The latest victim also weighs in on why women keep being voted out early in the game.
Whose idea was it for Claire to sit out all those challenges?
How did Danny convince the rest of the tribe to get rid of her?
Claire Rafson on ‘Survivor 44’.Robert Voets/CBS
And what does she make about all these women being voted out?
We asked the first Soka victim all that and more when we spoke the morning after her televised ouster.
Watch the entire interview above or read it below.
Matt Blankinship and Claire Rafson on ‘Survivor 44’.Robert Voets/CBS
CLAIRE RAFSON:I think you retroactively jinxed me.
I actuallywasthe original winner ofSurvivor 44.
They do that sometimes.
The Soka tribe on ‘Survivor 44’.Robert Voets/CBS
Okay, so what went wrong?
Why are you here talking to me after week 3?
Oh my God, so much went wrong.
Claire Rafson on ‘Survivor 44’.Robert Voets/CBS
I feel like it was like a calamity of errors.
Sometimes you win some, you lose some.
That’s showbiz, baby!
That’s showbiz, baby.
Did his vote just carry that much weight?
How did he influence everyone to get rid of you?
It was really like that.
I think if we had gone to Tribal that first week, it probably wouldn’t have been me.
Had we gone the second week, it probably wouldn’t have been me.
And his voice was just really loud, right?
He was our biggest challenge strength guy.
He was the one carrying the team, he was working a lot.
He’s just like a hummingbird kind of guy and he really was able to whip those votes.
Plus, you know, Matt not having a vote.
It just was a lot of things together.
And so that’s where I’m at.
What was it like watching all that play back?
I don’t regret anything I said.
I don’t think I was wrong about it.
Me and Danny go alone to the water well, and he gives me this fake plan.
He’s like, “We’re voting for Matt, you’re the backup.”
And I was like:I’m the vote, it’s me.
I remember being very distinctly like:Okay, let me see how serious he is about this.
And he was like, “You’re being irrational.”
And I was like:I’m done.
And obviously we didn’t figure it out.
Heidi was really non-committal, telling me she doesn’t know if I’m worth keeping to my face.
I was like,Honestly, could you at least pretend like you want to work with me?
Okay, let’s talk about those immunity challenges, or lack thereof.
He wants it to be a quick decision.
So you huddle together and you really quickly all do it.
Our tribe vibe was we’d all just go and stare at each other silently.
No one wants to sit out.
Heidi actively didn’t want to sit out and people were looking her way, looking my way.
So I was like, “Let me sit out.”
I really wanted to get some time with Matthew.
[I] wanted to hang out with him and get some stuff from him.
That sit-out was the first one.
Yes, and sitting on that bench, I feel 100 percent happy with that, right?
That four-hour slide puzzle challenge would’ve sucked.
And so I was like, another person sitting out, let’s do this.
That’s why I picked you to win!
And I thought it was a great move!
[Laughs] So that was the first.
They’re kind of looking at me.
I think Danny even goes like, “It’s okay.
It’s fine.”
And again, I’m not going be doing the snake puzzle at the end.
I think people undervalue how much tribe cohesion matters in those early days.
You’re at camp, no one wants to disagree about anything.
I was also okay with sitting out.
I was thinking about it like a long game.
So that happened next.
I knew I was going to get this tribe strength challenge against me.
So let’s say we go, I don’t play, we lose.
I knew they were going to say, “Claire’s weak, let’s go for her.”
That wasn’t the same the week before.
Oh, Claire played, she must be the weakest."
I had practiced thema bitand didn’t think that I was going to crush it.
I tried a few times.
She was not feeling my vibe.
[Laughs] That’s kind of the thought process for the sit-outs.
So what are you thinking about when Probst not once but twice openly questions that?
What you don’t see is there’s a lot of mat chat.
If the other tribes thought I was weak, fine.
I didn’t mind that part.
Take game out of it for a second.
What about just on a personal level?
You’re out there in Fiji and you see these incredibly built challenges.
How are you feeling about just not being able to get out and have some fun and do them?
All I wanted to do was play.
I’d be sitting there, and on the bench you could’t help your tribe.
I’d be sitting there like, “Oh no!
I wanted to play so badly.
But again, I was thinking about this so strongly in the long term.
I was just thinking that I want to get to the individual challenges.
So yeah, it definitely sucks because I wanted to play.
I literally worked out every day for four months.
I was in the best shape of my life.
I had a lot of fun doing things around camp.
All that was really fun.
It was a differentSurvivorexperience.
The first four people voted out last season were all women.
The first three people voted out this season were all women.
Is this just all a big coincidence?
I love the new era.
I’ve loved seasons 41, 42, 43.
It’s not a coincidence, right?
And this is how it goes, right?
What’s interesting about it too, though, is the puzzles are what it comes down to.
It wasn’t shown in the episode, but Soka always made it to the puzzle first.
We were losing ground on puzzles, which is not an inherently physically brawny kind of thing.
Especially when you’re thinking about getting to the merge and making it further.
I think it’s a little shortsighted.
I’m sure it’s not the way you envisioned it in your head when you went out there.
I’ve been aSurvivorfan since I was four years old, since day one.
This was the first time I ever took the plunge.
I might fail epically and I need to be okay with that.
[Or],I could be the first person voted out and I’m okay with that.
I have a lot of things going on in my life that I’m proud of.
I have family and friends who will love me no matter what.
But it was devastating.
It’s been a little fun the past eight, nine months.
I’m gonna lose!”
[Laughs] But as a lifelongSurvivorfan, it’s definitely given me a lot more empathy for pre-mergers.
I think I’m going to become a vocal pre-merger rights advocate.
Probably my favorite thing is that in the first challenge, I got everyone water bottles.
If one tribe’s in the shade, everyone’s in the shade.
Everything’s measured to the tee.
Brandon got a water bottle because he was obviously, like, dying.
And I call over Jeff to the bench and I was like, “I see Brandon has water.
And so mid-challenge they had to go and give every single person a water bottle.
That was on me from the bench.”
That was a fun one that was definitely not shown.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
