The Greatest Female Players in Challenge History: #7- Emily Schromm

Michael Alvey
3 min readJul 10, 2019

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4 Seasons: Cutthroat (3rd place), Battle of the Exes (3rd place), Rivals II (Win), Champs vs. Stars (Win)

Final Efficiency: 4/4 (100%)

Win Efficiency: 2/4 (50%)

15 Mission Wins, 6–0 Elimination Record

Individual Missions: 1/1

Partner Missions: 6/20 (30%)

Combined: 7/21 (33.3%)

Average Times Voted In Per Season: 1

Seasons Making Final Going Into Minimum Amount of Elims: 2

With just four seasons under her belt, it speaks to how excellent Emily was in her short time on the show that she’s considered one of the greatest female competitors of all time.

Although it’s not long, Emily’s resume speaks for itself.

Emily was clearly not in as good of shape in her rookie season as she would be later in her career (when she got into CrossFit and became arguably the most physically fit female in the history of the show), but she was still one of the best females on Cutthroat. She took out Melinda in Handcuffs and Paula in Pole Me Over to reach the final.

But it was just her and Jenn on the blue team in the finals, and they had no chance of winning.

Partnered with her ex-flame Ty on Exes, the pair found themselves on the wrong side of the numbers in a veteran-stacked cast. They were thrown into elimination twice and went in once for losing a mission, but came out on top all three times.

Against Leroy/Naomi in Banded Together, Emily and Ty finished the elimination before Naomi even got to the pole.

Then Emily manhandled Cara in X-Battle, winning the second round in literally two seconds and prompting Mark to say, “Emily competes almost like a dude.”

And in the second-to-last elimination Hall Pass, Emily defeated her future partner Paula.

Emily was a beast in the final but was held back by Ty’s lack of cardio, causing them to finish third.

There was no doubt who was the favorite on the girls’ side of Rivals II when Emily was paired with Paula. And the duo lived up to expectations, winning six out of 10 missions and never seeing an elimination. Emily capped off her career with a victory, cementing her place as one of the best female competitors in Challenge history.

She came back on Champs vs. Stars after a long layoff and was by far the best female on the show, outperforming world-class athletes like Kim Glass, Michelle Waterson and Shawn Johnson. She won two MVPs, including winning the Sink or Swim mission to reach the final.

Politically, Emily isn’t really known for being a strategist, but she hasn’t been actively bad either.

On Cutthroat she went into elimination twice while Jenn never went in once, but she felt as a rookie it was her place to go in rather than the established vet. There wasn’t anything she could do on Exes to crack the vet alliance of Johnny/Camila, Mark/Robin, CT/Diem and Dunbar/Paula.

On Rivals II her and Paula were in strong alliances with Diem/Aneesa and Camila/Jemmye, along with most of the veteran guys. Emily’s relationship with Jordan also helped them pick up the rookie team of him and Marlon.

If Emily returns to the show and puts together one or two more excellent seasons, she will be in consideration for the greatest of all time. But for her now, her small sample size keeps her out of that discussion.

Rankings

30. Jillian Zobroski

29. Ruthie Alcaide

28. Theresa Jones

27. Aneesa Ferreira

26. KellyAnne Judd

25. Jenna Compono

24. Amber Borzotra

23. Nany Gonzalez

22. Diem Brown

21. Jenn Grijalva

20. Tori Hall

19. Nicole Zanatta

18. Dee Nguyen

17. Jonna Mannion

16. Ashley Mitchell

15. Veronica Portillo

14. Paula Meronek

13. Susie Meister

12. Coral Smith

11. Kam Williams

10. Rachel Robinson

9. Jodi Weatherton

8. Tori Deal

7. Emily Schromm

6. Kaycee Clark

5. Sarah Rice

4. Camila Nakagawa

3. Evelyn Smith

2. Cara Maria Sorbello

  1. Laurel Stucky

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