During the first seven episodes of NBC's reality-competition boxing show The Contender, co-hosts Sylvester Stallone and Sugar Ray Leonard have made several references to the fact that contestant/lawyer Joey Gilbert (who will be fighting in this week's episode against Jimmy Lange) is the best and best-conditioned all-around athlete in the show's sixteen boxer field. Now, it appears that Stallone has found a way to use Joey's athleticism to his advantage.

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In a press release released last month, Stallone's Instone LLC, a nutritional-products company that launched last spring, announced that it had hired Joey to be the spokesman for its product line. Print ads featuring Joey and Sly together for Instone are scheduled to run over the next month in national health and fitness magazines such as Sly magazine, NPC News, Muscle & Fitness and Flex.

Said Instone chief marketing consultant Vince Andrich, "Joey and Sly are a perfect match. This partnership underscores Instone’s commitment to connecting with all ages of consumers, who want to look, feel and perform better.”

Nutrition had already been a key part of Joey's fitness regimen, since his sister Gina Gilbert-Green had served as Joey's nutritionist and personal trainer prior to his stint on The Contender. But Joey's dual role as both a professional boxer and an attorney also had a strong allure to Instone. Said Stallone, “Joey Gilbert personifies the qualities that so many consumers of nutrition supplements aspire to – he’s a world-class competitor, well educated, and incredibly disciplined. That’s a winning combination, whether you’re talking about a professional boxer, an attorney, or the spokesperson for a nutrition company.”

For his part, Joey was "very excited to represent Sylvester Stallone’s Instone, because it is committed to providing its consumers with the best that nutritional science has to offer. I share Sly’s passion for helping people use the right health products and training techniques to achieve strong, athletic, healthy physiques - whether they’re in the professional boxing ring or at home working out in the garage.”

Although Joey's fate on The Contender is still unknown, he is a former three-time NCAA national boxing champion who was twice selected as Outstanding Boxer at the national championships. Combine that with his face-time on The Contender, plus his license to practice law in Nevada, plus his work as a sports agent and his work as a TV commentator and it's easy to see how he was attractive to Instone -- no matter the outcome of this week's fight.

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