Former Biggest Loser contestant Joelle Gwynn has admitted she was left mortified after being verbally ‘abused’ by fitness trainer Bob Harper on the show – but he has defended his behavior because it made for ‘good TV’.

Joelle, from Detroit Michigan, appeared on season seven of The Biggest Loser in 2009 alongside her then-friend, Carla Triplett.

She applied to be on the show in a desperate attempt to lose weight and tipped the scales at 309 pounds at the beginning of her journey.

However, despite having turned to The Biggest Loser for help, Joelle ended up being humiliated on television when Bob, 59, repeatedly screamed at her during a group workout. 

At the time, he had instructed the group to run on the treadmill for 30 seconds, but when he noticed that Joelle had given up around the 20-second mark, he began to yell at her.

‘What the f*** Joelle? Every single time it’s 20 seconds. Every single time. What is it? Tell me what it is?’ he spat.

‘You don’t come off for 30 seconds, ok? That’s all I’m asking. Just do that. God!’ 

His acid-tongued takedown became one of the show’s most memorable – and most uncomfortable – moments to date. 

Biggest Loser alum Joelle Gwynn has spoken out about being humiliated on the show

She was on the receiving end of trainer Bob Harper’s acid tongue during an uncomfortable workout scene 

And now, speaking out about the scenes 16 years later in Netflix’s docuseries, Fit for TV: The Reality Behind the Biggest Loser, Joelle admitted that it was so horrible to experience that she went ‘out of body’. 

Joelle was visibly upset watching the moment back.

‘That country bumpkin of a man berates me in such a way that I’ve never seen on the show before,’ she said.

‘I’ve never seen someone get abused like that. It was was very, very, very embarrassing.’ 

‘It brought me back to home. I’m there because I would get sh** like that at home and eat, so you cursing me out doesn’t help me,’ she continued. 

‘I do not care for Bob. F*** you, Bob Harper. Your little dog too.’  

Bob, however, stands by his treatment of Joelle and defends his behavior because he was on a mission to make ‘good TV’. 

‘When it comes to Biggest Loser, always remember we were trying to make an entertaining show that was on prime time network television,’ he said. ‘What’s more important for weight loss?

In scenes that aired in 2009, Bob yelled at Joelle for not giving her all during a treadmill workout

At the time, he shouted at her: ‘What the f*** Joelle? Every single time it’s 20 seconds. Every single time. What is it? Tell me what it is?’ 

Bob launched into a foul-mouthed rant in front of the rest of the contestants 

After watching the moment back, Joelle said: ‘I’ve never seen someone get abused like that. It was was very, very, very embarrassing’ 

‘We all know it’s diet, but that becomes boring television. You know what’s not boring television? To see us in a gym yelling, screaming… that’s inspirational, that’s good TV.’

‘And producers love that sh**,’ he continued. ‘They were like, “we want them to puke, we want the madness of it all!”‘ 

Turning his attention to the scene with Joelle, Bob said: ‘The TV execs were very happy because that’s how you create the drama… it wasn’t about the treadmill, the picture was bigger than that.

‘It was like her committing to something and finishing it. It wasn’t one of my proudest moments.’

As Bob previously claimed, Biggest Loser producers were very much interested in making television intended to stun audiences. 

And that’s exactly what executive producer David Broome attested to. 

‘We wanted the show to be shocking,’ he said. ‘One great big kumbaya doesn’t make good television, I can promise you that.’

The Biggest Loser, created by Ben Silverman, Mark Koops, and Broome, was a competition reality show that initially ran on NBC for 17 seasons from 2004 to 2016 before moving to USA Network in 2020.

The show featured obese or overweight contestants who competed to win a cash prize by losing the highest percentage of weight relative to their initial weight.

Bob was one of the show’s main trainers alongside Jillian Michaels.

Fit for TV is a three-part documentary series that takes an inside look at the making of the hit reality TV competition, exploring the good, the bad, and the complicated.

The series features interviews with former contestants, trainers, producers, and health professionals and explores how the experience shaped the lives of those involved with the show long after the cameras stopped rolling.

While Biggest Loser was contentious for several reasons, one particularly controversial part of the show was the ‘temptation’ segment.

In the segment, contestants were faced with a ‘temptation’, which would usually require them to gamble by eating or drinking delicious but high-calorie foods in exchange for what may seem to be a beneficial trade-off. 

On one occasion, the temptation saw the contestants put in a room with plates and plates of fast food. 

Whoever ate the most calorific food was granted a personal trainer for an hour.  

Speaking in the Netflix docuseries, executive producer JD Roth defended the segment. 

The Biggest Loser initially ran on NBC for 17 seasons from 2004 to 2016

Danny Cahill said he approached Biggest Loser producers to consider creating an aftercare program 

‘Temptation is real life,’ he said. ‘I can’t say that 100 percent of the temptations we got right, but I can say that life is full of temptations.’ 

Fellow exec David agreed. ‘I needed that show to be relatable to the rest of the world who aren’t in this dome that we’ve created,’ he said.

‘You pass a cupcake in your refrigerator or on your counter, or you pass that fast food restaurant on your way home from work. How can we get that in The Biggest Loser.’

Once they had appeared on the show, it wasn’t unusual for contestants of The Biggest Loser to start piling the weight that they had lost back on. 

This was largely down to them having to return to work and their families, and not having the luxury of six hours a day to work out. 

One contestant, Danny Cahill, pleaded with producers to consider creating an aftercare program.

Danny won season eight of The Biggest Loser and shed a whopping 239 pounds in six months, after initially weighing 460 pounds. 

But, following the show, he regained the weight that he had lost.  

Speaking in the documentary, Danny said that there was more producers could have done to support the stars of the show.

‘I did call one of the producers and said people need help,’ he said.

‘I even brought up, could we do an aftercare program? Lots of money has been put aside from the show, psychological help, gym memberships, recovery, whatever it took and pretty much no one was interested in doing anything like that. 

‘I think it’s really a shame. 

‘Hundreds of millions of dollars that was made from the show, even if just a little bit of that was put aside for the 300-400 people that had been on the show I think they would have had a lot more success.’

Responding to the calls for sufficient post-show help, producer David said: ‘Certainly, we would have loved to have had aftercare, but we’re a television show, we’re a television production. 

‘Without endless pots of money. NBC weren’t going to give it to us, and nor were they wrong in that.’