7 Seasons: Fresh Meat, Inferno 3 (Win), Gauntlet III (Final), The Island (Win), The Ruins, Fresh Meat II, Rivals (Win)

4–3 Elimination Record

25 Challenge Wins

Daily Challenges: 10/10

Eliminations: 9/10

Finals: 10/10

Politics: 6.5/10

How is it that the two girls eliminated first on the Fresh Meat seasons went on to become two of the greatest female competitors in Challenge history?

Before there was Cara Maria, Evelyn went from first one out to female face of the franchise.

She was dealt a bad hand on her first season. Getting picked by Danny was a double whammy — not only was he one of the worst competitors in Challenge history, but he was also a part of the Real World: Austin cast that was immediately targeted by the vets. Ev/Danny were pitted against Wes/Casey in the first exile, where they lost (they had 37 more pounds of weight to carry than Wes/Casey).

Every Challenge fan wishes Evelyn would have been on The Duel to give Jodi some competition, but she wasn’t able to be on the season due to illness and didn’t return until the Inferno 3.

She was considered the best female on the Bad Asses and was never nominated for an Inferno, as none of the Good Guys wanted to face her in elimination. She won the final life shield by winning the Nothin’ But Net mission, absolutely destroying the competition and beating most of the guys. The Bad Asses beat the Good Guys in the final, as Ev captured her first title.

Evelyn was again the top girl on Gauntlet III, getting thrown in by the Rookies to try to have the Veterans lose their strongest player. The Vets were going to vote in Coral against Ev, but Coral quit rather than take an inevitable defeat. Instead Casey was voted in, where Evelyn didn’t break a sweat beating her in Ball Brawl. Ev was robbed of her second victory when Big Easy collapsed in the finals.

Evelyn cemented her status as a legend on The Island. Her season-long feud with Johnny culminated in her beating Dan and Tyrie in the Bridge It Face-off to earn a key. She then delivered one of the greatest speeches in the show’s history, calling out the group of Johnny, Kenny, Dunbar, Johanna and Paula by saying, “Fuck you and fuck your alliance” and stealing Bananas’ key.

Johnny won the next Face-off and took his key back from Evelyn, and it looked like she wouldn’t get another chance to get a key. But the last Face-off had all the remaining competitors without keys compete, and Evelyn outlasted Dan, KellyAnne and Johanna in the brutal Water Bound mission to win the final key.

Despite her constant bickering with Johnny throughout the season, she cut a deal with him and Kenny to steal Dunbar’s key in return for a spot on their boat. The boat of Ev, Johnny, Kenny and Derrick was completely stacked, and Ev picked up her second victory.

Any ideas that the issues between Kenny/Johnny and Evelyn were settled went out the window early on The Ruins. In the second elimination, Evelyn agreed to go into elimination, but only if it was to face Casey. However, the Champions wanted to keep the Challengers’ worst player on their team, and pitted Evelyn against her best friend KellyAnne.

Rather than have to deal with another season of being constantly targeted, Ev threw the elimination to KellyAnne.

Evelyn came in as a late replacement on Fresh Meat II after Jonna couldn’t get into Canada due to an issue with her passport, and she was partnered with the unpicked stoner Luke.

Evelyn and Wes quickly rallied the house against Kenny, as no one wanted to see Mr. Beautiful win his fourth season.

Despite having the entire house other than Kenny/Laurel and Jill/Pete on their side (Ryan/Theresa and Jenn/Noor were floaters), their alliance slowly crumbled, in part due to Kenny/Laurel’s dominance and in part because of strategic errors by Evelyn and Wes, namely throwing Brandon/Katelynn in against CJ/Sydney, sending in Danny/Sandy against Jill/Pete and in general trusting Ryan and Jenn too much.

Ev/Luke were sent into the third exile by Kenny/Laurel, where they defeated Paula/Jeff. By the seventh exile, Wes and Evelyn’s alliance had completely crumbled and they were pitted against each other, and Evelyn won her second exile of the season.

But she was thrown into the next exile against Landon/Carley, where her decision to not solve the puzzle gave them a five-minute penalty and resulted in her elimination (and subsequently resulted in her throwing a huge temper tantrum against Luke).

Getting paired with Paula on Rivals, the duo was the odds-on-favorite to win and didn’t disappoint. Although they got last in the first mission, they took out Aneesa/Robin in Hands On, then went on to win four missions and the final.

Evelyn became the second female in Challenge history with three wins, joining Veronica in the exclusive club.

There’s never been a more intense competitor — male or female — in Challenge history than Evelyn.

While she wasn’t a great political player — finding herself on the wrong side of the numbers on The Island and The Ruins and having one of the worst political breakdowns of all time on Fresh Meat II, she also had an aptitude for the game.

One of her most underrated moves was on Fresh Meat II, where she concocted a decoy plan to fool Kenny that the house would be voting in Ryan/Theresa. Since Kenny had loyalty to Ryan he agreed to give Ryan the matchup he wanted, but then the house changed the vote to put in Jill/Pete.

I thought long and hard about Evelyn versus Laurel for the number one spot. This was my rationale for giving Ev the silver medal.

I think when it comes to competition, there’s no clear answer to who’s better. I’d give Laurel an advantage when it comes to eliminations — she is 9–2 compared to Ev’s 4–3 record, and nobody can compare to Laurel when it comes to physicality.

In finals I’d give a pretty clear advantage to Evelyn, as she has better cardio than Laurel. When it comes to daily challenges, I think it’s pretty even between them, with maybe a slight edge to Laurel since Evelyn never quite dominated the dailies in a season like Laurel did on Fresh Meat II.

I wouldn’t call either of them great political players, as they each had one atrocious season — Evelyn on Fresh Meat II and Laurel on War of the Worlds 2. But I think Evelyn has a more strategic and analytical mind for the game, where Laurel has played more emotionally.

This was so close, I even went through all of their seasons and ranked them against each other. Here’s what I came up with:

Laurel Free Agents Ev Rivals Laurel Fresh Meat II Laurel Cutthroat Ev Inferno 3 Ev The Island Laurel Rivals Ev Gauntlet 3 Laurel Invasion Ev Fresh Meat II Laurel War of the Worlds 2 Ev The Ruins Ev Fresh Meat

Some of these seasons are close calls and can be debated, but Laurel’s average placement of 5.8 was better than Evelyn’s 8.

For me it ultimately comes down to Evelyn having two dud seasons on Fresh Meat and The Ruins where she was out first and second, while Laurel only has blemishes against elite competitors in Camila and Ninja.

Unfortunately for the fans, Evelyn retired after Rivals to pursue a career in law.

During her reign, it was almost unfair for Evelyn to compete against the other girls — it was like Lebron James competing against a bunch of high schoolers. If she had kept coming on the show, I have no doubt she would have continued to dominate and would have the most victories in Challenge history.

Although it’s now been almost a decade since she’s appeared on the show, Evelyn’s legacy as one of the fiercest, strongest, and greatest females in Challenge history remains intact.

Rankings

25. Tonya Cooley

24. Holly Shand

23. Ruthie Alcaide

22. Theresa Gonzalez

21. Jenna Compono

20. Jillian Zobroski

19. Diem Brown

18. Tori Deal

17. Dee Nguyen

16. Kam Williams

15. Jenn Grijalva

14. Tori Hall

13. Jodi Weatherton

12. Ashley Mitchell

11. Veronica Portillo

10. Paula Meronek

9. Susie Meister

8. Coral Smith

7. Rachel Robinson

6. Sarah Rice

5. Camila Nakagawa

4. Emily Schromm

3. Cara Maria Sorbello

2. Evelyn Smith