TBL's ALI VINCENT--How She's Keeping the Weight Off, Advice To Those Starting Weight Loss Journey

There's an interesting interview with THE BIGGEST LOSER'S female winner Ali Vincent over at That's Fit dot com that's worth visiting to read in its entirety.

Here are two Q/A snippets that I found of special interest.

The first tells us how Ali is keeping off her huge weight loss--and it's not easy, not for lazybones, shows focus and strength of will:

TF: What was your daily calories in/calories out goal on the road to winning Season 5 compared to today? (Ali was initially voted off, but did win a spot to return to the ranch.) In your book you share you still keep a food journal, but do you still strap on a bodybugg?

AV: I've got it on my arm right now. Yeah I do, I love it, love it, love it. People are like, "Do you still have to wear that?" I don't have to wear the bodybugg, but for me, it's the best tool I've found to track the calories I've burned every day. For me it's liberating. As long as I burned it, I can eat it. Now I'll stay on about 2,000 calories and I'll just make sure I burn 2,000 calories. It was hard for me to do before, but now I have an active lifestyle. I never go more than three days. On that third day, if I haven't done a workout, then I go.

When we first went to the ranch, my calories [in] were 1,200, but they didn't use the bodybugg [for the burn] like they do it now. On Biggest Loser we had one day of rest with higher calories, so I added 800 calories on my rest day for a 2,000 calorie day. [After being voted off the show] I stayed on a 1,200 calorie budget and I had to burn 3,750 a day to get me in a 50 percent [weight] loss range at the finale. When I returned to the ranch, Jillian asks me, "What in the hell are you doing?" I told her, "I go to bed when my bodybugg tells me to go." I relied on a mathematical equation. When you win the Biggest Loser, you live and die by the bodybugg. There's other tools out there, the bodybugg was the tool that I was given and that I use.

The second is advice for those starting a journey to lose fat and gain fitness:

TF: What do you tell people who are obese/overweight and don't know where to start?

AV: A, you gotta tell the truth of what you are. I didn't even know I weighed 234 lbs. You have to know where point A is before you can get to point B. Then think about what point B looks like. How much weight do you want to lose? Get clear on what your goal is going to be, then break it down in between. Start journaling everything that you do throughout the day. Go online, get support groups, get a trainer or a friend. If you want to be healthy, find the healthiest person you know and start hanging around them. Start watching them. You have to take action.

It never gets easy. Not the start, not the middle, and obviously not the finish--which is no such thing. It's just the ongoing....

Ali's Book, BELIEVE IT, BE IT releases tomorrow. Previous TBL winner Matt Hoover also published a book. I'd like to see Kai Hibbard write a tell-all, frankly, of the manipulations behind the scenes and how the pressure of TBL seems to lead some pretty close to eating disorders, exercise addiction, and dangerous diet behaviors for the moolah.Wonder if they invited her for the "Where Are They Now" type of show coming up soon?

Prolly not?

Ali, Matt and Suzy, and Eric Chopin (who has regained, btw) will be in it.

Anyway, the special airs November 25.