We love J.Lo's emphasis on her natural beauty, we truly covet her insane NYC apartment, and we'll never forget that dress. But, this? This we do not love so much: We received this pitch for her new #BeTheGirl weight-loss challenge from BodyLab, a lifestyle brand she founded.
The challenge involves 10 weeks of personalized fitness and nutrition plans including easy, healthy recipes and motivation from Jenny herself. It starts off harmless and fitspiration-y enough:
Following the official kick-off, participants will commit to a 10-week program with Jennifer Lopez as their inspiration and motivator along with a team of experts. They will receive healthy and easy-to-make recipes, personalized fitness plans and expert nutritional advice from Jennifer Lopez and a team of hand-picked experts.
So far, so good. Sure, J.Lo may not be the world's foremost expert in fitness and nutrition, but she's brought in some expert friends to help, right? We're excited to meet them. Yeah, 10 weeks! Let's get going! Yay fitness! But, then:
"I’m asking the women of America to join me this Spring in the #BeTheGirl challenge so together we can work, motivate, and empower each other to be the best version of ourselves,” said BodyLab Founder, Jennifer Lopez. “When I eat, you eat. When I sweat, you sweat. When I run, you run. Let's kick-start a healthy lifestyle together with the BodyLab line of products, free App, and online tools.” Hmm, okay. We know she means that we're all in this together or whatever — and we certainly do appreciate that — but it really sounds like we're not allowed to eat until J.Lo eats. Then, the challenge starts to delve into some very weird pseudoscience territory:
"I’m asking the women of America to join me this Spring in the #BeTheGirl challenge so together we can work, motivate, and empower each other to be the best version of ourselves,” said BodyLab Founder, Jennifer Lopez. “When I eat, you eat. When I sweat, you sweat. When I run, you run. Let's kick-start a healthy lifestyle together with the BodyLab line of products, free App, and online tools.” Hmm, okay. We know she means that we're all in this together or whatever — and we certainly do appreciate that — but it really sounds like we're not allowed to eat until J.Lo eats. Then, the challenge starts to delve into some very weird pseudoscience territory:
There are three phases of the #BeTheGirl Challenge, including:
Repair and Reboot: Kick-starts your body as you begin The Challenge with a detox & cleanse plus a fat burner contained in the 7-Day Ultra-Fast Slim Kit.
Wait, what? We really went from zero to crazy quite quickly, now, didn't we? As we've written before, there's no need to do any special detoxing or cleansing — your body's usually got it under control.
Burn and Build: Stimulates fat burning and metabolism boosting with the Thermodynamic Total Burn, Thermodynamic Pre-Workout Extender and BodyLab TastyShake Complete Whey Protein Complex.
Um, what happened to personalized fitness and nutrition plans? Why do we need so many supplements all of a sudden? Why so much burning??
Endurance: Helps participants to maintain their stamina through the Endurance Boosting Deep Tissue Oxygenator, which has been clinically shown to improve VO2 max (the established measure of fitness), and Advanced Joint Formula for Active Women.
If you're truly interested, VO2 max is a measure of the maximum amount of oxygen you can take in and actually use during exercise. Although it's used a lot, there is some debate about its usefulness as a marker of fitness. The Endurance Boosting Deep Tissue Oxygenator appears to be a proprietary megadose of B vitamins and other extracts, including ginkgo biloba. Yum. There will be hundreds of weekly prizes and at the end of the 10 weeks, the five most successful participants in the #BeTheGirl Challenge will be the lucky recipients of the #BeTheGirl in NYC Prize Package, including a stay at one of Jennifer’s favorite hotels, a luxurious spa treatment, and the chance to meet JLo herself! The winners will be determined based on equal parts physical transformation of body change, and their transformation story submitted after completing their 10-week Challenge journey. Sheesh. We're all for being the healthiest version of you, and if it's Jenny that gets you there, that's great. But, we're not so hot on turning weight loss into a competition — we've seen where that gets us — or on pushing rando supplements to make it happen. After all, your weight doesn't have to define your summer, and you don't need a diet either.
Repair and Reboot: Kick-starts your body as you begin The Challenge with a detox & cleanse plus a fat burner contained in the 7-Day Ultra-Fast Slim Kit.
Wait, what? We really went from zero to crazy quite quickly, now, didn't we? As we've written before, there's no need to do any special detoxing or cleansing — your body's usually got it under control.
Burn and Build: Stimulates fat burning and metabolism boosting with the Thermodynamic Total Burn, Thermodynamic Pre-Workout Extender and BodyLab TastyShake Complete Whey Protein Complex.
Um, what happened to personalized fitness and nutrition plans? Why do we need so many supplements all of a sudden? Why so much burning??
Endurance: Helps participants to maintain their stamina through the Endurance Boosting Deep Tissue Oxygenator, which has been clinically shown to improve VO2 max (the established measure of fitness), and Advanced Joint Formula for Active Women.
If you're truly interested, VO2 max is a measure of the maximum amount of oxygen you can take in and actually use during exercise. Although it's used a lot, there is some debate about its usefulness as a marker of fitness. The Endurance Boosting Deep Tissue Oxygenator appears to be a proprietary megadose of B vitamins and other extracts, including ginkgo biloba. Yum. There will be hundreds of weekly prizes and at the end of the 10 weeks, the five most successful participants in the #BeTheGirl Challenge will be the lucky recipients of the #BeTheGirl in NYC Prize Package, including a stay at one of Jennifer’s favorite hotels, a luxurious spa treatment, and the chance to meet JLo herself! The winners will be determined based on equal parts physical transformation of body change, and their transformation story submitted after completing their 10-week Challenge journey. Sheesh. We're all for being the healthiest version of you, and if it's Jenny that gets you there, that's great. But, we're not so hot on turning weight loss into a competition — we've seen where that gets us — or on pushing rando supplements to make it happen. After all, your weight doesn't have to define your summer, and you don't need a diet either.