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This is the Biggest Loser Finale results week. Hopefully, you've been keeping track of my local gym's The Biggest Loser competition and enjoying my weekly updates. Here's a recap:

Week 1 (Jan 14th) - weighed in at 198lbs (original weight)
Week 2 (Jan 21st) - weighed in at 189lbs (-9 lbs)
Week 3 (Jan 28th) - weighted in at 189lbs (0 change)
Week 4 (Feb 4th) - weighed in at 186lbs (-3 lbs)
Week 5 (Feb 11th) - weighed in at 186lbs (0 change)
Week 6 (Feb 18th) - weighed in at 184lbs (-2 lbs).
Week 7 (Feb 25th) - weighed in at 183lbs (-1 lbs).
Week 8 (March 3rd) - weighed in at 180lbs (-3 lbs).
Week 9 (March 10th) - weighed in at 180lbs (0 change).
Week 10 (March 17th) - weighed in at 174lbs (-6 lbs).
Week 11 (March 24th) - weighed in at 174lbs (0 change).

This week (finale):
Week 12 (March 31st) - weighed in at 170lbs (-4 lbs).

I worked my tail off this weekend, including a 3.5 hour workout on Saturday that included over 5 miles on the treadmill as well as weight training. The gym owner noticing my lengthy workout commented "You've been here almost 4 hours? You really want to win the free gym membership, don't you?"

Well, as of 3pm today, everyone has weighed in for the final time. And the winner is...

[drumroll please]
...
...
...

I won the gym's Biggest Loser contest with a 14.14% percentage loss and 28lbs! My wife came from behind to tie for 2nd place with a 9.6% loss, which means the Keating family dominated The Biggest Loser contest. Too bad this wasn't The Biggest Loser Couples.

Ok, and now the Final Top 6 Leaderboard (15 total contestants):

1) TOM 28 lbs lost = 14.14%
2) NICOLE (18 lbs lost) and JOAN (14 lbs lost) = 9.6%
3) KIM 19 lbs lost = 7.7%
4) SHAWN 11.5 lbs lost = 6.7%
5) MARY 10 lbs lost = 4.7%
6) ERIN 7.75 lbs lost = 4.4%

Not only did I win 1st prize (free 1-year gym membership), but my wife and I were on the same team with 3 other players and we also won the "team prize" ($50 AMEX gift card) since we had the largest percentage loss as a team as seen here:

Team Leaderboard by Trainer:
Team One Lisa's Team (includes Nicole, me, and 3 others): 7.6%
Team Two Sally's Team: 3.9%
Team Three Danielle's Team: 2.9%

But it's not over... While the gym Biggest Loser competition is over, the race goes on. I still have to win the TMC Biggest Loser competition which ends May 1st. Reminds me of a famous scene in Ben-Hur - one of the greatest movies of all time - where Messala tells Judah Ben-Hur that the battle is not over...

Ben-Hur: Where are they? Where are they? (shouting) Where are they?
Messala: (vengefully) Look for them in the Valley of the Lepers, if you can recognize them. (grabbing Judah's clothing) It goes on. It goes on, Judah. The race, the race is not over.

Continuing my updates for my local gym's The Biggest Loser competition, here's Week #11. Need I remind you that this this past week was a holiday weekend with Easter Sunday a couple days ago. I knew this was going to be a troublesome week for me since I was going to be visiting with family to celebrate Easter. This meant lots of tempting foods. In fact, I ate turkey, 9 pieces of cocktail shrimp, mashed potatoes with butter, corn, and a roll with butter. For dessert I had a couple thin mints, Carvel ice cream cake, chocolate mousse cheesecake with fudge frosting, and a piece of my wife's Easter Lemon Pie with homemade whipped cream. On top of it all, my wife got me a giant 1 foot tall chocolate Easter Bunny rabbit from Bridgewater Chocolate. I cannot resist chocolate. You think you're a chocoholic? The entire bunny's ears and head was gone in less than a day.

Now if you recall, in Week 7, I had a shoulder injury, but regardless I wasn't going to make any excuses for not losing weight. I said I wouldn't gain weight on any week. In Week 7 I wrote, "Anyway, even with the injury I'm hoping to lose at least 1lb per week. I may have a few 0 weight changes, but I'm hoping to never have a weight gain. Wish me luck!"

With my virtual guarantee I would not have a week with a weight gain you're probably wondering how the heck I could eat all that food, including 3 main desserts and a massive piece of chocolate and expect to not gain weight. (Mind you the weigh-in was the day after Easter.) Well, that's a damn good question!

I knew I would want to eat my favorite foods and desserts for Easter, so I did three things. One, I lowered my calories slightly last week. Two, I worked out like a mad man burning anywhere from 400-1000 calories per day in the gym. Third, I used mental motivation by watching & listening to inspiring music and videos this week. Specifically, I have on my Microsoft Zune movie clips from Rocky movies and some of the soundtrack songs.

One of my favorite inspiring movie clips is when Rocky faces Ivan Drago, the giant Russian in Rocky IV. Rocky, the much shorter fighter and of course the underdog had to use his will to overcome seemingly impossible odds.

Duke: [to Rocky] You see? You see? He's not a machine, he's a man, he's a man!
Drago: [to his own trainer] He's not human. He's like a piece of iron.


I kept telling myself I will not gain weight this week. I will not fail. Irish pride and ego certainly help. While I can't compare my workout ethic to Rocky, I certainly did push myself harder so I could eat what I wanted on Easter.

And the verdict? I weighed in at 173.75, a 1/4 pound loss!! Although the gym rounds up so I stayed at 174 pounds - the same as last week. I'm ecstatic I didn't gain weight, yet ate whatever I wanted.

Here's the full week-by-week recap followed by the Top 5 Leaderboard Standings:

Week 1 (Jan 14th) - weighed in at 198lbs (original weight)
Week 2 (Jan 21st) - weighed in at 189lbs (-9 lbs)
Week 3 (Jan 28th) - weighted in at 189lbs (0 change)
Week 4 (Feb 4th) - weighed in at 186lbs (-3 lbs)
Week 5 (Feb 11th) - weighed in at 186lbs (0 change)
Week 6 (Feb 18th) - weighed in at 184lbs (-2 lbs).
Week 7 (Feb 25th) - weighed in at 183lbs (-1 lbs).
Week 8 (March 3rd) - weighed in at 180lbs (-3 lbs).
Week 9 (March 10th) - weighed in at 180lbs (0 change).
Week 10 (March 17th) - weighed in at 174lbs (-6 lbs).

This week:
Week 11 (March 24th) - weighed in at 174lbs (0 change).

Ok, and now the Top 5 Leaderboard:

1.) Tom/me 12.1% body weight lost (24 lbs)
2.) Joan 8.9% body weight lost (13.5 lbs)
3.) Nicole 8.3% body weight lost (15.5 lbs)
4.) Kim 8.1% body weight lost (20 lbs)
5.) Shawn 5.5% body weight lost (9.5 lbs)

This is the final week, with the final weigh-in taking place March 31st. Joan has been gaining on me and took the #2 spot from my wife, Nicole. Joan's starting weight was only 151, so all she needs to do is lose 5lbs this week and if I lose 0 she's actually beats me by 0.1%. This of course means I need to lose at least a couple pounds just to be safe and win the free year gym membership. I'm going to shoot for 4 pounds this week which will put me at 170lbs. If I can get one more pound and be at 169, I will be ecstatic. That would be >15% weight loss in just 11 weeks!

Wish me luck for this final run to the finish line!

Continuing my updates for my local gym's The Biggest Loser competition, here's Week #10.

Just to recap last week, I "threw the gauntlet down" against my fellow co-workers who were running their own Biggest Loser contest. I did a one way $100 bet against all 5 players that I could beat their weight percentage lost.

One of the players who we'll call "J" emailed me, "You threw it down and I just picked it up! Your $100 beans is all mine!"

Now that's the kind of smack talk I need to get my butt in gear and lose some more weight!

As for the other players, one player whom we'll call "D" sounded quite confident he could beat me. He asked my starting weight and my goal weight. He's a much bigger guy than I am so he can certainly lose more pounds than me - the big question is can he beat my percentage. He seemed confident he could. Good luck with that Big D! Hey wait, that's a McDonald's sandwich!

Another player whom we'll call "T" was skeptical he could match my weight loss numbers. He said something to the effect of "It's much harder for me because I have to lose a lot more pounds than Tom does." I guess no $100 for him. Of course, he could be playing coy so I don't try as hard. As for the other 2 players "R" & "A" no comments so far.

In any event, here's this week's update including all previous 9 weeks for context. As I told some high school friends via email, I made them a "guarantee" I would lose at least 5 pounds or I would have to give up "something" that I would sorely miss. Fortunately, I knew I would lose at least 5 pounds this week because of the "new challenge" from my co-workers giving me new motivation. Nothing like a little inter-office rivalry to get my Irish pride going.

My weight loss this week? A whopping 6 pounds! As Emeril would say - BAM!! This is my largest weight loss since Week 2 where I lost 9 pounds. And now for my next prediction, I predict I will win the next Powerball even if the previous $275 million jackpot will reset to something puny - like $20 million. (Just kidding. I don't gamble.)

Here's the full week-by-week recap:

Week 1 (Jan 14th) - weighed in at 198lbs (original weight)
Week 2 (Jan 21st) - weighed in at 189lbs (-9 lbs)
Week 3 (Jan 28th) - weighted in at 189lbs (0 change)
Week 4 (Feb 4th) - weighed in at 186lbs (-3 lbs)
Week 5 (Feb 11th) - weighed in at 186lbs (0 change)
Week 6 (Feb 18th) - weighed in at 184lbs (-2 lbs).
Week 7 (Feb 25th) - weighed in at 183lbs (-1 lbs).
Week 8 (March 3rd) - weighed in at 180lbs (-3 lbs).
Week 9 (March 10th) - weighed in at 180lbs (0 change).

This week:
Week 10 (March 17th) - weighed in at 174lbs (-6 lbs).

Erbert & Gerbert's, the Midwest sandwich shop that brought you humanflipbook.com, comes the world's most powerful air vortex cannon (www.candlecannon.com). Prepare to be amazed by this candle blowing air cannon. Yeah sure it's designed to blow out candles, but it could just as easily be aimed at unsuspecting victims on the street up to 180 feet away resulting in comments like,  "WTF was that?"

My sister Kellie owns and operates the Oxford Academy of Hair Design in Oxford, Connecticut where she is an instructor teaching and certifying beauticians. It's one of the best hairdressing schools in Connecticut I might add, but I'm biased - she is family after all.

Anyway, she informed me late last night that someone nearly poisoned her with Visine, which could have made my sister very sick, put her in a coma, or even death.

She writes:

So It looks like I won’t have much trouble getting traffic to my website now. I am in the Boston Globe, Ny Papers, all the CT papers, all the CT newstations and now people are creating blogs about this!!

This is Insane!

I guess she's famous now. Actually, her school has been featured on TV a few times. They even wanted to make a reality show based on her beauty school. After all, beauty schools are the perfect place for gossip, drama, drama queens, etc. Mr T. was involved but I believe it fell through. Too bad - can you imagine if the reality crew caught the Visine poisoning attempt on camera? Talk about ratings!

My sis' points me to this Google link featuring the Visine discussion on the Web:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=oxford+academy%2C+visine

Also, according to the Connecticut Post:

Seymour police say a student at a beauty school has been accused of putting Visine eye drops in the water bottle of an instructor.

Twenty-two-year-old Olga Louniakova of East Haven has been charged with reckless endangerment, threatening and criminal attempt to commit an assault.

Seymour police say Louniakova allegedly put the drops in the water bottle of an instructor who teaches at the Oxford Academy for Hair Design.

Investigators say Louniakova had a problem with another student at the school and had intended to put the solution in that person's bottle.

Police say the eye drop solution can lower body temperatures to dangerous levels, make breathing difficult, and bring on nausea, vomiting, blurred vision, seizures and even coma.

What does Yahoo Answers! say about ingesting Visine?

The active ingredient in Visine eye drops is Tetrahydrozoline HCl 0.05%. Swallowing this substance can result in a number of nasty effects, including:

* Lowering body temperature to dangerous levels
* Making breathing difficult, or even halting it entirely
* Blurring vision
* Causing nausea and vomiting
* Elevating and then dropping blood pressure
* Causing seizures or tremors
* Sending the ingester into a coma

Yikes! Even a small amount can be dangerous. Apparently, the intended prank was inspired by the movie "Wedding Crashers" where Owen Wilson puts Visine in the glass to give diarrhea.

Well sis, I'm just glad you're OK. Here's some pics of my sister and her school:

My Sister Kellie to the far left in front of her Oxford Academy of Hair Design business. Apparently the guy in the middle is some famous guy - David Guliano from Sexy Hair.


My sister (left) with some of her hairdressing students I believe.

Continuing my updates for my local gym's The Biggest Loser competition, here's Week #9.

Week 1 (Jan 14th) - weighed in at 198lbs (original weight)
Week 2 (Jan 21st) - weighed in at 189lbs (-9 lbs)
Week 3 (Jan 28th) - weighted in at 189lbs (0 change)
Week 4 (Feb 4th) - weighed in at 186lbs (-3 lbs)
Week 5 (Feb 11th) - weighed in at 186lbs (0 change)
Week 6 (Feb 18th) - weighed in at 184lbs (-2 lbs).
Week 7 (Feb 25th) - weighed in at 183lbs (-1 lbs).
Week 8 (March 3rd) - weighed in at 180lbs (-3 lbs).
Week 9 (March 10th) - weighed in at 180lbs (0 change).

No change this week, which I expected since I had a 12-day cold and couldn't do any cardio. I was also losing a little bit of my motivation to continue to strive to lose weight since I'm in 1st place for the gym's Biggest Loser competition and I'm close to my goal weight of 175 lbs.

However, I have found a new motivation to lose more weight. A few days ago, a coworker was by my desk and I commented how he looked great from all his weight loss. He mentioned he lost 25 lbs from his participation in TMC's Biggest Loser competition. I thought about joining TMC's Biggest Loser competition as well, but it started 1-2 weeks after my gym's Biggest Loser competition and I didn't really need another contest to motivate myself. Besides, my gym is offering a free year's gym membership which is worth about $800, so that was also a huge motivating factor. I just assumed TMC's Biggest Loser competition with 5 contestants was just for "pride". It was then that my coworker mentioned it was a $75 buy-in to play. Nothing like 5 x $75 = $375 to motivate me even more to lose weight! So I told my coworker I'd like to play as well and he was game to having me join. He was kicking butt himself with his 25lb weight loss and no doubt he thought he'd be taking my $75 as part of his winnings.

A few hours later, he came back to tell me some of the other players didn't want me to play. Bummer. I started around the same time and was willing to have my final weigh-in end date be 1-2 weeks earlier since I started earlier. I know 3 out of the 5 contestants read my blog regularly, so no doubt they saw my Biggest Loser blog updates and saw how well I was doing. I obviously scared them off. No wonder none of them invited me to play when they started their competition after I started mine.

I was looking forward to some inter-office rivalry and collecting my $375 (+ $75 of my money), but alas it was not to be. But that's OK if some don't want me to play, because I'm going to play anyway. No, not for the money pot they're offering, since I can't get in on that. Nope, instead I'm going to offer my own inter-office bet. I'm going to bet each of the 5 TMC participants $100 that I can beat their total body percentage weight loss. If I don't beat a particular person they get $100, but if I do beat a particular person they don't have to pay me anything. It's a one-way bet. This means I could potentially lose $500 if they all beat me.

The gauntlet has been laid.

Oh and to quote Ivan Drago from Rocky IV who said to Apollo Creed - "You will lose"... (video of this quote below)

I love the Brits. I most admire them for their World War II toughness & fierce determination and can-do attitude against seemingly overwhelming odds. There is also something to be said for their "properness" and manners. Britain, a tiny island once held the mightiest navy in all the world and explored and colonized much of the world spreading for better or worse the English language and culture. Britain gave this world some of its greatest free-spirited explorers.

With this in mind, I never would think of the British as the type of people that sues McDonald's for spilling hot coffee like America's over-litigious society nor would I expect them to be granted a free government hand-out. But it appears Britain has lost much of that free spirit. Like the rest of Europe they have become more socialist than capitalist. Whether you agree or disagree in nationalized health care, we can all agree that Britain's nationalized health care system is a disaster.

So perhaps I shouldn't have been surprised that the British government has now issued an order to wrap their lampposts in padding because the Brits were walking into lampposts while texting. No doubt some probably sued and won millions complaining there was no radar-induced audible alert that they were about to bash their forehead into the post. Oy!

Let's assume there are 1 million lampposts in Britain and the padding costs $100 + $50 labor to install. That's $150 million to pad lampposts to protect someone from getting a bump on their head? C'mon! What a waste of British taxpayer money. Even if it isn't that much money, I still say Survival of the fittest. Let the dumb ones who walk into lampposts fall backwards onto a busy street and be weaned out of the human gene pool. Ok, that was a little harsh. Well, perhaps they can just fall all on their arse and it'll knock them sense into them to not text while walking or at least look up every few seconds.

Where have the Brits I have come to admire and love gone?

[via Yahoo!]

Continuing my updates for my local gym's The Biggest Loser competition, here's Week #8.

Week 1 (Jan 14th) - weighed in at 198lbs (original weight)
Week 2 (Jan 21st) - weighed in at 189lbs (-9 lbs)
Week 3 (Jan 28th) - weighted in at 189lbs (0 change)
Week 4 (Feb 4th) - weighed in at 186lbs (-3 lbs)
Week 5 (Feb 11th) - weighed in at 186lbs (0 change)
Week 6 (Feb 18th) - weighed in at 184lbs (-2 lbs).
Week 7 (Feb 25th) - weighed in at 183lbs (-1 lbs).
Week 8 (March 3rd) - weighed in at 180lbs (-3 lbs).

Surprisingly, after I predicted my weight loss would slow down, I pulled a 3 pounder this week. This even though I was away this weekend in Maine and didn't go to the gym for 4 days. Total percentage loss is 9.09%.

Continuing my updates for my local gym's The Biggest Loser competition, here's Week #7.

Week 1 (Jan 14th) - weighed in at 198lbs (original weight)
Week 2 (Jan 21st) - weighed in at 189lbs (-9 lbs)
Week 3 (Jan 28th) - weighted in at 189lbs (0 change)
Week 4 (Feb 4th) - weighed in at 186lbs (-3 lbs)
Week 5 (Feb 11th) - weighed in at 186lbs (0 change)
Week 6 (Feb 18th) - weighed in at 184lbs (-2 lbs).
Week 7 (Feb 25th) - weighed in at 183lbs (-1 lbs).

My weight loss has slowed down with just 6 more weeks to go. The good news is that I've lost 15lbs with a fantastic 7.57% weight loss. The even better news is that I'm currently in 1st place for the Biggest Loser competition with 15 total competitors. My wife is actually in 2nd place. Guess the Keating family is kicking some serious butt!

Now for the bad news. I injured my right shoulder about 8 days ago and haven't been able to do much upper body weight training. I think I would be down another 3lbs if not for my shoulder. I'm sure my wife would tell me to stop complaining since I'm in 1st place. I love competition and the thrill of victory but more importantly, when I set me mind to something I just want to do the very best I can regardless if I am competing against others. Part of it is pride, part of it is stubbornness, and part of it is ego.

On top of it all, I caught a nasty cold this week. I woke up this morning and my ears were clogged from the congestion. I took a shot of NyQuil and headed off to my 7:30am morning training session with just a granola bar in my stomach. I usually work out at night but I wanted to work with this particular trainer and she could only do early mornings.

The trainer warned me that people that aren't used to working out in the mornings can feel light-headed. I thought to myself "Me? Light-headed? Bah! I've never felt light-headed in my life from a gym workout. Only girlie men get light-headed". Well, word to the wise - when you take a shot of NyQuil on an empty stomach, you have a cold, then run 6.5mph for 5 minutes and then have a trainer push you to your limit, you are going to feel light-headed.

I was in the middle of doing a drop set exercise when I couldn't lift the weights and was struggling way more than I should have. Trainer looks at me and says "Are you feeling ok? You look very pale". I told her I was fine, but could understand why I couldn't life the weights since they were very light. My stubbornness and never give up mentality was pushing me way beyond mere mortals. Ok, off the ego trip. So anyway, I started to feel light-headed, told her I just needed a second and she then asked if I wanted a Gatorade, which I accepted. By the time she got back, she said "You are very pale. I think you need to lay down." So I swallowed my Irish pride and laid down with my feet up for 5 minutes. The trainer says this happens all the time with people that aren't used to working out in the morning. Still, my ego was a little bruised. I told her about the shot of NyQuil and she said "No wonder why you're light-headed. Working out will increase the speed of the absorption and you have a head cold." After my 5 min break from my continuous circuit training, I got back on the machine. She asked me if I wanted to skip the last set and I told her no. I always finish what I start. I'm hearing Ronald Reagan saying in my ear, "There you go again - with that ego of yours."

Anyway, even with the injury I'm hoping to lose at least 1lb per week. I may have a few 0 weight changes, but I'm hoping to never have a weight gain. Wish me luck! And now back to your regularly scheduled program of VoIP & gadget news!

Continuing my updates for my local gym's The Biggest Loser competition, here's Week #6.

Week 1 (Jan 14th) - weighed in at 198lbs (original weight)
Week 2 (Jan 21st) - weighed in at 189lbs (-9 lbs)
Week 3 (Jan 28th) - weighted in at 189lbs (0 change)
Week 4 (Feb 4th) - weighed in at 186lbs (-3 lbs)
Week 5 (Feb 11th) - weighed in at 186lbs (0 change)
Week 6 (Feb 18th) - weighed in at 184lbs (-2 lbs). I'm surprised I lost anything this week since I was away on vacation. Went to AAA 4 Diamond rated Rabbit Hill Inn in Vermont (gorgeous bed & breakfast by the way) and of course ate some calorie-rich food, including grilled beef sirloin & venision osso buco, rainbow trout, as well as some world-class desserts such as chocolate stout cake, Northeast Kingdom Gateau (very rich & chocolatey), and some tasty chocolate truffles and pastries during their afternoon tea. I did however bust my butt on the treadmill last week in anticipation of eating badly on vacation. I guess it paid off.

Rabbit Hill Inn nailed a perfect score in the Select Registry and Zagat said of Rabbit Hill Inn: "This just might be the most romantic place on the planet."

I should mention that Rabbit Hill Inn has several unique Stave puzzles, which are like art pieces, which sucked both my wife and I into the lounge area for hours on end trying to solve. These puzzles are handcut and go for hundreds - even thousands of dollars. We spent a good deal of time in the two chairs by the window (pic below) putting together a Stave puzzle depicting an elephant. Hmm, sit on my butt for hours on end and still lose two pounds. Now that's the way one should lose weight!