Torrington High School may as well be the new host site for television’s hit show ‘The Biggest Loser.” Teachers, counselors, secretaries and students have all been working side by side to shed off those extra pounds they all find so irritating.

Weight Watchers is the most popular form of losing weight with the faculty. English Teacher Katherine Patrick along with Sandy Garber, counselor Carla Sturgeon, and office gurus Lisa Eddington and Kim Gerrard all have hopped onto the hip weight loss train.

Patrick has lost over sixteen pounds through the program since she joined in April of 2007.

“It’s been really hard for me because I’m older than everyone else,” said Patrick of her loss. Although sixteen pounds is around the equivalent of ten cantaloupes, she still doesn’t seem happy with her accomplishment and wishes to lose more. “Weight Watchers is easy because I can eat anything that I want as long as I’m willing to ‘spend the points.’” Patrick recommends it to anyone trying to lose weight to do so while doing something that is fun.

Gerrard has also shed some eleven pounds since re-joining the program in late August. Unlike Patrick however, Gerrard also walks every night and has also joined an aerobics class that meets twice a week at the 28th Avenue Dance Studio. Along with Gerrard and Patrick, Garber has also lost a significant amount through the Weight Watchers program.

Over the course of a year, Garber has accomplished a weight loss of over forty pounds. She also chooses not to exercise: “I hate exercising. All the weight I have lost has been from eating right.” She finds her biggest obstacle in her weight loss journey has not been losing the weight, but maintaining a weight she is happy with. “As soon as I lose around twenty-five to thirty more pounds, I believe that could be a weight I could actually maintain easily.”

Eddington and Sturgeon are the final two Weight Watchers of the high school. They have each lost thirty and seventeen pounds respectively, also beginning with their programs in April. Eddington became a Weight Watcher because, “I hit a weight that threw me over the edge.” So, to reduce, she joined the program, as well as ‘exercising crazy’ every night. Sturgeon joined because her jeans didn’t fit. So to move to the next smallest size, she is an avid Weight Watcher and also rides horses and walks regularly.

As the biggest loser of THS faculty, biggest weight loser that is, Kathy Hamer-Smith sits on the throne. Over a three year period, Hamer-Smith has lost forty-seven pounds, and not with the aid of the Weight Watchers program. Hamer-Smith has lost this weight through cutting her daily food portions as well as developing a healthy and regular exercise routine. She attends the EWC fitness center at least three to five times per week. “I wanted to see if by losing weight I would lower my blood pressure,” and after her loss of nearly fifty pounds, Hamer-Smith succeeded.

The all-around champ at slimming, though, is senior Roman. Since last December, he has dropped over seventy pounds. “It hasn’t been incredibly hard. Mostly, I’ve lost weight through exercise. When I started, I couldn’t even run a mile. Now, I’m up to four miles at a time—easy.”

Did he diet, too? “Well, I tired cutting out all flour products. That works fine at home, but it was killing me on speech trips. So, mainly I’ve just been running. Demoni [Newman] and Clark [Lenz] ran with me.

Roman's journey has not been without pitfall, though. “I plateaued for almost three months. It was really hard.”



Weights and fitness coach Mark Sims recommends that anyone wanting to lose weight should start out slowly. “If you have never run before, start walking and move to a slow jog or bike. Increase the distance as you progress and you will see results.”