Biggest Loser Season 1 Winner Ryan Benson Recalls Feeling the Show ‘Set Us Up to Fail’: ‘We Were Exploited’ (Exclusive)

When Ryan Benson stepped on the scale during the live finale of the show’s first season The biggest loser In 2005, he was elated. He weighed in at 208 pounds, meaning he lost an incredible 122 pounds in just 24 weeks, the most of any contestant that season.

Starting at 330 pounds, Benson took home $250,000 in prize money and was named the winner, or “biggest loser,” of the hit series’ first season.

The fame and extreme weight loss didn’t last.

“Within three days of the show, I gained 25 to 30 pounds back just in water weight,” Benson told PEOPLE exclusively in an interview that explores his journey on the show, the controversial approach he took to lose weight at the time, and the perspective he has gained over the years.

Twenty years ago, Benson, 56, now SVP Global Content Delivery at Lionsgate, was an aspiring actor in Los Angeles looking for his next big gig when a friend told him about a new weight-loss reality show.

“It was tempting to think, ‘I can take two or three months off work and just focus on losing weight,'” he says.

Ryan Benson Episode 108 The Biggest Loser “Playing it Close to the Vest”.

Trae Patton/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty

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Going into the first day of filming, Benson admits he didn’t know what to expect. “I think because I was in the first season, the producers and the coaches and everyone involved with the show was kind of learning on the fly,” he says. “[Trainers] Bob [Harper] and Jillian [Michaels] they weren’t big celebrities, they weren’t famous names. They were there every day working with us.”

Thirty-six years old and admittedly hyper-competitive at the time, Benson recalls taking drastic measures, both at the urging of the series and on his own, to do what was necessary to win.

“For the last 24 hours I didn’t put anything in my body and I just went to the gym and put on a rubber suit to sweat and then went to the sauna,” says Benson, referring to the period when contestants were sent home to finish the final weeks of weight loss on their own before live final weigh-ins. “They set us up to fail. I just wanted to win.”

While still on The biggest loser campus, Benson says he and his 11 fellow contestants endured a brutal regimen and “trained like professional athletes.”

“We’d do an hour of cardio before breakfast after a good weight session, then maybe go on a long hike followed by more cardio and then maybe more weights…anywhere from six to eight hours a day,” he recalls. . “It hurt to do anything when he woke up in the morning. It was definitely hard for me. I’ve been lucky that I’ve never hurt myself or hurt myself.”

Ryan Benson, Dave Fioravanti, Lisa Andreone and Kelly Minner: The Biggest Loser Episode 105 “Food Tower”.

Trae Patton/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty

While the physical process required extreme endurance and the dramatic weight loss expectations tested the contestants’ resolve, Benson recalls that the experience could seem particularly cruel because of the “temptations” the show set.

“In the first season, they had food everywhere,” he says, of the trays of high-calorie fast food or candy that were left out to trick contestants into cheating on their diets. “There was a part of me that thought they wanted to catch people on camera, just gobbling up this food and kind of make it funny… I don’t know what they were expecting, but there were moments where I felt like, ‘Yeah, they want us to fail.’ We were definitely taken advantage of.”

Benson says that while he joined the show to lose weight, he admits that it quickly became a win for him. “That competitive side really got to me,” he says. While shedding pounds and delighting in awed “oohs and ahhs” from the crowd during the weigh-ins, Benson decided to kick his weight loss into high gear before the finale.

“I did a master cleanse where you just drink freshly squeezed lemon juice, cayenne pepper, and maple syrup mixed together and eat nothing for 10 days while doing a lot of exercise,” Benson recalls.

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Biggest Loser Ryan Benson “Final 5 Workout”.

Trae Patton/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty

At one point during the show, blood appeared in his urine, he says. “The doctors tested our urine the day of our last weigh-in and they told me there was blood in mine because I was so dehydrated,” Benson recalls. “My wife was so angry with me that she said, ‘Nothing is worth this.'”

The extreme approach helped him take home the win, but it was unsustainable. He gained about 25 pounds back within three days, and ended up back to square one, and over 300 pounds. “It’s no secret that I gained all the weight back,” says Benson, who has since lost about 35 pounds.

Reflecting on the aftermath of the show, Benson says the part he “struggled with the most” was the shame of not being able to keep the weight off after his televised victory.

“You feel guilty for going through this and not living up to what you did on the show even 20 years later,” he says. “I mean, anyone who’s overweight and struggles with weight in their life has issues that they carry with them. But then to face it in a very public way and feel what I did there … it kind of added to the problems that I already had, in terms of weight and health problems.”

The Biggest Loser Season 1 – Matt Kamont, Andrea Baptiste, Aaron Semmell, Lisa Andreone, Gary Deckman, Maurice Walker (front row, from left) Kelly MacFarland, Ryan Benson, Kelly Minner, Dave Fioravanti, Dana DeSilvio, Lizzeth Davalos.

Trae Patton/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty

Benson appreciates that The biggest loser it was developed over the next sixteen seasons, until it was canceled in 2016 (the series had an eighteenth season in 2020). At its peak, the series averaged at least eight million viewers each night and was a huge hit for NBC.

Over time, the tactic of constant “temptations” with food was abandoned, and he believes that the show still inspired people. “I can see why the show was sad in the beginning – they were just doing something to attract viewers. Then, luckily for them, it became inspirational,” he says.

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And in a way, the series is a symbol of another time, both in the world and in Benson’s own life. Now a father of three teenage children who are being raised with a holistic approach to body image, Benson is relieved to know they are growing up in an age of body acceptance.

“My children are in a generation that is much more accepting of all body types and the whole realm of the human condition,” he says. “They are much more accepting than my generation when I was young.”

Benson even watched his season with his kids. “Watching it through their eyes is very fun,” he says with a laugh.

Would his 36-year-old self go on a weight loss show again? Maybe, he says, assuming the production took a more nuanced approach. “If I was in the same position I was then, I’d probably do it again,” Benson says. “It would have to have a completely different spin. They would have to take a more holistic approach, focusing on both mental and physical health, not just the number on the scale.”

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