Zach was arguably one of the more controversial characters on this season of Australian Survivor.
The 39-year-old personal trainer became the seventh person eliminated from the show. He was unanimously voted off by the Contenders during last night’s tribal council, with tribe-mates Shonee and Fenella leading the charge in having him eliminated.
The pair, along with several other Contenders, felt that Zach’s views and comments about women were offensive. They chose to boot him from the show, in an attempt to create a more cohesive tribe.
We caught up with Zach to find out more about his time on Australian Survivor and see what he thinks of the backlash to his… ‘unique’ views.
He didn’t have much to say in response to the backlash – he spoke instead of ‘performance based environments’ – but he managed to make it perfectly clear that he’s got no regrets.
TV WEEK: It was an intense tribal council! It seemed like it was between you, Benji and Tegan when you were going in to the tribal council. Did you expect that your name would come up, or were you blindsided?
Zach: No I wasn’t blindsided at all, I knew it was coming straight away. You guys don’t really get to see what goes on behind the scenes, you only see what they want you to see. But I knew straight away that it was my time. I wasn’t worried at all, that’s kind of how I am.
Did you know ‘your boys’ Benji and Robbie were voting for you as well?
Yeah 100%. They can’t go and put votes on, say Tegan, because then they’d have to go back to camp and explain why they put votes on that person. It ended up becoming a vote of self-preservation.
You’ve previously been quite vocal about being the ‘strongest’ – physically – on the team, in challenges. Fenella made the joke last night ‘thanks for winning them all for us’ in response. Do you see where she was coming from? Do you understand why the women in the tribe were irritated by what you were saying?
Yeah, of course. That’s the problem though, when you’re breaking down team strategy and you’re having to look at the resources you’ve got in place to win these challenges, you start trying to critically analyse things and start trying to figure out what key players are going to be good in those clutch positions. And that offends some people, who are not used to operating in performance based environments.
Have you seen the negative reactions on social media to your comments? Do you understand that negative reaction, and the negative reaction from the female tribe members?
Yeah I mean, look this is the thing, you can’t please everyone. I went out there with the sole purpose of playing kind of a bit of a villain. I wanted to ruffle feathers a little bit and have a bit of fun with it, I get a lot of backlash but I also get a lot of love as well! I gotta say I’ve got a lot of people inboxing me telling me I’m highly entertaining.
Moving forward, how do you think the Contenders tribe will go without you?
I think it’s going to be really difficult for these guys. I think you’re going to see the Contenders losing more challenges, and I think once we go to a merge you’re going to see the Champions severely outnumbering them in challenges.
Who should the Contenders be the most concerned about, within the tribe? Who is the biggest threat?
Now that Tegan and Heath are back together, they carry a lot of power and a lot of weight. They’re a pretty dangerous power couple.
Australian Survivor continues tonight, 7:30pm, on Network Ten.
