Trio digs up treasures to make old Philo proud

In what mightbe looked at provincially as poetic justice for the state that produced the inventor of television (Philo T. Farnsworth, Beaver, UT, 1906-1971), a number of people with Utah connections have been downright dominating of late in TV reality shows.

First, Ken Jennings, 30, a BYU graduate and Murray resident, wins more than $2.5 million on "Jeopardy!" Next, Salt Lake native Shawn Nelson, 28, a graduate of Olympus High School and the University of Utah, wins $1 million plus an executive position with Virgin Records, on "The Rebel Billionaire." And then, Ryan Benson, 36, a BYU alumnus now living in Spokane, Wash., wins $250,000 for dropping the most pounds in "The Biggest Loser."

That's nearly $4 million raked in during one television season for three guys who not long ago were walking across their Utah college campuses wondering if they'd ever hit it big.

No matter what they were dreaming of doing, it couldn't have been this.

And the take could have been more if two sisters from Pleasant Grove, Kristy and Lena Jensen, hadn't bogged down in a hayfield in Sweden that eliminated them from the $1 million prize last fall in "The Amazing Race."

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Ken Jennings' story has been well-documented after his record-setting "Jeopardy!" streak finally ended after 74 consecutive victories. As for Shawn Nelson, he received a fair share of acclaim even before bungee-jumping and wing-walking on TV and becoming pals with Virgin Records CEO Richard Branson on "The Rebel Billionaire." It was Nelson who turned oversized beanbags into a multinational, multimillion-dollar Utah-based business called LoveSac — the venture that got him invited to "The Rebel Billionaire" in the first place.

On the other hand, Ryan Benson — who, by the way, is no relation; no one in my family has ever won $250,000 — has received less local attention. This is due, no doubt, to the fact that he now lives in Washington, and also because there's a lot less of him these days to pay attention to.

He weighed 330 pounds when "The Biggest Loser" began and 208 pounds when it ended. His 122-pound drop represents a reduction of 37 percent of his original mass, or, as a NBC publicity release put it in a not-so-subtle plug for yet another of its reality shows, "more than the total body weight of most of the skeletal young women competing on 'Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Model Search.' "

Ryan's secret, by the way, was exercising like a maniac and eating like Gandhi — which isn't really much of a secret.