Tony Vlachos

Tony Vlachos
Born	(1973-09-10) September 10, 1973 Jersey City, New Jersey, U.S.
Occupation(s)	Police officer, Reality Television Personality
Television	Survivor: Cagayan (winner) Survivor: Game Changers Survivor: Winners at War (winner)
Spouse	Marissa Vlachos (2012 – present)
Children	2

Anthony Vlachos (born September 10, 1973) is an American police officer, best known for competing on the reality television competition series Survivor where he is widely considered to be one of the greatest players in the show's history. He won the show's 28th season, Survivor: Cagayan, as well as the 40th season, Survivor: Winners at War, the first all-winners season, making him the series' second two-time winner, after Sandra Diaz-Twine. In the interim, he competed in the 34th season, Survivor: Game Changers, where he was the second person voted out.

As a Survivor player, he is known for his unique gameplay style mixing fast-paced and chaotic situations, aggressive yet meticulous strategic moves, control over the rest of his tribe, his capacity to find hidden immunity idols (having found the most out of any winner at four between his three seasons), and for his peculiar personality often resulting in strange or humorous scenes. Vlachos is also known for his long-lasting "Cops R' Us" partnership with fellow contestant Sarah Lacina, who won Survivor: Game Changers, the two participating in the same three seasons they appeared on.

Survivor host Jeff Probst, back when Vlachos had only participated in the show once, already considered him one of its best winners, claiming that that he had "never seen anyone play with that much energy and juggle that many balls at once, and pull it all off." Upon winning the 40th season and its accompanying $2 million prize, Vlachos became the first man to win Survivor twice (and second person altogether after Sandra Diaz-Twine). He has won the most amount of money from Survivor among all contestants, totaling just over $3 million across his three seasons. Since Winners at War, he is sometimes known as the "King of Survivor", a counterpart to Diaz-Twine's "Queen of Survivor" nickname.

Personal life

Vlachos was born on September 10, 1973, the son of Greek immigrants. He grew up in Jersey City, New Jersey, idolizing law enforcement officers, and dreamed of one day becoming one. He graduated high school in 1992 and spent several years working in various different jobs while "partying" with his friends and working on his automobiles. He states that despite this recreational period in his life, he did not smoke, drink alcohol, or do drugs.

He began bodybuilding when he was 20, an activity with which he says he was "obsessed". He began working out in his basement with plastic weights filled with sand, and graduated to iron weights in about a year.

In 2000, Vlachos became a Jersey City police officer. On February 5, 2014, he saved a 69-year-old man who had a massive heart attack on his lawn in nine inches of snow.

In 2007, Vlachos began dating a fellow police officer named Marissa Ann. They dated for approximately three years before he proposed to her on July 24, 2010. They married on June 2, 2012, and their daughter, Anastasia Marie, was born on February 16, 2013, five months before Vlachos left to film Survivor: Cagayan. Two months after arriving home, Vlachos and Marissa discovered she was two months pregnant with their second child, a son they named Constantine Anthony, who was born on June 9, 2014.

Vlachos has been a resident of Allendale, New Jersey.

Survivor

Cagayan

Vlachos was cast on the 28th season of the CBS reality television show Survivor. The theme of the season was Brawn vs. Brains vs. Beauty. Vlachos was cast as a "brawn" and started out on the Aparri tribe. Before the first tribal swap, Aparri dominated the immunity challenges and did not go to tribal council. During this time, Vlachos formed an alliance, dubbed "Cops-R-Us", with fellow police officer Sarah Lacina. Despite this alliance, Vlachos lied to Lacina about his profession, claiming he was a construction worker. Vlachos also became close with Trish Hegarty and was wary of the popularity of former NBA All-Star Clifford Robinson. Vlachos was able to find the Aparri tribe's hidden immunity idol with help of the clue he found in the reward they received after winning a challenge.

Vlachos made the Final 3 alongside ally Yung "Woo" Hwang and rival Kass McQuillen. Hwang won the final immunity challenge, and Vlachos had to convince Hwang to take him to the final 2 rather than McQuillen. Vlachos argued that, in order for Hwang to maintain the integrity he claimed to play with, he needed to take his long-time ally and more worthy opponent with him. Hwang ultimately agreed and voted out McQuillen, allowing Vlachos to advance to the final 2. At the final tribal council, Vlachos received much criticism from the jury members (especially Hegarty) for his aggressive gameplay and constantly breaking his promises, while Hwang was criticized for riding Vlachos' coattails and choosing to take him to the end over McQuillen. However, after Spencer Bledsoe gave a long speech in favor of Vlachos, the jury ultimately chose him as the winner with 8 of the 9 jury votes (while only Tasha Fox voted for Woo to win), thus tying with Rob Mariano's win in Survivor: Redemption Island for the largest non-unanimous Final Tribal Council win in Survivor history.

Aftermath

Survivor: Cagayan has since been acclaimed by many to be one of the most entertaining seasons of Survivor. In a 2015 interview, host Jeff Probst listed Vlachos as one of his top 10 favorite Survivor winners ever, and one of his top 6 favorite male winners, commenting, "I like Tony because he's unlike any winner we've ever had. He's the Tasmanian Devil. He played an incredibly reckless game, but he was so gifted that he could make a mistake and recover because he was lapping you so that he was able to actually catch back up and fix his mistake. It's almost like he had his own time machine. I've never seen anyone play with that much energy and juggle that many balls at once, and pull it all off." In 2016, Vlachos became a part of the Survivor Hall of Fame, along with Tina Wesson and Rupert Boneham. Due to Xfinity TV's discontinuation of the award in 2017, he is the newest Survivor player (by season recency) to be inducted.

Game Changers

At the end of the reunion show for the 33rd season, Survivor: Millennials vs. Gen X, Vlachos was confirmed to be a participant in the 34th season: Survivor: Game Changers. He started on the Mana tribe. On day 1, Vlachos publicly announced he would be looking for a hidden immunity idol which worried the others. Mana lost the immunity challenge. At the tribal council, Vlachos joined the majority in voting out Ciera Eastin. The next day Vlachos and Sandra Diaz-Twine discussed how no one else would let a former winner win this season, and agreed to align. However, Vlachos later overheard Diaz-Twine talking with Troyzan Robertson, and believed she was targeting him. He then confronted her; she denied targeting him, but she later decided to do so. On Day 6, Mana lost their second immunity challenge. At tribal council, Diaz-Twine lobbied her tribemates into voting out Vlachos by a 7–2 vote.

Winners at War

During the promotional trailer for the season during the reunion show for the 39th season, Survivor: Island of the Idols, Vlachos was confirmed to be a participant in the 40th season: Survivor: Winners at War.

He started on the Dakal tribe. Vlachos played a quite game in the pre merge, staying calm and not running off to look for an idol, as he wanted to avoid an early exit like in Survivor Game Changers (https://tvline.com/2020/05/14/survivor-tony-vlachos-season-40-interview-winners-at-war/). In the early days, he reformed his Cops-r-us Alliance with Lacina. After reaching the merge, Vlachos formed a coalition with the high profile threats against the Low profile players (Lions vs. Hyenas strategy), as he wanted the threats to stick around. His coalition controlled the first few votes. After the first couple of votes, he went back to his original style, eliminating anyone he saw as a threat, finding a Hidden Immunity Idol, and take control. He emerged as a challenge threat, winning four immunity challenges, with the first three being consecutive. After winning immunity at the final 5, it was official that he would end the season with no elimination votes cast against him. At the final 4, Vlachos defeated Lacina in the fire-making tiebreaker challenge.

At the Final Tribal Council, Vlachos was commended for blindsiding people without angering them or making himself a target, and winning challenges. Vlachos's dominant strategic game was preferred over Natalie Anderson's dominance on Extinction Island and Michele Fitzgerald's underdog game. On May 13, 2020, it was revealed via zoom chat that Vlachos was crowned the winner, receiving 12 of the 16 jury votes. The only votes he lost were Ethan Zohn's, Parvati Shallow's, Tyson Apostol's and Jeremy Collins's (all four voted for Anderson). With this victory, Vlachos became the first ever male contestant and second overall contestant after Diaz-Twine in the show's history to win Survivor twice.

External links

• "Tony Vlachos". Survivor: Cagayan. CBS.
• Longeretta, Emily (May 21, 2014). "'Survivor: Cagayan' Recap: (Spoiler) Wins It All After Dramatic Finale". Hollywood Life.