The Biggest Loser franchise expands into games, a resort spa

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Can you duplicate the experience of “The Biggest Loser” without trainers Bob Harper and Jillian Michaels standing over you, ordering you to do one more rep or push-up?

Today, NBC Universal’s “Biggest Loser” franchise unveils two new ventures aimed at fans of the weight loss competition who watch the TV series each week and think, “I wish I could do that.”

One venture: the Biggest Loser Wii and Nintendo DS fitness games, offering individualized workouts. The games join a host of other compatible products including cookbooks and fitness and cooking gear.

The other is the Biggest Loser Resort at Fitness Ridge, a fitness spa in southern Utah that has partnered with the NBC franchise. Guests will spend up to $2,000 a week to have an experience that resort co-owner Tami Clark says mimics the life that contestants live on “The Biggest Loser.” (Click here to see photos of the Biggest Loser Resort at Fitness Ridge.)

Guests adhere to a 1,200-calorie diet and rise at 6 a.m. to begin a day filled with hiking, cooking, fitness and nutritional classes, and lots more working out. (There’s little room for cheating, as there are no vending machines or other food sources.) It’s lights out at 10 p.m.

“Then they get up [the next morning] and do it all over again,” Clark said. “There’s a one-week minimum stay.”

There are no plans to have Bob and Jillian visit the ranch. But Clark says she has plenty of tough trainers who can stand in for them. Someone might want to tell that to Jillian.

Speaking at a press day for the new season of ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Jillian said she hasn’t heard about the resort. Asked whether ‘The Biggest Loser’ experience was possible without TV’s toughest trainers, Jillian motioned in Bob’s direction and said, ‘We are ‘The Biggest Loser’ experience.’

-- Rene Lynch

Photo: NBC Universal