TVSquad

(S08E07) As promised, absolutely everything Biggest Loser was transported to our nation's capitol, Washington DC, for the week. The contestants had to deal with vacation eating, exercising, and even their challenges and the weigh-in happened surrounded by national monuments.

It was a pretty exciting thing for our contestants, and even Bob and Jillian were somewhat in awe of the majesty of where they were. The episode wasn't as emotionally gripping as it's been the last few weeks, but I think a lot of that has to do with the distractions of everything that was going on this week.

It's hard to have an emotional breakthrough when you're away from the comfort of the Ranch and the Biggest Loser Gym, and all the trappings that have come to make these contestants feel at home. So I found myself worried as to what would happen after a week of chaos when these guys got up on that scale.

Before it even got that far, though, Alison broke the game again and eliminated Brown and Black. It's time to go singles, so the only person you have to blame, or praise, is yourself in regards to that yellow line. What surprised me, though, was how many contestants really came through.

I was a little disappointed that nothing was made of Liz's supposed vendetta against Tracey. What happened to kill her with kindness. Shay was right. When it came down to Liz and Tracey below the yellow line, Liz barely put up a fight for herself. Lucky for her, Tracey had pretty much dug her own grave the past eight weeks by allowing her competitive game-play side to dominate what she was doing. So it was no surprise that she went home.

But before we got to that, we had a fun challenge with the contestants running the streets of Washington, DC looking for regular people to join them in a workout with Bob and Jillian at the Washington Monument. I thought Daniel and Amanda would have a huge advantage on this one, considering they'd been seen before. But then Allen got smart and called on his brotherhood of firefighters.

And yet, somehow, Liz's "grandma" charm won out in the end, and she beat out Allen for the win. Unfortunately, that victory didn't help her out enough going into the next four-part challenge and she was eliminated. I need to talk about that challenge, though. Where the hell did Rebecca come from in that?

That final challenge she seemed to never even slow down while Rudy was getting more and more fatigued. She reminded me a lot of Tara from last season, who would go into a similar machine mode for challenges.

With the end in sight, and everyone fighting as individuals, it's time to look at the remaining contestants and see who's looking strong. I was pleased to see Amanda show some chutzpah this week, and even Daniel busted through whatever wall he's been battling the past few weeks and put up a good number. Could he actually make a run for the title?

Rudy, Danny and Shay face a disadvantage each week in that they have to put up tremendous numbers just to stay competitive with the smaller contestants. Shay dropped a solid nine pounds, and still nearly dropped below that line. They'll have to work that much harder if they want to stick around, but if they have an off-week, will people keep them?

The players keep thinking that bigger people can lose more weight, but they don't seem to get how percentage of weight loss works. Helen was the lightest player last season, and she walked away with it all. That's because she could drop four pounds and still beat someone a hundred pounds heavier who dropped seven.