Senior Max Tydeman won Senior Survivor, competing with 187 other seniors for the prize of $940.
“I felt pretty happy,” said Tydeman. “Felt like I worked pretty hard. I basically had three v. one against me. I was against three of my good friends, and they all teamed up and split the money, so I had to basically kill two of them out before I could win.”
To participate, seniors needed to pay a $5 fee and arm themselves with Nerf guns. The six-week-long battle ended in a strategic showdown in Palm Springs, Calif. during spring break. Ultimately, Tydeman eliminated his friends, seniors Braeden Rellaford, Ta Ohr and Gavin Hidalgo, the last remaining players who also teamed up on him.
“Everyone thought I was coming down Monday, so I tricked everyone, but I was actually coming down Sunday,” said Tydeman. “So then I shot Gavin at the pool side with his whole family there. And we had a duel and that’s how it ended.”
The competition was managed by junior Eleanor Kuhns, who ran the Instagram account and kept track of every participant’s targets and kills.
“It was all manual, so we just kept it for tradition sake, and the person teaching me did it in that way, but it was a lot of people, sheets, a lot of texting, lots of Instagram. And, yeah, just a lot of manual work,” said Kuhns.
Tydeman survived the last few rounds, which consisted of slightly different rules. As the amount of players decreases, the rules are adjusted towards the end to raise the stakes.
“The timeframe is until 10 instead of nine for previous rounds, because there’s less people in the rounds, but it’s actually the final round where they become different. So you need one elimination every round to continue. But for the finalists, if it’s a tie at the end, then it’ll be the person with the highest kill count,” said Kuhns.
The money and the rules meant that many seniors were willing to invest lots of time into getting their target.
“On opening day of senior assassin, Jack Hampson came to my house, and we probably dueled for hour and a half,” said Tydeman. “Jumped off a 20 foot cliff. It was a battle.”
Tydeman plans to invest his winnings into camera gear.
