The Biggest Liar

So I admit it, I love watching the Biggest Loser. Even last season with horrible Heba, Ed, and Vicky did not diminish my love for the show. Well things have changed, my friends!

A couple weeks ago when Blaine got kicked off, they filmed him at the end preparing for an "Ironman". Except, they showed him talking about the race, and the numbers didn't add up. They didnt even add up to a half Ironman. Whatever, I just chalked it up to him being a newbie and not knowing what the deal was. I was a little irritated though when NBC stated that he would be competing in an IRONMAN, when that clearly wasn't what he was training for. Why exaggerate? Doing a half ironman is an amazing accomplishment. They dont need to diminsh that by making it sound like he was planning to do a full. Not to mention, NBC airs Kona every year, so you'd think they know what is involved in an actual full Ironman!

But last night took the cake. Blaine's cousin, Dane got kicked off. In the clips at the end, they show him talking about doing a marathon with his wife, and then SHOW them "finishing" a marathon. The clock shows a time of 5:53. Then, NBC states that Dane and his wife completed the marathon in 3:53. The hell?

Wellllllll.......come to find out, they didnt even run the whole damn thing! They got picked up at some point, it sounds like around mile 17, and then dropped closer to the finish. They didnt even tell the race officials they got a ride, they collected their medals. It took other racers reporting them to the race officials before they were DQ'd!

Here is what pisses me off. If this formerly 400+ lb guy ran even a half marathon, that is AWESOME. But for NBC to blatantly lie about his accomplishment is a slap in the face to everyone who HAS actually trained for and completed a full marathon. I dont care how long it takes you, I mean, look at my times. I'm slow as hell. But finishing a marathon is a huge effing deal, and NBC just completely shit all over it. But, for a show that promotes "average" weekly weight loss to be double digits, and trains contestants to think that a 5lb loss is somehow poor, I shouldnt be surprised.

There have been a lot of cleberities in the past few years who have gotten some press for running a marathon. That has just led to the perception by the general population that completing a marathon is no big deal. Well, it IS a big deal. And it takes a LOT of hard work and effort. It really saddens me to see a major network feeding into the misconception of how NOT a big deal doing a marathon really is.

Here's some more chatter on it:
http://blogs.kansascity.com/tvbarn/2009/02/the-biggest-los.html