Izel Bitcherzina

**Izel Montés** was a male contestant that competed on ***The Royalty Challenge***. He first appeared on the fifth season, The Royalty Challenge: Cold Zone, where he was the twelfth eliminated; placing in 7th place. He was also awarded Rookie of the Season.

In **Cold Zone**, Izel joined the game mostly getting close to the younger players on the cast; including Sierra Castillo and Sylvia Riah. After all of them survived the first round, they formed an alliance called Icons Of STC with Mariah Neveraz. However, the four of them as an alliance were short-lived when they were blindsided by Mariah being voted into elimination by the majority in Round 2. Izel instantly suspected that there was majority alliance including a chunk of the Veteran players and began to closely watch them. He started joining voice calls frequently to observe their behaviour and make them feel good with him. After losing Mariah in Round 2 and Sylvia becoming a target in Round 3, Izel joined Sylvia's alliance The Skinnier Legends with them, Devin Tauruan, James X and Sierra in hopes of saving Sylvia. Izel and his allies attempted to swap the target onto duo Danielle George/Ryan Matthew; but the plan failed and Sylvia was sent into elimination again. Getting frustrated about being put on teams who were putting in little effort, Izel falsely suspected Caoimhe Mulcahy threw their challenge in Round 4. With Sierra being voted into elimination and their new connection with James, Izel and Sylvia managed to avoid being on the bottom of the chain and were left cheering for their ally in elimination. With Sierra winning her elimination and the announcement of a purge, Izel was finally able to prove his physical capabilities by winning the purge challenge. With his alliance being the house targets, Izel found himself in his first elimination during Round 6 when everyone on the winning team other than Sylvia voted him into elimination.

Being vocal about how he sees Devin playing everyone and different sides of the house, word travelled back to Devin who began to target Izel. Devin labelled him fake and spread it to other players, such as Danielle/Ryan, to turn them against him. With Danielle being sent into elimination, she jumped on call and called Izel fake. Izel explained that his comments regarding them were that he liked them as people, but in the terms of the game he didn't care for them as they didn't have a working relationship. Despite the tension, Izel remained calm and managed to pull off his first elimination win of the season. Picking Sylvia to be on his team and getting Sierra assigned to them, they teamed up with Zaire Langill in the Outsiders alliance; planning to have Zaire to throw the daily to their team so they could make a move against the power players. Getting a lot of the earlier points, Izel and his allies took out Caoimhe/Dorian Washington/Remi Rowan from the challenge; leading to a heated confrontation between the two alliances. Izel managed to remain calm and reminded everyone that they are just playing a game. Despite great efforts, Zaire changed her mind about throwing and won the challenge for her team. With Sierra already in elimination, Izel was left unpicked and pulled the double block. Deciding to take the opportunity of calling-out a power player, he pulled Devin into the elimination with him and Sierra and managed to secure his second elimination win by defeating them. Once again picking Sylvia to join his team in Round 7, the pair won the daily challenge and took the shot to send Ryan into elimination. Izel began to suspect James of playing both sides of the house and acting as a messiah to the younger players in order to keep himself safe. Proving himself as a more well-rounded player compared to Sylvia, Izel was once again targeted once he lost the daily challenge in Round 8; and got confirmation about James' game when he voted him in. In his third elimination against Fergus Crowe, Izel was unable to pull-off the win and was eliminated from the game.

## **Trivia**

* Izel was one of the two players to become 'The Icelated' more than once on **Cold Zone**.
	+ He was the only male challenger to have this happen.
* Izel was the first player to receive an award as a non-finalist.
	+ He is also the the first non-finalist to bank money outside finalists.
* Izel is tied for entering the most eliminations in **Cold Zone** with 3.
	+ He has also the most elimination wins for a male challenger on this season.