Sometimes as I drift off to sleep, I like to put myself on a season of Survivor and imagine how things would unfold. Would I win? Be the witty fan favorite? Maybe I would be that season’s villain the likes Jonny Fairplay wishes he could become. No matter what, my biggest fear would easily be becoming the first boot.

It has to happen each season. Someone has to go home first. Being the first one out is like the ultimate sign of rejection from your peers. It tells you that you weren’t able to integrate socially for one reason or another and that a bunch of other people felt OK simply cutting you. If you happen to be a fan of the show, it’s even worse because you live with the feeling of embarrassment for the rest of your life.

With that in mind, I decided to run some numbers on the first boots of Survivor history to see if there is any sort of trend we can follow. It’s the first in a new regular column I am going to write called Survivor Statistics. Before I delve into my observations, here are a few caveats:

· Some returning player seasons have not been included in this set of data. They represent a whole other set of circumstances which impacts how players vote and would have to be given separate analysis. The problem with that is there aren’t enough returning player seasons to really give us any kind of impression. The seasons with returning players included in this data set: Guatemala, Redemption Island, South Pacific, Blood vs Water and Philippines. Simply for the fact that none of these seasons featured a returning player as the first boot and for all but Blood vs Water, the returning players made up far less than 50% of the contestants.

· In seasons with Redemption Island twists in play, I still stuck with the first person voted off their tribe. So for example, while Rupert Boneham, Colton Cumbie and Rachel Foulger all rank below Marissa Peterson in Blood vs Water, I still counted her as the first boot since she was the first one effectively voted off her tribe (and no, I didn’t count the BS first vote from each side).

· Similarly to the Redemption Island twist, I chose Jolanda for the first boot in Palau because Wanda and Jonathan were never actually voted off. They didn’t even get a torch, they simply weren’t selected and I have always just thought of them as backups that were allowed to be filmed. That may not be fair but it’s the decision I went with. E-mail or tweet me your hate if you disagree.

· Finally for One World, I did not count Kourtney as she wasn’t voted off at all. Being a medevac is not being sent home by your tribe. Nina instead took her place as the “first boot”.

· I took my statistics for players’ ages from Wikipedia which seems to be the most accurate for when the filming period took place.

· In terms of occupation, I simply went with what the CBS bios told me because that is what I officially consider cannon.

· My source for who are applicants and recruits is this chart which has been very accurate in the past.

Got all that? Good. Let’s get into some observations.

Age

It should come as no surprise that early on, the older a contestant was, the more likely they would be first boot fodder. At 63, Borneo’s first boot Sonja Christopher is still tied for the oldest person to be sent home first. Since Borneo was the original and was setting a lot of precedents, it kind of makes sense that for the next couple of seasons, the first boots were still considered older players. Debb Eaton was 45, Diane Ogden was 42, Peter Harker was 44 and John Raymond was 40. John also happens to be the only first boot with a round number as his age.

When you get to Amazon, Ryan Aiken as the first boot is incredibly interesting. He’s 23, by far the youngest of the pre-All-Stars first boots and remains the second youngest of all-time. He was only surpassed by Marissa in Blood vs Water and if I had decided to go with their final placement instead, Ryan would have held onto the crown. Ryan becomes the precedent for sending home a young, athletic person and still being able to compete. Also worth noting, Nicole Delma was 24 when she went home in Pearl Islands. 24! Maybe it’s just me but she looks at least 40 whenever I watch that season. Sorry Nicole.

Here is a chart that can help visualize the age of each first boot from Borneo to Millennials vs Gen X.

The average age for first boots is 36.53. The people closest to the age are the immortal Francesca Hogi who first went home at 36 and Millennials vs Gen X’s first boot Rachel Ako who went home at 37. Interestingly enough, nobody went home first between the ages of 32–35 and 39. The average still falls in the mid-30s because a lot of 20 something year olds and 40 something year olds make up the first boots and happen to skew the average towards the middle.

Here is the breakdown of first boots in gaps of ages:

Statistically speaking, wait until you are out of your 20s to go play Survivor and if you’re almost into your 40s, maybe wait another decade to apply. Of course, the reason for so many 20 something year olds going home first is because they cast more people in their 20s than they do in their 50s or 60s. It’s just interesting to see the people in their 30s do so well because they represent a large majority of the people who go out and play Survivor.

Gender

Out of of 28 first boots, 18 of them have been women and 10 have been men. It took Peter Harkey and his holes to become the first man to be a first boot but he was quickly followed by John and Ryan. In fact, the numbers stay fairly even between both sexes until a stretch between Gabon and One World where all the new player season first boots are women. That’s a stretch of seven different seasons which essentially makes up the entire difference between the men and women.

This doesn’t necessarily fit in gender but I didn’t want to create an entire section just for this footnote. Of the 28 different boots analysed, only two people share the same name though it is spelled differently. Marisa and Marissa from Samoa and Blood vs Water respectively. You would think it would be a name like Jim or John but nope, Survivor likes to do things a little differently.

Occupation

If you’ve been cast on Survivor for the first time and happen to be a musician or something related to music, you might be in trouble. Sonja, the figurehead of the legion of first boots, was a musician. So was Sekou Bunch. Michelle Chase, Gabon’s first boot, was a music assistant and Semhar who was voted off first in South Pacific was a spoken word artist, despite my best efforts to forget her poetry. That’s even without counting Wanda and her terrific show tunes from Palau because she didn’t make it into this data.

Sorry Wanda, you got screwed over yet again.

Outside of that, it seems working with the law is also a bad idea. Four different players were either attorneys/lawyers: Francesca and Jolanda, an officer like Nina or a corrections officer like Debb. You would think that attorneys would be good at the game but clearly that isn’t always the case. Francesca is the only person to be first boot twice and it doesn’t look like her profession as an attorney did anything to help her.

Strangely enough, working for the post office also seems like a bad idea. It’s not the most common job to see on the show but both Diane and Darnell worked for the snail mail industry and both got the first boot on their respective seasons. Maybe the other players were tired of getting mail that wasn’t theirs and took it out on them.

I am most shocked that only one bartender and two students became first boots on their seasons. They always seem like it should be more because it simply feels like they cast a lot of “bartenders” and students.

Recruit or Applicant

19 of the 28 first boots were actually applicants. This was kind of surprising to me because we know that Survivor has been recruiting for a long time but they manage to escape the first vote more often than not. The first person to be both a recruit and a first boot is the old-looking young Nicole Delma from Pearl Islands. The longest stretch of recruits going home first is the holy trifecta of Michelle Chase-Carolina Eastwood-Marisa Calhihan from Gabon to Samoa.