A winner was crowned on Season 4 of The Floor after a wild battle. One hundred people started on the floor, and only one took home $250,000 — Ashley Washubrn from Illinois.
The Floor, hosted by Rob Lowe, has 100 contestants standing in an LED square on the floor. They all have an expert category, in which they face off against other contestants
This season had a few twists that put a wrench in some contestants’ plans. Along with the time boosts, which appeared in previous seasons, contestants had the chance to swap their category with another player after winning three duels. There was also the golden square, in which, when it was battled, the winner received an extra $10,000.
Season 4 was themed “America Duels,” which had two people from each state on the floor. Illinois came out victorious. The game show was renewed for Season 5, but it is unclear if it will have a theme.
Typically, whoever wins the most duels in one episode walks away with $20,000, but in the premiere episode, the amount was $40,000.
The final duel came down to Ashley and Josh, who was next to her on the floor the whole time. They had to verse each other in a best-of-three duel. Ashley won after two, winning “Ancient Greece” and “Sportscasters.”
TV Insider talked to Ashley Washburn about her win, the twists, plans for her winnings, and more.
Lorraine O’Sullivan / FOX
TVI: Congrats on your win. Has it sunk in yet?
Ashley Washburn: Not at all, but thank you so much.
What originally made you want to audition for The Floor in particular?
Well, I was watching it with my friends, and I just thought I’d be really good at it. Actually, the particular category was the Taylor Swift one last season, and I was like, “Man, I would crush that.” So, I looked up the show, and they were casting, so I auditioned.
Your original category was witchcraft. Do you consider yourself an expert in that?
I didn’t think so at the time, really. But actually, after I thought about it, I was like, this actually makes a lot of sense for me. I got really into everyone, had a new hobby in 2020, and my hobby was looking into witchy stuff. So I got into reading Tarot cards through that. And then, naturally, you just kind of go down the rabbit hole.
This season had a few new twists, like the category swap, time boost, and golden square. Which one of them do you think was the most useful?
For me, personally, was the time boost. I lasted a while, but I really thought the use of the category steal was really interesting because we only really saw it used like the first way you think of it, where you just take someone’s category a couple of times, we also saw it used offensively to swap into someone and play them in a category you actually wanted to play, which was really interesting, and not something I would have thought of. I don’t think in the moment, but to watch other people use it that way was really cool, and it added a new level of strategy for the game. That was really fun.
It was also a battle of the states this season. Do you think that was harder, because maybe you didn’t want to take out your other opponent for the states? Do you think people were gunning for their other states? What was the experience like with that?
Yeah, there was a sense that you wanted your state to make it. So, I would have really loved to play us stadiums, which was the other Illinois person, because I’m a big sports fan. But then, when I was like, “Oh, you’re also in Illinois, maybe I should do something else.” Maybe reconsider what I was going to do, because even if we didn’t have an alliance or anything. I did want to see him succeed. So I do think it added that level of like a friend on the floor automatically.
Did you have a strategy going in, and did it change as the green game progressed?
My only strategy was always going to be to try to get a time boost because I wanted to play aggressively. So my strategy was always changing, because the floor was changing around me really fast. But my strategy it was not only like, what categories I was going to play would change, but I always wanted to play three in a row. I did have that strategy of “I want to try to get a time boost no matter what happened.” But yeah, I would say my route to getting there changed almost every single time the whale changed hands.
How did you study initially, and then how did you study as the game went on?
Before it all started, I really only studied the more finite categories, so the state nicknames, the state flowers, bones, the stuff that was really straightforward. I studied those beforehand, but because I didn’t know where I was going to be on the floor, I didn’t really put a lot of time into studying other things. I brushed up on my own category, and then I would change what I was going to study based on what I was going into the next day. And I would try to mimic the floor as much as possible. So I would create slideshows of an image, and it’s blank, and then the next one would have the answer, so I could flip through that in hair and makeup and in the green room
You had Ancient Greece for a really long time, which just seemed like no one wanted to touch since you were the last one on the floor in the finals. You also had the time boost. Do you think that they were more intimidated by the category or the time boost?
I do think the time boost really amped it up, because there were a couple of people, like Jonathan at one time wanted to play Ancient Greece, and then Jacob also made it very clear he would have played me in Ancient Greece if I didn’t have extra time. So I think while it definitely was the topic that kept some people away, there were other people who would have been interested in playing it if I didn’t have that extra advantage. So I do think the time boost, ultimately was my savior, my protector, if you will.
You had kind of made a little deal with Josh. But did you actually want to go up against him in the end, or would you rather go up against Nicole?
I really did want it to be me and Josh in the end, because I just thought that would be so fun. We were sitting next to each other the whole game. He was square 88, and I was square 89, so we really did create a good friendship, and I really thought of him as someone who was a very good competitor, so I wanted him to get far in the game. And I know that he only played once in the beginning, but just standing next to him and listening to him play along with the duels on the floor and the way he talked about the game, I knew that he was going to be a strong competitor, and if I was going to win, I wanted to win against someone like that, not that Nicole wasn’t, but I just knew Josh better. So I did really want him to go far, and I thought it would be fun for it to be us in the final duel.
You had to do Ancient Greece and Sportscasters in the final duel, neither were your original category, but you did tell your competitors that you watch sports. Were you totally confident in them? Or were you nervous for those categories?
I was not nervous about Ancient Greece at all. I didn’t study it really at all. I brushed up on names for pottery because I thought maybe those would come up, and they do have technical names. So I brushed up on those, but I didn’t study anything else related to Ancient Greece. And then with sportscasters, I’d actually spent probably the most time studying that category in the last couple of days, because it was really clear that no one wanted to play him in that, so I thought there was a good chance that one would go pretty far, and if I somehow got pulled into the middle in the finale, I knew that sportscasters was a good chance for me to get a win, even if Tim still had it, I would have tried to play him. A couple of other categories I had played up to that point were also people recognizing a face and saying someone’s name, which I think is one of my strong suits. So, sportscasters was something I did want to play. I felt bad after the fact because Nicole had it, and Rob was like, “Oh, no one wants to play sportscasters,” trying to make her feel better. I want to play sportscasters. And I was like, “oh, sorry, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to scoop her,” but yeah, I did really want to play that category.
And it seemed like you had the easier ones, too. It felt like you had ones that were almost ex-players that everybody knew.
Yeah, it was. I knew that Josh didn’t know sportscasters. That was at the beginning of the episode, we talked about what categories we wanted to see go. My number one, I wanted the Beatles songs to be gone, because I knew as long as Jacob had Beatles songs, I did not want to deal with that. I wanted that one to go, and he really wanted Sportsmasters to be gone. So, once it got down to that point, I knew whether it was Nicole or Josh, that I had a pretty strong chance of winning based on those two.
Was there any category that you really, really didn’t want to do?
I really didn’t want to play Harry Potter. I’ve never read or seen any Harry Potter, and people are so crazy about Harry Potter. There is no amount of studying I could have done to get to the level of someone who has just loved it for so long. I was like, “I need this category to go away. Get it away from me.”
That’s tough to learn in a couple of days. There’s so much involved in that.
Yeah, crazy. That’s how I felt about Beatles songs, that same way. I’m like, if people who love the Beatles, this is second nature. It’d be like, if I had Taylor Swift songs. No one would be able to touch me in that, because it would just be second nature. I didn’t want to deal with anything like that, where I was like, “You’re such a fan of something, you’re just way above everyone else, even if I spent hours studying this.”
Do you have any fun plans for your winnings?
Oh, goodness, I’ve thought of a million things, but I am a huge hockey fan, and my family is a hockey family, so I do have plans to surprise them for Christmas. I am renting a suite at the hockey game, so that’s my plan. My immediate plan with it is I’m going to take my family to a hockey game, and we’re all going to get to go watch it together, and the kids get to go and have fun. But that’s my immediate plans with it. But I did tell production that if I won, I wanted to go to Greece, and I do mean that it takes a little more planning, but I want to go.
What advice would you give to future contestants?
I told the people this on the show, the time we were filming, but there’s nothing better you can do for yourself on this show than believe that you have a chance. Being intimidated or scared, or nervous about something is only going to set you back in the competition. If you are not the person who’s going to believe in yourself or back your own chances, you’re already at a disadvantage when you get up there. So playing with confidence and trusting your gut on things, I think, is the most important. So if your gut is telling you “I’m not ready to play again,” go back to the floor. And if your gut’s telling you, “I think I could do really well with that,” just try. Just go for it. I don’t think you can ever regret going for it, because sometimes it works out.
After winning this, is there any other game shows that you want to be on?
My great-grandma would love it if I went on Jeopardy!. I would really want to do something more, because the social aspect of the floor was really, it’s something you don’t see, but it’s a huge aspect of the behind the scenes. It’s the way you’re interacting with other players, and the things you’re revealing to them or not revealing to them. So I think The Traitors would be so fun, and I know they’re about to do a civilian season, so yes, I need to get in on that
You just kind of mentioned it, but what is something about the filming process, or something about the show that fans don’t see, that you think would shock them?
I think people are surprised when the contestants seem close or really friendly. They’re like, “Oh, you’re just being dramatic. That’s not your friend.” And you are in a really close space for hours and hours upon hours every day, and you’re seeing each other all the time. You’re in the same hotel, you’re on the same bus, you’re next to each other at lunch and dinner. I think that there is a genuine friendship and relationship that builds through that, but it also is very, I don’t want to say manipulative, but people get very strategic about how they go about doing that. Some people were there to really make friends, but Jacob and I would joke after the show that he tried really hard to be my friend, and I would not be his friend because he was on Survivor, and I was like, “I don’t trust you. You might act like you have to be my friend, but I don’t trust you. I don’t want to talk to you, I don’t want to tell you anything.” And I always felt like even he was just trying to get to know me. But, there’s an agenda. I don’t know. I’m not falling for it. So I think that fans would genuinely be surprised by the friendships and the social game that’s happening behind the scenes. I think that they think the show is like trying to exaggerate it, but it’s way worse than they even think
There are a lot of people from Survivor, we saw American Idol, a couple of other shows like that. Do you think that makes it harder going in knowing their shows, you know, how those people kind of play?
Yeah, Matt is one of my very good friends after the show, but he got popular online because he was on The Circle on Netflix, and he was just saying the other day, when he was on The Circle, he sold out his closest friends for a chance to win. So then I’ve seen Matt play The Circle, or I’ve seen Jacob on Survivor, and you always have that in the back of your head, even though they’re both very sweet and genuine people. So I think there is that level of “I already know you, and I already have seen what you’re willing to do to get ahead somewhere.” So there is that little bit of a disadvantage, I think, for those people who are coming in and have already played a game, and everyone knows them, but it was fun.
The Floor, Season 4, now streaming, Hulu
