S U R V I V O R ~ MARK BURNETT

His humble beginnings provide no hint of his current exploits. After his birth, he was raised first in the city, and later in Dagenham, a small town in Essex. At the age of seventeen, with no formal education, he enlisted in the British Army (he claims that it was due to watching too many war movies). He later became section commander of the infamous Parachute Regiment and fought in Northern Ireland and in the Falkland Islands, where many of his fellow soldiers died in the advance on Port Stanley.

In October of 1982, now a decorated soldier, he decided to leave Britain for the land of opportunity, America. But that wasn’t his original plan. He had intended to fly to Los Angeles, then take a flight south to Central America where he could work for the British Special Air Service (SAS) as a military advisor. He told his mother that he was going to pick up a ‘security job’ in LA, so as not to frighten her, for at the time, Central America was in great turmoil. Even he was a bit frightened himself.

But his mother was worried. “I’ve got a bad feeling about that security job in Los Angeles,” she said. Mark said he would think about it. And he would, because he would never lie to his mother, who had encouraged him to chase his dreams even though they were poor and could not afford luxuries, that anything can be accomplished if you put your mind to it.

He spent the flight to America pondering his mother’s words. By the time the plane landed, he had made his decision. He would not go to Central America. He would stay in Los Angeles, to chase the American Dream he had cherished since childhood. He would build a new life in the country where anything was possible.

Upon his arrival, he met up with Nick, a friend who had similarly emigrated from Britain a few years earlier and was working as a chauffeur. Nick had promised him a place to stay for a few days. He didn’t know anything about Mark’s cancelled Central American plan, so he was delighted to hear that he was going to stay in LA. On the drive from the airport, he told him that he had heard of a live-in nanny job in Beverly Hills and that the interview was that night.

He leapt at the opportunity, even though he knew nothing of what a nanny or even a babysitter was like. Least expectedly, his military background actually paid off because the family realized that it would be like hiring a nanny and a bodyguard at the same time.

After watching over the Jaeger family’s son Jeffrey for a year, he moved on to another family in Malibu, taking care of two boys for $250 a week. The father, Burt (now very close friends with Mark) soon suggested that it was time for him to get a ‘proper’ job, and gave him a position in his insurance office.

Two years later, Burt told him that if he wanted to become a success, he had to work for himself, and start small then expand, so Mark and his girlfriend, Kymberly, decided to rent a portion of a fence at Venice Beach and sell t-shirts on weekends. He felt that it was a rip-off to rent the fence, and it seemed dumb to him, but he paid the rental fee with the little money that he had and took the risk. It was a huge success. He never thought that he would be a good salesperson, but there he was, selling t-shirts for $18 on the beach and making a fortune.

He made so much selling shirts he quit his insurance job and started a credit card marketing business. Although he now had a large home, a nice car,a great office space, and quite a bit of money, he wasn’t satisfied. There was still something missing in his life, and he just couldn’t figure out what it was.

The morning of February 21, 1991, a newspaper article caught his eye. Written by Jon Markman, it was about a French adventure competition called the Raid Gauloises. It was held in a different location every year, and this one was in Costa Rica. Racers competed in five-person teams through various types of terrain, covering hundreds of miles. It reminded him of his Army days, and he suddenly knew what he was missing in his life. It was adventure.

While Martin only saw fascination in the article, Mark saw a business opportunity. He told himself that he would bring a similar race to America, where eventually, its popularity would exceed that of the Raid, first in America, and then the world. It would be called the Eco-Challenge. But first, he would enter the Raid and compete himself, to get a feel for both the competition as well as the organizational and media aspects of his endeavor.

What happened fifteen months later is probably better described in the words of the two men themselves.

Dugard: "…a year and a half elapsed between Markman's Raid article and the life-changing phone call of November 10, 1992. It was late afternoon. The caller was British, somehow polite and brash at once. His name, he said before a single second of the conversation had elapsed, was Mark Burnett. On November 27 he was leading the first-ever American team to an obscure French race called the Raid Gauloises — had I heard of it? — through the Arabian Peninsula kingdom of Oman. The race would begin December 6…"

"I was intrigued. It turned out that Burnett had read a story of mine in Runner's World [magazine] about a gruesome race held at a Marine Corps Air Station near my house…Something about the story had convinced Burnett that I was the perfect guy to write about his Raid Gauloises team. In fact, he'd already called the editor of Runner's World and told him so."

Burnett: "I lined up a lucrative series of corporate sponsors to back my team…I promised them media attention…To fulfill that obligation I cold-called media outlets, pitching the story of my plucky team. Now I know better. But back then I thought that's how it was done. Incredibly, it worked. Runner's World magazine agreed to do a feature story based solely on my exuberant pitch to their editor. The writer contracted to write the piece told me he'd never heard of such a thing happening before."

Although Marty only covered the Raid that year through Mark's journal accounts, it was a very interesting story to tell. His team, American Pride, did not win, but they certainly endured many hardships. Its members, aside from Mark (the self-declared and required team leader), included a stockbroker, an aerobics instructor, a freelance TV producer, and an actor. They were warmly received by the other racers, but when the race began, things started to go wrong.

Firstly, the beginning event was a twenty-mile horseback ride. The horses that Team American Pride had chosen were stubborn and would not go. One of the horses even refused to be ridden on. They dragged the horses up the dry riverbed, Wadi Akhbar, then abandoned them for the roped ascent up the waterfalls of Snake Canyon. But the actor refused to go on unless they stopped, built a fire, dried their clothes, and stayed the night. Under threat of disqualification (teams must finish with all members), they complied reluctantly. No longer was American Pride in the race to win. With no way to catch the lead team, they were now only in Oman to tour the course.

The race became a total failure for American Pride. They were walking in circles due to Mark's navigating skills, and at one point, race officials came to put them back in the right direction.

Three days later, on a kayaking segment, the wind blew cold and a storm struck. The same team member that insisted on building the fire panicked and anounced that he either wanted to quit or to rest ashore until the storm passed. Mark, as team leader, forbade him to do so, for going ashore in a storm was dangerous and he wanted to keep the team together and so still in the running for an official time.

But it was to no avail. The actor paddled hard to shore. There was no choice now but to leave him be and continue as a disqualified team.

When American Pride finally finished the segment, the race organizer, as an act of kindness to the first American team, offered to allow the rebel member back in and not disqualify them. But they had made their decision. Remembering his selfishness and mutiny, they would not take him back.

The aerobics instructor suffered an ankle injury six days after that, and Team American Pride was down to three. The three of them, Mark, Susan Hemond (the TV producer), and Norman Archer Hunte (the stockbroker) continued onward to complete the course.

This singular experience convinced Mark that adventure was where he was destined to spend his life. He had a definite dream. He knew that it was necessary to officially finish the Raid, to establish credibility before he attempted to run his own. So he entered again. This year, 1993, it was in Madagascar. Once again, Martin Dugard covered his team, this time on location. He drafted a new team (with the exception of Susan, the required female member) from the ranks of the Navy SEALs. The other men's names were Pat "Fabio" Harwood, Bruce Schliemann, and Rick Holman.

They fought well and they fought hard. Mark was determined to finish. He wore a photograph of his year-old son and his recently deceased mother around his neck for luck. At last they placed ninth, a great victory for both him and the American future of the sport. The Raid now had an American contender, and this was only the next step towards Mark's current fame.

Although he was very optimistic about his plans, people kept comparing it to the Hawaiian Ironman competition. He knew that Eco-Challenge would be much tougher than Ironman. Critics questioned his ability to make such a judgement, because he had never competed in an Ironman Triathlon. More than ever, he wanted to actually win the Raid. He had achieved an official finish, but nothing would silence those critics but a first-place win.

Borneo, 1994 — The Raid Gauloises in the land of the headhunters. Team American Pride consisted of the same men, but Cathy Sassin-Smith replaced Susan Hemond because she suffered a life-threatening injury last race that left her unable to compete. She was chosen through a 'mini-Raid' test in the mountains of Southern California.

Before the starting line at Ba Kelalan, a small village, Mark's thoughts wandered back to home, back to his office, back to Eco-Challenge. Until the very last minute, he mind was on soliciting teams to come to his race. Like "a lone man on a mission," he said, he seemed to only be in Borneo "for Mark Burnett, not Team American Pride."

Once the race started, all team members' thoughts were back on winning. They all expected to win.

All of a sudden and no one knew how, ten minutes into the race, they were dead lost, alone. Stuck in the jungle, they could not find the path they needed to follow. Hacking desperately at the foliage, more than twenty-four hours later, they came to civilization. They were overjoyed.

Then they looked around…things looked so familiar. They were back in Ba Kelalan!

After paying a guide for help (against the rules, but they didn't care), they found the path, and although they were terribly disappointed and frustrated at losing so soon, they moved onward. Maybe they could turn the situation around for the better.

The group soon began to fall apart, the blame for the navigation blunder being tossed around like a beach ball. Two days later, Bruce quit because of a knee injury. Now in last place, disqualified, and squabbling, Mark was greatly depressed. It couldn't have been any worse, he thought.

Another day later, he decided it was time for him to go as well. He realized that he had no reason to be racing there at all. He had already finished the Raid twice; he had nothing to prove. In his own words, he "didn't deserve to succeed in Borneo." His body may have been there, but his mind was too focused on Eco-Challenge to do him any good. That focus took away from his training for the race, so he wasn't prepared. He deserved to fail.

Shameful, full of guilt, but just that little bit wiser, he returned to Los Angeles. Returned to where he belonged. Leaving his failure behind, he went back to work on Eco-Challenge. He would race no more. That stage of his life was over. It was time to move on.

Fortunately Burt came to the rescue and offered to pay his bills for him that year. Although that lessened Mark's worries over his own financial situation, he continued to be nervous about his investment. But despite all of these fears, his instinct (which, by the way, is the one thing he trusts most) told him that Eco would be a great success. However, many unexpected difficulties would lie ahead.

In 1992 he had bought the American rights to the Raid Gauloises from its owner, race director Gerard Fusil and signed him on as a consultant. His consultation fee was in the hundred thousands of dollars, but Mark was willing to pay it with the limited funds he had because he knew he would need Fusil's help to make Eco work.

Unexpectedly, days earlier, Fusil had signed a contract with the Raid's French parent company, agreeing to provide a similar service to the Raid and no other race. Mark was left with a lot of wasted money and the daunting task of organizing the entire race on his own.

He was not discouraged. In fact, he was so ambitious he made a furtive attempt to acquire the worldwide rights to the Raid from Fusil. He was not successful, and the dispute was settled in court. Once again, maybe he shouldn’t have tried so hard.

Anyway, he decided to hire Brian Terkelsen, a stockbroker and accountant, to assist him in the financial and business planning aspects. Terkelsen predicted that, according to his five-year plan, profits would rise from $13,799 in 1993 to $2,566,448 in 1997. It was very reassuring.

His first task was to find a location for the race. He knew it would generate massive publicity for the state, and he really wanted it to be in Alaska. But Terkelsen showed him that Alaska would be expensive and that it doesn't really any more tourism. So he ran off letters to a variety of state tourism bureaus detailing the proposal. He hoped that the state would be able to provide them with permits and funding for the race.

After some conferences with officials in Montana, Wyoming, and Utah, he chose Utah. All of the three states had the kind of dramatic sweeping landscapes he was looking for, but the deciding factor was really the governor of Utah. He showed tremendous support for Eco, and made it clear that it would be a priority. Mark thought that having him as an ally would help smooth the permit acquisition process. Without him, it was possible that the process could take years, ruining the plan.

A few months later, he had the course all planned out. He walked into the State Tourism department, expecting to come out with the permits. "Permits?" they asked. "We don't handle permits here. All that land you've chosen is federal land. We can't give permits for federal land." Big oops.

What followed was a six-month, quarter-million dollar debacle with the Bureau of Land Management. Huge amounts of the hard-earned money were going into hiring environmental consultants to do environmental impact reports. The company went into debt.

Then the environmentalists got in the way. They were afraid that the race would disturb the wildlife there. Which was ironic, because Eco was designed to raise awareness of the earth, not to destroy it. He also didn't quite understand why they were complaining because 90% of the course was on existing trails and roads.

Apparently, according to Martin Dugard, this was mostly caused by a magazine editorial about the question of whether adventure racers belonged in the great outdoors. The writer of the editorial called the Utah desert a church, where the 'hooligans' should not be allowed to tread. Groups of envrionmental extremists were beginning to threaten to blow up the course or shoot the contestants. The danger was very real.

Things got tense as the race date approached. There were close calls, a last minute budgeting error, along with other mishaps, but finally, four days before the race began on April 25, 1995, the permits were granted. The race was on.

In January 1996, Eco-Challenge became Discovery Channel property, if you know what I mean. It would mean a wider broadcast of the television program, sponsorship, and a lot more camera crews than he had in Utah with MTV. The big challenge for Mark this time was working in the rigid corporate structure of Discovery when he was accustomed to a looser community of workers. So at the 1996 Eco-Challenge in British Columbia, he just didn't feel like he was fitting in. All of a sudden he wanted to get the race over with, rather than being excited about it.

What was worse, when Mark's production company had assembled the five episodes for submission, Discovery didn't think they were good enough. They sent the footage to another company to edit. It was as if they weren't being trusted with their own work. He was rather dissatisfied with Discovery's handling of his work. They were not making it the way he wanted it. On the other hand, the fourth episode was not re-edited and was submitted and received an Emmy nomination.

Rousing success and more rousing success. No more would the company Eco-Challenge Lifestyles be in debt. He had jumped the final hurdle and now was a millionaire, having won immunity from the lower levels of the social ladder and financial un-health.

He agreed. It would earn him a lot of money. But just before hey signed it, Moyer resigned. In the turmoil of the company, the deal was forgotten.

Months later, in spring 1999, they had an alternate offer. They didn't want to buy the race, but they still wanted to produce it. They would also cut his salary and show budget by half. Not exactly the greatest deal, but he seriously considered it.

It was at this time that he pitched Survivor to them. When they turned it down, he realized that there was something broken in their relationship. They had released him. He could now go elsewhere. Finally he might be able to produce Eco-Challenge the way he wanted it to be — a dramatic story of man in the great outdoors.

Ironically, during a Survivor pitch meeting with Steve Chao at USA Networks, he quickly turned down Survivor but suddenly announced that he was interested in the American distribution rights to Eco-Challenge. Then and there, a deal was made and signed, including a two million-dollar sponsorship from the state of Sabah in Malaysia. The 2000 race would be held there. (The 1999 race in the Patagonia region of Argentina still belonged to Discovery, according to contract.)

Speaking of Patagonia, working on Eco there was an odd experience for Mark. He was working with the same Argentinian government and military officials that he had fought against in the Falklands War. He half-expected to be "publicly lambasted" over the war, but that didn't happen. Instead, despite the British accent, they knew nothing about his military background, and did not suspect anything. They thought he was born and raised in America!

Anyway, it was over a Christmas party in 1996 when he had discussed buying the American rights to Survivor. He knew that it would be a good investment; something in the back of his mind told him that people can't resist that kind of show. And guess what, he was right.

So the final audition tapes were sent to him while he was still in Patagonia. In those hectic days, the cast was chosen and he went home to prepare. The question most asked was how the contestants would get to the island, and he always answered with the first thing that came to mind: "I'll have them jump off a boat with all their possessions, and the game will begin at that moment."

When he had gone location scouting in Borneo in June 1999, he had flown over a tiny fishing village along the coast. It was simple, beautiful, yet was primitive and indigenous. He didn't tell anyone at the time, but he was determined to shoot the opening sequence there.

But when he returned to Borneo for production eight months later, the location scout had no idea what he was talking about. He thought he was crazy. The scout took him to a different village, one that he felt was right, but Mark took a look at it and knew it wouldn't work. They flew up and down the coast for hours looking for the elusive village — and couldn't find it. He began to think that he only imagined the place.

When he returned to his hotel room, defeated, he took out the photos that he had taken on that first trip, frantically searching for a sign of that perfect village. But he couldn't find it. All hope was lost…or was it?

Then he found another stack of pictures he had misplaced in his luggage. And there it was: The one and only photograph of that village. He showed it to a couple of locals the next day and they helped him find it.

So it began on the morning of March 13, 2000. The lucky sixteen were taken to the island from the little village of Sabang. The rest is history.

When Survivor was being aired on TV, Mark went once again to Borneo for his first Eco-Challenge away from Discovery. The place was so familiar to him now; the host hotel was the Magellan Sutera in Kota Kinabalu, the same one as it was for Survivor production. "All in all," he says, "I'd spent about five months of my life in and out of the Magellan." He was welcomed like a hero. When he arrived at the hotel, a crowd of employees were there to welcome him back. They even gave him room 6260, the same room he had left on the dark morning to begin the making of Survivor.

"The irony of my greatest failure and my greatest triumph taking place on the same remote island was not lost on me. Borneo was my geographic talisman, reminding me of how far my dreams had taken me."

SURVIVOR WORLD MAIN PAGE

PULAU TIGA

AUSTRALIA

AFRICA

MARQUESAS

THAILAND

AMAZON

PEARL ISLANDS

ALLSTARS

VANUATU

PALAU

GUATEMALA

EXILE ISLAND

COOK ISLANDS

FIJI

CHINA

MICRONESIA

MARK BURNETT

JEFF PROBST