01 / The result
A new champion breaks through.
By Season 12, the leaderboard has started to mean something different.
It is no longer just 12 weeks of names and points that disappear when the challenge finishes. There is history now.
Past champions. Repeat podiums. Defending winners. People climbing back toward the top. New clients entering the field and immediately challenging people who have been doing this for years.
And this season added another name to that history.
Jessie Vickery. Season 12 Champion.
Jessie finished with 1,020 points, ahead of Dan Failla on 783 and former two-time champion Robert Johnstone on 633.
But the number that probably meant more to Jessie than 1,020 was another one entirely.
A goal reached at our final weigh-in. A barrier finally broken.
| Place | Member | Points |
|---|---|---|
| 01 | Jessie Vickery | 1,020 |
| 02 | Dan Failla | 783 |
| 03 | Robert Johnstone | 633 |
| 04 | Ben Donald | 612 |
| 05 | Josh Bentley | 518 |
| 06 | Martin | 501 |
02 / Jessie Vickery
Breaking through the barrier.
One of Jessie’s goals coming into this challenge was straightforward. Get to 110 kg.
That sounds simple written down, but there was some history behind it.
Jessie had previously found the 113 kg mark difficult to break through. He could get there, but pushing beyond it and sustaining the progress had been a sticking point.
Season 12 changed that.
At our final weigh-in he landed at 110.0 kg exactly. And he was rapt.
That is the part of coaching that a leaderboard cannot completely capture. The points gave Jessie something to chase each week, but underneath them was a personal marker that had frustrated him before. This time he got through it.
Jessie trained with me twice per week, with one of those sessions becoming our regular Friday weigh-in. Outside those sessions he continued using the app and following his broader program.
Nutrition wasn’t ridiculously restrictive either.
We worked with a calorie target and an accountable protein target. Compliance was good enough that we essentially never needed to change the parameters.
Some weeks his weight dropped noticeably. Some weeks it barely moved. Occasionally it went slightly backwards.
But the overall direction kept moving where we wanted it to.
There is probably a lesson in that by itself. In Jessie’s case, we didn’t need a new diet, a new training program or another adjustment because the scale didn’t move perfectly for seven days.
Sometimes the plan is already working. You just need enough patience to let it work.
Jessie talks about going from 117 kg to 110 kg, needing a new wardrobe and what he enjoys about the Lifechoice community.
03 / The honour roll
A new name in the record books.
Jessie’s win also continues an interesting run in challenge history.
Across the first 12 seasons we have now had champions including Josh Bentley, Daniel Foster, Indi Hangan, Courtney Jones, Lisa Kavv, Robert Johnstone, Brandon Fitzsimons, Ben Donald and now Jessie Vickery.
Josh, Courtney and Rob remain our multiple-time Season Hub champions. But the last three seasons have now produced three different winners.
- Season 10Brandon Fitzsimons
- Season 11Ben Donald
- Season 12Jessie Vickery
That is good for the challenge. Nobody owns the leaderboard permanently.
Every new season creates another opportunity for somebody to put their name into its history.
04 / Dan Failla
Runner-up. Again.
If Jessie was the story of the winner, Dan Failla is quickly becoming the story of consistency at the pointy end.
Dan finished Season 11 in second place. He has now finished second again in Season 12, this time with 783 points.
What makes Dan’s performance particularly interesting is that the challenge scoring system doesn’t necessarily favour someone with his starting point.
Dan is already one of my fittest clients and carries a very lean physique. He isn’t entering these challenges with large amounts of weight or body fat to lose, meaning some of the 50-point body-composition goal bonuses aren’t as readily available to him as they might be to somebody beginning from a different position.
So he has to accumulate his score through training, cardio, nutrition and performance.
Back-to-back second-place finishes aren’t an accident anymore. Dan has established himself as one of the challenge’s genuine contenders.
Meet Dan in his Client Spotlight → Hear why he returned to app coaching and what keeps him working towards his next goal.
05 / Robert Johnstone
The former champion returns.
Then there is Robert Johnstone.
Rob already owns one of the strongest records in Season Hub history after winning Season 8 and Season 9 back-to-back. Since then his finishes have moved around.
- Season 10
- 9th
- Season 11
- 7th
- Season 12
- 3rd
That is a pretty good climb back.
Rob finished this season on 633 points, only 21 ahead of defending champion Ben Donald.
The sporting side of these challenges becomes more interesting when people have history attached to their names. Rob isn’t simply “third place”. He is a former back-to-back champion who has worked his way back onto the podium.
And now the question becomes whether he can eventually become the first three-time winner.
06 / Ben, Josh & Martin
Still right in the mix.
The defending champion didn’t go away.
Ben Donald followed his Season 11 championship with a fourth-place finish on 612 points.
Defending a challenge is difficult. Last season Ben produced the strongest Season Hub performance of his career and deservedly took the title. This time he missed the podium by only 21 points.
It means the Season 11 winner remains right around the top of the competition rather than disappearing after his breakthrough.
And behind him was another familiar name.
More than ten seasons later.
Josh Bentley, champion of Seasons 1 and 6, finished fifth.
Across Seasons 10, 11 and 12 Josh has now finished 2nd, 4th and 5th. More than ten seasons after winning the very first challenge, he is still difficult to remove from the top group.
That longevity deserves recognition.
Martin: a strong debut.
One of the best new performances came from Martin, who finished sixth with 501 points.
Martin is a new client and currently trains with me three times per week. To enter your first challenge and immediately finish within the top six is a strong start.
He finished only 17 points behind two-time champion Josh Bentley, which gives some perspective on how competitive his debut actually was.
Season 12 was his introduction. Now we get to see what happens with another 12 weeks of training behind him.
07 / Lily Finnegan
Sometimes progress means getting back in.
Not every important result happens at the top of the leaderboard.
Lily Finnegan finished 13th, but her season needs a different context.
Lily has been working her way back following an ankle injury, so simply returning to consistent training and getting involved in the challenge again matters.
The objective now isn’t pretending the injury never happened. It is rebuilding.
Getting sessions back together. Building confidence. Restoring the training base. Then using Season 12 as the platform for a stronger run next time.
Those stories matter too.
A leaderboard can show where somebody finished. It can’t always show where they started from.
08 / Beyond the points
The scoring is telling a better story.
The scoring system has continued evolving as the challenges have developed.
Season 12 rewarded training, cardio, nutrition, personal bests and measurable fitness goals. The important shift over the last few seasons has been the increased emphasis on results, rather than simply rewarding whoever can accumulate the most activity.
Jessie’s season is a good example. Yes, he trained consistently. Yes, he accumulated points.
But the scoreboard was also reinforcing something that mattered outside the competition: breaking through that 113 kg barrier and reaching his 110 kg goal.
That’s where I want this challenge to keep heading.
The points should encourage the behaviours. But ultimately, those behaviours need to lead somewhere.
Your own program, shared points and a community around your training. Our guide explains eligibility, joining and the updated scoring, which differs from the rules used in this Season 12 recap.
09 / Twelve seasons in
There is a history now.
This might be my biggest takeaway from Season 12.
When these challenges first started, every leaderboard basically existed on its own. Now I can look at the top five and see stories.
Jessie: the new champion who broke through a personal barrier.
Dan: consecutive runner-up finishes.
Rob: the back-to-back former champion climbing onto the podium again.
Ben: the defending champion still only 21 points away from third.
Josh: a two-time champion still sitting inside the top five more than ten seasons after his first win.
That makes the competition better. It gives new challengers somebody to chase and gives returning challengers another chapter to write.
But underneath all of that, the purpose hasn’t really changed.
The leaderboard is there to create a bit of competition. The coaching is there to create direction. The app creates accountability.
And the actual goal is still to help people make progress they can carry beyond the end of a 12-week challenge.
Jessie finished Season 12 with the most points. More importantly, he finished it at 110 kg, beyond a barrier he’d struggled to pass before.
That is a result worth putting his name on.
Season 12 Champion. Jessie Vickery.
Now we reset the leaderboard and find out who writes the next one.
The Season Hub / Train With Cuz
Your next chapter.
Already training with me? Keep an eye on the Season Hub in your app for the next challenge. If you’re thinking about starting, tell me what you want to work towards and we can talk about a plan that suits you.