American Idol season 2 winner Ruben Studdard will be back on reality TV this fall, but this time around he won’t be singing. Instead, he’ll be a contestant on the upcoming season of NBC’s The Biggest Loser, according to People.
NBC Sets Fall 2013 Premiere Dates >>>
Ruben has struggled over the years with his weight. He tried undergoing an “intense workout regimen” with 1,200 calories per day as his limit. He said, “I was losing weight, but I was exhausted. It was making me sick. I’m a big man. There was no way to do those workouts on that amount of food, so everything was contradicting itself.”
After losing only 12 pounds, the soulful R&B singer abandoned this regimen, but he started back on a healthy track in 2006 after joining the Duke Diet and Fitness Center at Duke University, becoming a vegetarian and beginning to exercise again — after weighing in at 455 pounds, he successfully lost more than 70 pounds on this program. He told Rachael Ray at the time, “Food still has to taste good, that’s the thing for me. But I make a lot more healthier choices. I eat all fruits and vegetables with the exception of egg whites and some cheese, but that’s pretty much it.”
He continued on this path after he married Surata Zuri McCants in 2008. Unfortunately, he hit another roadlock three and a half years later in 2011 when the two went through a divorce (citing “irreconcilable differences”). Another burden he dealt with was having to pay back hundreds of thousands of dollars to the IRS in back-taxes. As a result, Ruben began gaining weight again. “I just started going out and kickin’ it,” he explained on The Wendy Williams Show in June 2012.
Ruben also told People, “I’ve never had an issue with my weight. [But] my family has a history of high blood pressure, diabetes, heart-related issues — things I didn’t have to deal with yet because I’m young. But I don’t want to be worried at 40, and if I don’t fix things now, I will be.”
The Biggest Loser season 15 premieres on Tuesday, October 8 at 8pm on NBC.
Don’t want to miss out on Ruben Studdard’s weight-loss journey this fall? Add The Biggest Loser to your very own watch-list by downloading BuddyTV Guide for free for your phone.
(Image courtesy of WENN)
Staff Writer, BuddyTV
Jeff Dodge, a graduate of Western Washington University, has been a TV news editor for many years and has had the chance to interview multiple reality show stars, including Randy Jackson, Nick Cannon, Heidi Klum, Mel B and John Cena.
