Amanda Khan

**Amanda Khan** was a contestant on Season 2.

## Background

*Retrieved from CBC.ca*

Studying to become a medical doctor is one thing, but Amanda is aiming for a second 'Doctor' title as well, undertaking both her medical degree and a doctorate of philosophy at the same time! A recipient of the Canada Vanier Scholarship, Amanda's work aims to make surgery safer — she's working on a new surgical tool that will allow surgeons to handle delicate tissues without crushing them, preventing unwanted complications and reducing the time patients spend in hospital. Sounds like more than enough for one mere mortal to handle, but in addition to her passion for medicine and philosophy, Amanda's an avid outdoors enthusiast no matter the season, enjoying everything from snowboarding to scuba diving. Sounds like her well-rounded smarts might make her a tough competitor to beat!

Amanda is a MD/PhD student completing both her Medical Degree (Faculty of Medicine) and her Doctorate of Philosophy (Biomedical Engineering, IBBME) concurrently at the University of Toronto.

Amanda is a recipient of the Canada Vanier Scholarship, which is awarded to world-class doctoral students – she is ranked eighth in Canada.

Amanda is working on making surgery safer. She is currently designing a new surgical tool that can give feedback to surgeons when they are handling tissues too roughly. With her tool, surgeons can know exactly how much force to handle delicate tissues with, without crushing them. This can prevent surgical complications and reduce the amount of time a patient stays in the hospital.

In her spare time Amanda loves to spend time outdoors, snowboarding, scuba diving and weightlifting.

## Episode 206

Before Amanda was summoned to the stage, a clip of her and the other three contestants, Margaret Fay, Marco Iannuzzi, and Permadi Witjaksono, introducing themselves was shown. In this clip, apart from introducing herself, Amanda stated that she wants girls to know that they can be leaders in any field. In the first challenge, Double Take, Amanda got 7 correct answers. As a result, Amanda finished in 1st place and was awarded 5 overall points.

In the second challenge, Twitterverse, Amanda was the first contestant to present her tweet based upon the theme of **blind date** and she had composed, "HORRIBLE LAUGHTER, POISON BREATH, TROUBLE HANGOVER. #SLOPPYBOOTY." Guest judge Dan Levy commented that if Amanda's hashtag wasn't hashtagged again that night, then something would be wrong. Dan ranked Amanda in 1st place for her tweet and Amanda was awarded 5 overall points as a result.

In the third challenge, Faces, Margaret, Marco, and Amanda all got 5 correct answers, but Marco answered faster on average than the other two did and Margaret answered faster on average than Amanda did. As a result, Amanda finished in 3rd place and was awarded 2 overall points. In the fourth challenge, Mix Master, Amanda earned 3 points. As a result, Amanda finished in 2nd place and was awarded 3 overall points.

In the fifth challenge, Balls of Fury, Amanda finished catching her red balls 1 minute and 15 seconds into the challenge and correctly completed her equation grid and finished 1 minute and 30 seconds into the challenge. As a result, Amanda finished in 3rd place and was awarded 4 overall points. After the first five challenges, Amanda had received a total of 19 overall points, which she shared with Margaret. The tie between Margaret and Amanda was settled by the number of times either contestant placed 1st in challenges. Since Amanda placed 1st in two challenges and Margaret placed 1st in one, the former finished in 2nd place and the latter finished in 3rd place. As a result, she was congratulated by Jessi, along with Marco, for qualifying for the Gauntlet.

In the sixth and final challenge, the Gauntlet, Amanda initially gained a slight lead over Marco as the former completed the linguistic section. However, after unscrambling his final word right after Amanda did, Marco was able to catch up to and surpass Amanda at the visual section and he widened his lead over her over the next couple of sections. At the physical section, Amanda, who was already behind Marco going into it, failed three times at transporting three bricks across her teeter-totter. Meanwhile, Marco had a flawless performance at the physical section and proceeded to the logical section, which he completed with some difficulty. Ultimately, Amanda stopped at the physical section as Marco hit the buzzer, which signalled his victory and his spot in the season finale. After the challenge ended and Marco was declared the sixth finalist of the season, Amanda and the other three contestants celebrated onstage with Jessi.

### Summary of Results

 5

  WON  This contestant won the final challenge and advanced to the finale.
  LOST  This contestant lost the final challenge and was eliminated from the competition.
  ELIMINATED  This contestant was already eliminated from the competition.
     This contestant qualified for the final challenge due to a sufficient total score.
     This contestant was eliminated from the competition due to an insufficient total score.
     Denotes a challenge that is based on linguistic intelligence.
     Denotes a challenge that is based on physical intelligence.
     Denotes a challenge that is based on musical intelligence.
     Denotes a challenge that is based on visual intelligence.
     Denotes a challenge that is based on social intelligence.
     Denotes a challenge that is based on logical intelligence.
### Notes

1. ↑ Despite sharing a total score of 19, Amanda placed 1st in two challenges and Margaret placed 1st in one. Therefore, Amanda and Margaret placed 2nd and 3rd, respectively, for the pre-Gauntlet phase of this preliminary episode and Amanda advanced to the Gauntlet along with Marco.
2. ↑ Despite sharing a total score of 5, Marco answered faster on average than both Margaret and Amanda did and Margaret answered faster on average than Amanda did in the challenge. Therefore, Marco, Margaret, and Amanda placed 1st, 2nd, and 3rd, respectively, for this challenge.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 http://web.archive.org/web/20151219211801/http://www.cbc.ca/smartestperson/participants/amanda
2. ↑ https://www.cbc.ca/smartestperson/blog/meet-episode-6-competitors