Olympic Gold Medalist Rulon Gardner To Compete on NBC’s Biggest Loser

Olympic hero and former Nebraska Cornhusker Rulon Gardner will be among the contestants on the upcoming season of “The Biggest Loser”

From Jill Carmen/NBC

Universal City, Calif. – Olympic Gold medalist wrestler Rulon Gardner and 21 other contestants will have to choose between longtime “Biggest Loser” trainers Bob Harper and Jillian Michaels or two new trainers on NBC’s must-see season 11 premiere of “The Biggest Loser: Couples” airing Tuesday, January 4 (8-10 p.m. ET).

The eleven family and friend teams of two hit the ground running when they arrive at the “Biggest Loser” ranch, greeted by host Alison Sweeney with the news that they will immediately compete in their first challenge – running a 5K on a treadmill. And each team will get to make a game-changing decision based on the order in which they finish. They’ll be given the unprecedented opportunity to choose whether to work out at the ranch with trainers Bob Harper and Jillian Michaels, who have helped contestants lose over 25,000 lbs. in ten seasons – or work out at a secret location with two new trainers.

If the contestants choose the new trainers, whom they know nothing about, they’ll receive four weeks of immunity. If they choose to stay at the ranch and be trained by Bob and Jillian, they’re at risk of going home after just one week. The players’ reactions result in some surprising choices, ultimately leading to five teams going with the new trainers and six teams staying at the ranch with Bob and Jillian.

The trainers spend time getting to know their new contestants, including Denise Hill, a mother of eight who gained weight with each pregnancy without really losing the weight after, Arthur Wornum, this season’s biggest contestant at 507 lbs., Sarah Nitta, a woman who desperately wants to be a mother after losing pregnancies because of her weight, and identical twin policeman, one who lost his 24-year-old son and the other, who is estranged from his son because of his obesity.

Off at a secret location, “the unknowns” work out with their new trainers, a longtime personal trainer and a two-time Golden Gloves-winning boxer. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the contestants are put through the paces by Bob and Jillian at the gym, and put their teamwork skills to the test with a wild workout involving Jillian’s big truck. Later, a weigh-in reveals which group of contestants lost more, the ranch contestants or “the unknowns.” And one contestant breaks the “Biggest Loser” record for the most weight ever lost at a weigh-in before the first elimination of the season sends one player home.

“The Biggest Loser” is a production of Reveille LLC, 25/7 Productions and 3Ball Productions. Ben Silverman (NBC’s “The Office,” “Ugly Betty”), Dave Broome (“Shedding For The Wedding,” “Tsunami Aid: A Concert of Hope”), JD Roth (“MasterChef,” “What’s Eating You”), Todd A. Nelson (“Unan1mous,” “Beauty and the Geek”), Howard T. Owens (“MasterChef,” “The Buried Life”) and Todd Lubin (“30 Days,” “Nashville Star”) serve as executive producers.

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