12 week starve yourself thin challenge?

So one of the boys from gym had a good story today about doing some security work at a gala dinner for participants in a "12 week challenge" run by one of the chain gyms.

Sounds like this'll be a nice positive post, right? Wrong.

He apparently asked one of the more successful participants how they did it, and the response was "1100 calories one day, 400 the next".

What?

400 calories isn't even enough for my breakfast, and that's all you get for an entire day every other day?

Well then... what amazing results did this produce? 8kg of weight lost, in 12 weeks... by starving.

Now compare that to what I do, where I'll take the same amount or even more weight off a client with targets of 1600, 1800. even 2100 calories depending on what I think is most appropriate. AKA they aint fkn starving it off.

What are these idiot trainers really doing with these extreme, starvation approaches though?

1. They're training the client's brain to think "if I eat like a normal person, i'll stay fat. I have to suffer for this or I don't want it badly enough".
2. They're training the client's body to run on less fuel, to slow down and conserve fuel. This is why even though they're starving, they only drop a relatively small percentage of the excess weight they are carrying. And then what? 

There are probably unlimited approaches you could take towards healthy weight loss, but starving yourself thin is never one of them. The unfortunate clients don't know any better, because they're constantly bombarded with new diets on tv every day, new meal replacement product advertisements, all this crap telling them "less calories = more weight loss". It doesn't. The trainers SHOULD know better, but apparently don't know or don't care.

This pisses me off.

Screw 'em. I'm going to do my own 12 Week Flexible Dieting Challenge!