Brad Fiorenza Says A Breakup and Sleep Deprivation Led to His Downfall on 'The Challenge: All Stars' Season 4
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Brad Fiorenza
The Challenge: All Stars Season 4 is here! Throughout the season, Parade.com will speak with the challengers who were eliminated from the all-star competition.
Brad Fiorenza entered The Challenge: All Stars Season 4 with the wind at his back. He had just come off of one of the strongest performances of his 13-season career, and was looking to follow that up with his first win in almost 15 years. However, the wind at Brad's back promptly blew him over. After an impressive showing as the top guy in the first daily, he soon got his star stolen by Kefla Hare. That prompted a massive downward slide for the all-star, as he finished in the bottom group for five consecutive daily challenges.
Some particular performances were detrimental to Brad's team, and prompted his competition to wonder why he wasn't performing at his best. And so, when Ace Amerson playfully assumed Brad would want to go in and steal his star, to the point of creating a story around it, he was surprised to see Brad adversely react. Brad was uncharacteristically scared to go into elimination, nervous he didn't have the skills this season to keep his star from being stolen again. Despite his desires, Brad was sent in, partially due to others fearing he would drag them down in the dailies. And, in a video game-themed test of memory with Adam Larson, it was soon game over for Brad.
Now out of the game, Brad speaks with Parade.com about the factors that led to his subpar performances, his surprise at being sent into elimination, and how he went three days without sleep prior to his appearance on Season 39 of the MTV version of The Challenge.
Related: Everything to Know About The Challenge: All Stars Season 4
So you came out of All Stars Season 3, which was one of your strongest seasons ever. But this season, and this was vocalized by a couple of people in the house, it seemed like you were mentally in a different place, with Jay even saying you were "angry at the world." Can you talk a bit about what had been happening that put you in such a different head space?
I just went through a breakup, I spent about three and a half years with somebody; we were living together. We broke up roughly two weeks before the show. So before departure, normally, you're training and you're packing. And I was going through a really difficult breakup. And I had some other personal stuff going on in my family life that I won't get into. But I will say that I was excited to have the opportunity. And I was excited to compete.
When we flew out, the jetlag got me. And then I found myself struggling with sleep, I made it through that first challenge; I was still the first male finisher. And then I did my best with it, man. But we've all kind of had those nights where you watch the clock. You might have to get up for work at 6:30, 7:00. And it's 2:00; then it's 3:00; then it's 4:00. And you're doing that countdown. I feel like that was pretty much the story of my season. I found myself doing that almost every night. So I ended up starting to take naps in the middle of the day and things like that. That's really out of character for me. I've never been a Napper, but I just exhausted myself to the point where I was falling asleep in the middle of the day. Then at night, it would be a quiet house. And I felt like I was thinking back to the things I'd left at home. And it really was a difficult transition.
I did my best with it. I'm still grateful for the entire experience. But man, it's kind of hard to see yourself perform and make just serious mistakes. The open seat when I was partnered with Laurel was probably the most difficult one for me, I followed Leroy up those stairs. I started to panic after I realized that I made a huge mistake like that. And then being able to analyze that panic, when I saw myself kind of scurrying around an open seat. "Man, just grab the seat!" is what I wanted to say while watching it. And it was silly mistakes like that, where it was hard not to beat myself up too much. I think I still do to some extent. But I try to remind myself that I wasn't focused. It sucks that I wasn't focused. But it's not like I was there and I didn't care. I was trying. But unfortunately, sleep and stress got the best of me. And it was hot in those challenges. You mix all those things together, and it's hard to do your best work for sure.
I gotta imagine it's a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy. You do something like miss the bags in the luge challenge, and have Leroy yell at you. And that makes you so nervous and anxious about the next daily that you mess that one up too. And the cycle continues.
Mike, I'm glad you brought that up, because I didn't speak about missing the bags in the prior interviews. And I will say...wow. So I've always been into fast stuff. I've raced motorcycles, a little bit of motocross back in the day. Even when I was a kid, I just loved speed. And we were the first team to go. And I was so excited because we'd already done the luge challenge once before on The Duel 2, where when I actually got the win. The real trick to winning that one, which is a lot easier to analyze after the first team had gone, was to go slow and to get the bags. And if you listen to the rules, it's like, "Well, that was pretty much spelled out for you."
But think about the visual. It's luging. You've got this extreme Olympic-style track in front to you. And that was the biggest distraction. It's kind of like waving a bunch of checkered flags and like getting on motorcycles. But you've got to really listen to the rules to hear that the trick is to not go over five miles an hour. Well, these motorcycles do almost 200 miles an hour. So you really have to think and really analyze the rules. And I think that, once you watch somebody make those mistakes, that's an easy way to learn because somebody else made the mistake in front of you.
It was the perfect recipe for disaster because I love racing. I got in there; I went fast. And oh, my God, did I miss 'em! [Laughs.] And there's one thing that I'll never live down, it might be that one. I just feel like that was probably my biggest mistake of the season. And then the second would have been the the partnership with Laurel and missing that seat. But man, that was a rough moment for sure. And I was so down on myself on that day. I was really upset because I got a lot of love and respect for Leroy. I felt like I let him down. I felt like let my whole team down. And that was just a lot to process. And I feel like I got way too excited about the racing part of that.
Getting into the most recent episode, you clearly did not want to go into elimination. So what was your reaction to getting voted in, especially after Ace did this big public story in front of everyone about how you'd go in and get his star?
Yeah, I wasn't expecting that. It just seemed a little out of character. I've just never seen Ace act like that, you know. It was just an interesting time. Tensions were very high. I was not happy to hear him say that. I felt like it was a very bold thing to say in that moment with the way the pressure was building in the house. Cara had spokne to me one-on-one about if I wanted to go in, and I thought that was a pretty friendly conversation where she was asking nicely, and I told her, especially because I hadn't been getting much sleep, that I was not looking to go in and get a star at that moment. And I respect their gameplay. I thought the communication was a little bit different, so I thought I might be okay. I was a little surprised. But then I tried to adapt the best I could.
I will say I was confident that I was going to come back after that elimination. That just didn't happen. I mean, you try to keep an open mind about what you might see when you walk into an elimination. And I feel like, for me, at least--I don't know if a lot of competitors would agree with me on this--when I'm training, I'm picturing going into Hall Brawl against someone twice my size.
You're not training to memorize a cheat code and enter it with your feet onto a giant controller.
100%, yes. Well said. I think that I need to remind myself moving forward that that's the game we're playing. And I feel like, statistically, you're more likely to get an elimination like I had than to get one of the traditional haymakers like Hall Brawl or Pole Wrestle. I mean, let's be honest, then the minute you think you're gonna get the controller, you're gonna go in there against CT in Hall Brawl and be like, "Oh my God, how do I pull this off?" [Laughs.] Not just pull out the win, but how are you gonna not get hurt? So I feel like there's so much anticipation, and there's so much excitement even trying to get prepared for an elimination, and then you show up to something like that. I tried to keep an open mind. And honestly, I've never done anything like that before in my life that I can remember, I can't even think of an elimination where I'm like, "It was kinda like this one." I was thrown off. I still tried to do my best, and it just wasn't my night for sure.
How different was this season socially for you? We saw in this last episode how nobody wanted to partner with you in trivia. And Cara voted you in because she felt that she couldn't rely on you to not keep her out of the bottom if she was partnered with you due to your previous performances.
Cara and I have never really played a close game, as far back as I can remember. She's kind of a bit of a wild card. I don't know exactly what her gameplay is. I feel like it shifts with the wind in the game. I don't really hold anything against her. But I don't know really how to play a good game with her. And I didn't know she was feeling quite like that. But I will say during the trivia, I might have shot myself in the foot a little bit. I remember saying, "Don't partner up with me for this." As we're walking up, it was trivia. And people are picking partners. And I'm like, "Oh, you don't want to partner up with me with this one, because I have a rough history with trivia."
There's so much pressure. You're either on the end of a building or you're about to get ripped off by a bungee cord over water, or whatever it may be. And I did make the mistake of saying that. That might have been a bad strategy, as opposed to just keeping a level head and reminding yourself the past is in the past, and that that doesn't have to predict your future. And I did a poor job of staying motivated when I saw that that portion of the game trivia is a little bit tricky for me. But what I'm going to do moving forward is just stay calm on trivia days and do my best to remind myself that the past doesn't have to be your future and do my best to learn from it. You know, I don't fully agree that I wasn't going to be a good partner. But I also see the data points I provided to also build that argument.
Well speaking of your future, what's interesting is that you went from this season into being a mercenary on Battle for a New Champion on the MTV flagship. How much did you mindset leaving this season affect your appearance there?
Oh my gosh, let me tell you this. So like I spoke about. Struggling with sleep a little bit, Mike, that the mercenary thing is way harder than I ever thought it was going to be. So I took a 16 hour flight, I get to Croatia. I didn't sleep on the flight at all. I thought I would. I actually took sleeping pills and still stayed up the whole flight. This is a true story. So that I'm like, "Okay, stay cool. We'll get some sleep in the hotel. We'll make this work." I get to my hotel room. The air conditioning in that particular room is not working. And I can't sleep when I'm hot. So I'm tossing and turning for like, two, three hours.
Then I finally went down to the front desk. And I said, "Listen, this is an important day, I got to get some sleep. "And they said, "Well, if you want, we can possibly move you into a room upstairs that might be a little cooler." The elevator, I can't remember if it was under repair, or if this hotel just didn't have one. It was a nice hotel, but it was older. So I would have to pack all my stuff back up into the suitcase and go up the stairs. And I said, "Do you know what? Just forget it. I'll do my best with this." I went a whole other night without sleeping.
So then I go into the elimination. Now I've gone two nights without sleeping. This is my third day. I thought I was having an out-of-body experience. I remember all I kept thinking to myself is, "We're going to do our best. And I just hope this doesn't look as bad as I feel." It looked every bit as bad as I felt. [Laughs.] I mean, honestly, I remember seeing that and being like, "Wow, that's how I felt." It was horrible. You could see my eyes were bloodshot. It just looked like my face was sunk. And I was on three days without sleeping for two nights, plus all the travel and airplane food for almost 24 hours.
It was one of the most difficult things I've ever gone through. And all I remember thinking is, "Wow, all the mercenaries that showed up in the past and really just showed up, I have so much more respect for them." I thought because you weren't living in the house, that it must be nice to train and come straight out of your fresh program at home and just go right in to do your best work. It was such a different experience for me. And I've just got a lot of respect for anybody that shows up and competes as a mercenary. It's difficult.
Finally, in honor of the infamous "[expletive] They Should Have Shown" episode of the old-school days of The Challenge, what's one moment from your time on the show that you wish you had made the edit?
Honestly, not really, man. That was a whole year ago. So it's kind of hard to relive a year because it just feels so long ago and so much has changed since then. But I will say that I don't really have a moment that stands out. But the experience as a whole, it was still a blessing. I was still grateful to be able to share that experience with the franchise and everybody on both sides of the camera, because I have so much love and respect for so many people on both sides. But God, I wish I could have done more.
I mean, looking back, I love this game. I love the people that love this game and the energy that comes with that centrifugal force. And I just felt like I wasn't adding much to it this season. I mean, the luging, I can't believe that didn't come up with the other interviews, Mike. I mean, that was one of my worst performances on a challenge that I could remember. And I can only hope that in the future, I perform much better. And hope to have much less furious seasons as well. I just remember the thoughts I had at the end of the night. I thought I was further along with processing the breakup. I thought it was further along with a couple of other smaller things I had going on at home that were just kind of coming to closure. And unfortunately, on those sleepless nights, they were kind of eating me alive and got the best of me. So I just hope to enjoy the moment more moving forward and remind myself that we never want to do another season like this again.
