TV contestants continue losing

Between the two of them, Windsor resident Dave Schenone and best
friend Po Peleti have lost a whopping 235 pounds.
Part of that weight was lost on a reality television show, Money
Hungry, in a surreal environment surrounded by other teams all
trying to win $100,000. But the best, and perhaps the hardest, part
of the weight loss came when Schenone and Peleti returned home to
friends and family, and went back to being regular guys surrounded
by regular friends eating regular food.
That transition sounds challenging enough, and many of the Money
Hungry teams have since gained back the weight they lost on the
show. For Schenone, the transition was complicated by knee surgery,
lack of mobility, and forced cutbacks to his exercise regimen.
Still, Schenone lost over forty pounds on crutches by eating
healthily—and both he and Peleti have continued to lose weight
after their stint on television. (Winner Mark of “Slimpossible” has
since gained 30 pounds.)
“It absolutely has changed our lives, before and after,”
Schenone said. “I live a much more active lifestyle now. I feel
like a new person. Sure, we both still got a ways to go, but it has
really kick-started our new lives.”
On the show, Schenone and Peleti—known as The
Regulators—exercised constantly and ate meagerly. Their regimen
resulted in an exercise-and-diet induced haze.
“We were in a daze the whole time. We were so exhausted
physically and mentally. We went from eating 5,000 calories
today—maybe more—to 1,500 to 1,000 or 800. The last week we cut it
to 500. We were like zombies. I wouldn’t recommend that to
anybody,” Schenone said.
Peleti agreed.
“It was a competition, so it was extreme. Now we’ve gotta find
that balance,” Peleti said. “When you put yourself through an
experience like that, you have a hard time coming back and
adjusting to your normal life. It took me a while to get used to
going from the TV show Po, where I couldn’t eat any sugar, to the
Po who has two kids, and a family routine, and tons of carbs in the
cupboard.”
Schenone and Peleti seem to have made the transition remarkably
well—in addition to eating healthily and exercising regularly, they
have helped change the lifestyles of their friends and family,
too.
“I think my mom is struggling with weight, and she takes it a
little more seriously now,” Peleti said.
“Every day I’m eating tuna and ground turkey, she sees how
consistent I am, and how consistent I am with working out. Now that
she sees me taking it a little more seriously, she takes it a
little more seriously too. With my immediate family, I’m trying to
make the small changes. Instead of going to McDonald’s, we’re
picking a better choice like Subway. And we try to eat at
home—prepared meals, me and Dave are big fans of that.”
Schenone noted that eating more healthily has benefits not only
to his waistline, but to his pocket, as well.
“You end up saving a lot of money if you prepare your own meals.
If you go out to eat, you’re gonna spend a minimum of $20. I just
went to Tahoe, and everyone wanted to go out to eat all the time. I
just made my own meals, and by the end, everybody else was out of
money and I wasn’t,” Schenone said.
Of course, being on television has brought its own set of
unusual circumstances—beyond losing a combined 168 pounds in 45
days. The pair is amused when they go into Walmart and hear
whispers—“are those the guys from TV?”—and watch cell phones
snapping pictures of them. Peleti and Schenone don’t see themselves
as television stars, although they worry that sometimes their
friends do, and perceive an unreturned phone call as evidence of a
new television star persona, rather than Peleti and Schenone just
being forgetful or busy.
But Peleti and Schenone are humble about being on television,
and have turned their fifteen minutes of fame into an opportunity
to reach out to friends and acquaintances who are also struggling
with weight.
“I was helping one of my buddies out and in 10 days, he’s lost
15 pounds. When I go work out with him, I find myself just
listening, and letting him know, I understand what you’re going
through,” Peleti said.
“We both realize the blessing we were given, to go into an
environment where we could just focus on weight loss,” Schenone
added.
The Regulators came in second, and as such, didn’t lose the
$10,000 they had invested in the television show. They just
recently received their reimbursement check, and are returning the
money to their sponsors.
In the next week or two, they plan to host a thank-you party for
friends and supporters. They’ll make an announcement on The
Regulators Facebook page, and encourage fellow Windsorites to
“like” the page if they want to come to the party.