I realize now it really takes a massive attack to decide to lose weight when you’re that overweight [Evans weighed 246 pounds when the show started]. What I came to understand was, it’s totally in my hands. I had to take full accountability and responsibility. If I get fat again, I would say to myself, ‘You are totally choosing to be fat. You know what got you here and you know what you can do.’ You can choose the body type you want to have. And at 50 years old, I did.”

Now down to a size 8 (from a size 22), Jackie is healthier and more energetic than she’s ever been. And she and her son Dan aren’t the only family members who have been affected by the show. “Our whole family is in such a different place,” she raves. “We go to the gym together—my son and daughter-in-law. He’s lost 22 pounds. My oldest son lost 40 pounds. My husband went down two pants sizes. It’s been a total transformation for our family.”

Whether you’re on your own weight loss journey or just want to stay in shape, it helps to have the advice of trained professionals. Cheryl Forberg, RD, is the nutritionist on The Biggest Loser and in her five seasons with the show, she’s witnessed common mistakes people make that cause weight gain. Here are some of her top healthy eating tips:

• Have a variety of food choices: “There are so many different kinds of fruits and vegetables. You can add layers of flavor and modify cooking techniques,” advises Forberg.
• Eat three meals and two snacks a day: This helps keep your energy level up.
• Eat carbohydrates, protein and healthy fat in every meal and snack: “Don’t just have fruit for a snack, add a little healthy fat and protein, like a few nuts,” she advises. Another great tip? Try edamame, a great source of protein and fiber.
• Cut the white stuff: “White” foods such as white sugar, white flour and white rice are a great source of calories, but don’t contain much fiber, antioxidants or vitamins.
• Put yourself first: “People often prioritize everything else over their own health and well-being—whether it’s their kids, their spouse, or their job,” Forberg says. Set aside time for yourself!

Trainer Jillian Michaels has spent three seasons on The Biggest Loser. She gives us her top tips for successful weight loss:

• Count calories. “You have to watch your calories. Weight loss is about creating an energy deficit and the only way to do that is to eat fewer calories than you burn in a day.”
• Be consistent. “You can’t eat well some days and not others and expect good results. The same goes for exercise: You can’t work out four days one week and then none the next.”
• Don’t give up. “Weight loss is a bumpy road. You will have great weeks and terrible weeks. As long as you are consistent, the weight will ultimately come off.”

About the Author: Jenelle Riley is a freelance writer based in Los Angeles.