‘The Summit’ Winner Therron Pittman Looks Back at the ‘Thrill of the Game’ During Two-Week Journey (Exclusive)

CBS’ newest reality competition series, The Summit, aired its Season 1 finale earlier this month, with three out of 16 people making it to the top: Therron Pittman, Punkin Jackson, and Nick Morgan, who won an additional $250,000. Pittman, a 29-year-old waiter from Los Angeles, spoke to PopCulture.com about what the two-week journey was like for him and what advice he has for anyone thinking about doing it themselves, pending on future seasons of The Summit. (Interview has been edited for length and clarity).

PopCulture: Did you ever think that you would actually make it during the whole journey when you found out that that was what you were going to be doing?

Therron Pittman: Oh, no. Absolutely not. So when they told me that I was summiting a mountain, and this has to do with me playing a social strategy game, I was like, “There’s no way that’s me.” Kansas is flat, baby. I know I live in LA, but Kansas is flat. Not a mountain.

PC: What motivated you to continue going?

Pittman: I think it’s a little bit of an ego. I love board games. I love games. I’m a student of reality TV. I love shows like Big Brother and Survivor and Amazing Race. And once I got out there, at first, I was like, “I can’t do this.” You saw an episode when I was like, “Okay. But if I can do these alliances, I can cry and still stretch myself to the top.” And I think what really set the tone was when we had that first obstacle. I started tearing up, and I was like, “It’s not for you.” And then Dennis was my partner. And I’m so grateful because I don’t know how it would have been if I would have had a different partner. But this is really the first one that gave me confidence. Like, we did it. We have this beautiful moment. He kissed me on the cheek. It didn’t make the air, but I was like, “Oh my god. Can this kiss me?” Boys motivate you.

PC: How surprised were you when you saw the eliminated trekkers on the other side of the Summit and hearing their thoughts about you?

Pittman: I was surprised for a couple of reasons. We didn’t know what was going on. We didn’t know how the show would end, but the thought of them coming back kind of crossed my mind, but it wasn’t the main focus. I was like, “Nah. They didn’t have their time.” And so when they came back, I was like, “Oh, okay. Now I need to calculate who I did wrong, who I might be able to sway,” and I was like, all of my friends are in the final five, so it goes down to a vote. We’ll see how this plays out.

PC: Was there ever a time where you truly almost gave up or thought that you were gonna be voted out?

Pittman: As far as voted out, no. I never thought I was gonna be voted out at all. I was, like, 0% stress because I always knew where the numbers lie and people always came and talked to me. And so, to be honest, my name didn’t get said until, well, the final six, and it shouldn’t have been said there anyways. But it did. But as far as giving up, there was where we rappelled the wrong face, and then we had to zipline down. I don’t know what was going on that day. My partner was Amy, and she was freaking out at the first rappel part.

You don’t get to quite see that, but she was freaking out. And I was like, “Amy, calm down, calm down, calm down.” And then it flipped. Once she got there, she just started being calm, and I started freaking out. And as soon as I got down to the bottom of that rope, I was like, “There’s no more rope. A couple people went before me. Oh, this is about to snap. It’s snapping on me. I’m dying.” And I truly told them, “Please bring me back up. I’m done. I quit.” I was over it. And they were like, “Well, you’re gonna have to zipline down even if you couldn’t.” I was like, “Well, I guess I’ll go again,” but I really thought that was my moment. That was the hardest challenge for me mentally, jumping backwards off of a cliff and ziplining to the ground.

PC: You always seemed so unsure for each obstacle and not really thinking that you’d be able to do it, which is completely relatable and understandable under the circumstances. Is there anything that really surprised you about yourself during the whole journey as you got farther?

Pittman: I would say that a lot of the obstacles for me, they were heights-based. And so it took me some mental time to adjust to heights after heights after heights. I would say once we got past the zipline across the ravine, after that, I was like, “Hey, listen. You’re gonna have to keep doing these hikes challenges if you wanna quit.” I did that ice wall. And after I did that ice wall, I was like, “Wow, I just did that. I didn’t cry. It was tall.” I’m so surprised that if you really just change your mindset, it might help you do the challenge. The fear is still going to be there, but you have to really convert that fear into excitement. Like, I’m climbing a rock wall. I’m doing a rope. So, I don’t know if that quite answered the question, but I was really shocked that I was able to do all those challenges in the first place.

PC: What kind of strategies do you think played in your favor?

Pittman: I think the best strategy I could have done was setting a great foundation up from the beginning. I would say that my goal going in was to lay low and to just be in the middle of the radar, make great relationships to the point where people don’t even know who I’m connected to, but in a good way. But that was all thwarted when [host] Manu [Bennett} decided to give me that map. My original strategy when I got that map was I knew that the person who’s carrying the map, if we get lost, will go home.

So, I made sure to share that responsibility with everybody. I said, “Everybody look at the map. Who wants to hold the map? I’m okay leading, but we’re all gonna choose a direction.” And I think that that moment and starting off with a good foundation of, like, “Oh, this person is a team player. He’s going to let everybody. His ego is not taking over,” really was a great strategy from the beginning. Set yourself up so that way people remember what you did at the beginning because you only have a couple days for first impressions.

PC: Is there anything that you regretted at all during the journey?

Pittman: It’s not necessarily regret because I was friends with everybody in the final five but I wished that… you know, you get so focused on the money. And I love Beckylee to death. In real life, Beckylee is literally one of my favorite humans from the show. And when I think about her and the game she was playing and watching it back, I feel kind of bad that we kinda cut her off because I think she was playing such a phenomenal game. She deserved it. And as far as regrets, that’s like the only regret I have is, like, I feel like I hurt someone that I end up caring about so much more after the show.

PC: What made you wanna do the show, especially not knowing what you were going to be doing?

Pittman: I love reality TV. And so, the excitement of being in the first cast doing something new, and I’m like, “This is the season to win because after this season, everybody’s gonna know the strategy.” So, not knowing what I was going into or where I was going, they didn’t tell you. I just had to get a passport. I asked them, like, “How should I train?” They were like, “I don’t know.” And so what kept me going was the idea that this is a chance for me to play a real life board game and to challenge myself in real life. I pride myself on how great I am at thinking, and so I was like, “Can I outthink x amount of other people?” Because we didn’t even know how many people were gonna be there. So that’s really what got me. It was the thrill of the game.

PC: What advice do you have for anyone that is thinking about doing the show?

Pittman: I think the best thing that helps me out there, and the reason I was not tired is I took swimming lessons. I was expecting us to do some swimming, but I think that really helped my lung capacity. So that’s some just straight up, like, straightforward advice is maybe take swim lessons to get that lung capacity up.

As far as mental capacity, one of the biggest lessons I learned out there is that we’re so used to doing things by ourselves in real life, and it’s okay to lean on your teammates, but remember to lift them up equally because it it’s easier to give out cookies if you have cookies. Don’t drain yourself and then try to give out more and vice versa with everybody else. Give just as much as you get out there because it’s replenishing and lean on your fellow castmates because some of those challenges I wouldn’t have been able to do because I was in my own head. And I’m so grateful for the friends that I made out there. Like, just make friends. Have fun. Be yourself. Be yourself, that’s the key.

The first season of The Summit is streaming on Paramount+.