Third episode of the season deals primarily with the fallout from the challenge on Monday night. This episode is very heavy on talking, not a lot of weightloss going on this time around, which may come back to bite them on the arse come weigh-in day.

Want to know who was under the blanket and who is leaving the show? Read on…

The pre-show teaser again shows the ominous form under a blanket being wheeled away on a gurney. It was tacky when you did it last night, it’s tacky again tonight guys. People really do die during exercise and it’s really not cool to promote the show in such fashion.

The red team are apparently not doing it too tough – camping on the super plush green lawn of the mansion. And they have tents. And eskies full of “stuff”.
Doing it real tough there. It’s not like they don’t all have plenty of fat stores to keep them warm through the night!

Not a lot of sympathy from the blues. They really ought to consider how it’s going to feel when the shoe is inevitably on the other foot!
Meanwhile, they’re sitting around the lounge talking about how the lack of gym time will hurt the reds… Yes, they’re sitting around, talking. Talking about exercise…
Eventually they get their backsides into gear and head off to the gym… without prompting by their trainers! Got to be the first time for that, at least this early in the season.

Munnalita has never been camping. Raise your hand if you’re surprised?

Then… BA-BA-BUMMMMMMMMMM! An ambulance starts coming up the drive and as Alex questions, why is there an ambulance there, they have paramedics on-site…
They’re all shocked and hoping the blanket over the head of the person isn’t because they’re dead, so it seems they screwed with the contestants heads as well, not just ours, which is a seriously bad thing to do. A lot of people there are there precisely because they have mental health troubles as well, depression and self esteem issues primarily. It’s probably not a great idea to upset them in such a fashion?

So anyway, Bob and Shannan turn up to train their team and after looking around, Bob does a head count and realises there’s only six. So he went to look for the missing Blue, Gerard, then off to ask the medic what had happened to him, but they can’t tell Bob for confidentiality reasons, and the rest of the blue team is unimpressed as well, because that means they’re all in the dark. Surely Gerard would not have minded his teammates knowing what had happened? I know if it had been me I would’ve said that it’s okay to let people there know about medical issues.

And now we’re off to sookyland with Sarah once more. We get it, you’re missing your boyfriend, you’re upset about Gerard. Everyone is upset about Gerard. Everyone is missing their loved ones.

Okay, so, Sarah walks away when Jillian and Michelle rock up, and Michelle’s instincts tell her something was up? No shit!
Apparently Sarah wants to leave, so Michelle is dispatched to try and talk her down. She doesn’t have a lot of success, then Jillian turns up and asks what’s the problem and Michelle tells her that Sarah wants to leave.
“Let her leave!” – Jillian
Basically, Jillian’s reasoning is that if you want to be there, she’s with you 110% all the way, she’ll do everything she can for you. If you don’t want to be there, that’s fine, “Go with God”.
While I admire Michelle’s efforts to try and get Sarah to stay, I have to side with Jillian – there’s 6 other people there who’re willing to put in the hard yards. If you’re not willing, get out and stop wasting everyone’s time.

Meanwhile the Blue team are all very concerned about poor Gerard, about whom they still know nothing. Kelly is right off her game and finding it hard to concentrate on her training, which is understandable. Once their training was done, Shannan the bloody legend went off to just call the bugger up!
Turns out Gerard got back from the challenge and started to sort of relax and wind down… then he started feeling a bit woozy and got shooting pains up the arm, so he went off to see the medic who said oh no, you’ve got to go to hospital! So off he went!
No indication as to whose idea it was to have the blanket over his head. But Gerard tells Shannan that he’ll be okay and he doesn’t want to cause any trouble and that he just wants to get back there so Shannan can go back to kicking his ass.
Which wins Gerard about 14 billion points, in my book. Not to mention really ought to bitchslap the critics into silence – no one is making these people do these things. They can quit any time they like, and no one is going to think less of them if they quit after having a god damn heart attack.
Yet Gerard can’t wait to get back there. These people know the risks, but they also know it may be their only chance to really kickstart a change in their lives.

And now we’re back away from the very real drama surrounding Gerard, to the drama queen herself, Sarah. Michelle sits down out on the camping ground with her red team to have a chat with them about Sarah wanting to leave, saying that if Sarah does decide to stay on she’ll have earnt a lot of respect from Michelle, as it is obviously a very hard decision to make (or unmake, whatever). Munnalita opens her mouth and something intelligent comes out for once, when she points out that Sarah staying on would probably make her much stronger, as she’s then faced up to the problem and will approach it from the attitude of “I can do this” rather than “This is too hard, I can’t do this.”

As they’re talking, the door to the mansion opens and out walks Sarah… in civvies, not her red team shirt. Everyone correctly guesses that this means she’s out and she confirms it by waddling up and wishing them all the best of luck and sobsobsob, etc.
Michelle takes one more crack at getting her to stay but no, Sarah has made up her mind!

In a gesture of friendliness, the blue team came out to wish her the best of luck. Sarah tells Kelly that she’s leaving the house and Kelly is obviously taken aback for a second, but she quickly embraces her former opponent and firmly states that Sarah will just do it outside the house!
I don’t think anyone believes that, not even Kelly!

And still to come this week, or so the promo says, Bob calls in a favour from an old friend… Cat from the first season, who has lost an amazing amount of weight since she was on the show and is looking fantastic. Bob and Cat pay a visit to Sarah in an attempt to convince her to come back. Tune in tomorrow night to see if they’re successful. Or Thursday/Friday, it’s not clear what day that will air.
My tip: No, she’s gone for good. And I suspect she’s not going to lose significant amounts of weight now that she has left the show, simply because she clearly doesn’t have the temperament to do something about her problem.

But we’ll see. She obviously really needs the help, so hopefully she’ll recognise that and return to the mansion before it’s too late and she loses too much ground.