The Biggest Loser episode 6: Tracey stays mostly in the shadows

by Alex Bentley

After five straight weeks of Allen homemaker Tracey hogging all the headlines on The Biggest Loser, it was inevitable that others would take the spotlight. In a way, though, she and her fellow Blue team members forcibly took it off her this week.

That's because they won the week's challenge, which came near the beginning of the episode instead of its normal mid-episode timeslot. The contestants engaged in a Survivor-like challenge of digging keys out of the sand in order to open a box with an unspecified reward. The men on both teams were quickest to get their keys out (which ended up being about six feet down), but Allen and Rudy on the Blue team were quicker to help out their teammates, giving them the win and a reward of tickets to go home for the week.

However, host Allison Sweeney threw another twist at them: If they so chose, they could give the tickets home to the Black team and stay on campus with Bob, their trainer. The decision didn't seem that hard for them, as they chose that option pretty quickly. This led to the typical at-home drama that Loser has shown in past seasons. Seemingly every Black team member had to deal with family that was supportive at first but then quickly turned back to their old ways, blindly eating unhealthy food while the contestants expressed shock -- shock! -- that their family would do that in front of them.

Meanwhile, Bob was relishing the chance to beat up on the Blue team. Tracey was finally given full gym clearance after her week 1 injuries. She seemed to have no problems with the workouts, though, even having the energy to help pimp the benefits of milk with Bob and teammate Liz. The Blue team also took the time to volunteer at a local food bank after supposedly being inspired by a challenge from the previous season. This was no challenge, though -- they simply loaded up backpacks with food for children who couldn't afford it.

Finally it was time for the Black team to come back to the ranch for a last-chance workout and the weigh-in. The Blue team went first since they stayed on campus. The three women lost relatively small amounts of weight, with Rebecca, Tracey, and Liz dropping 5, 4, and 4 pounds, respectively. The men did a bit better, with Allen losing 8 pounds and Rudy taking off 14 to give the Blue team a total of 35 pounds, or 2.65% of their total weight.

The Black team got off to an inauspicious start, prefaced by Tracey wishing them bad juju -- "Did you eat some cake? I hope you did." Again, it was the women who didn't live up to expectations, with Amanda (4 pounds), Shay (5), Abby (4), and Dina (5) struggling to lose weight after being at home all week. Danny gave them a bit of hope with a 15-pound loss, but Daniel inexplicably gained a pound, his second bad week after losing nothing two weeks ago.

Because he wasn't losing weight and because he's the only contestant who had been on the show before, it seemed obvious that Daniel would be going home. The decision appeared to hinge on Shay, though, who would not vote for Daniel since he was her original partner. Abby and Amanda agreed with her, and all of them (plus Daniel) voted off Dina. After losing 35 pounds on campus, Dina was shown to have lost 30 more pounds at home, getting her down to 188 overall.