Brittain Bancroft

**Brittain Bancroft** was a contestant on Season 3.

## Background

*Retrieved from CBC.ca*

Brittain is a goofy, friendly dad from the East Coast. After studying to become a corrections officer, he decided to change gears to pursue a career as a mechanic despite no training in the field. He rose to be one of the top-performing members of his graduating class with some of his College’s highest grades.

Being a hands-on dad to his young daughter means most of Brittain’s downtime is spent reading with her and occasionally playing with My Little Ponies. When he gets the chance he loves to camp and spend time outdoors with his family.

Brittain believes that the trades are currently underemphasized in the education system. He hopes that by a mechanic appearing, and maybe even winning, on Canada’s Smartest Person, he can help show that people who choose careers in the trades are smart!

## Episode 304

As Brittain entered the stage with his competitors, a clip of him and the other five contestants, Siera Bearchell, Darryl Gidyk, Devon Jones, Bruce Tsuji, and Michelle Zakrison, introducing themselves was shown. In this clip, Brittain claimed that he is an underdog but that, whatever he plays, he plays to win. In the first challenge, the Speed Round, Brittain received an overall percentage score of 54%. As a result, Brittain finished in 3rd place and was awarded 2 overall points.

With the first challenge and the resulting double elimination out of the way, a more elaborate clip presenting Devon, Bruce, Brittain, and Michelle in that order was shown. In this clip, Brittain stated that he is proud of being a dad, of being a mechanic, and of the path that he took to get there, which included being the valedictorian of his class. In the second challenge, CSP News, Brittain identified 4 correct words in the first round, 5 in the second round, and 5 in the final round. With a total of 14 correct words, Brittain finished in 1st place and was awarded 5 overall points.

In the third challenge, Mix Master, Brittain and Michelle both earned 3 points, but the latter answered faster on average than the former did. As a result, Brittain finished in 2nd place and was awarded 3 overall points.

In the fourth challenge, Gear Head, Brittain correctly assembled his blue gears 26 seconds into the challenge, correctly assembled his red gears 1 minute and 3 seconds into the challenge, and correctly assembled his green gears and triggered his whistle 1 minute and 25 seconds into the challenge. As a result, Brittain finished in 1st place and was awarded 10 overall points. After the first four challenges, Brittain had received a total of 20 overall points. As a result, he finished in 1st place and was congratulated by Jessi, along with Devon, for qualifying for the Gauntlet.

In the fifth and final challenge, the Gauntlet, Devon was the first to complete the physical section and thus maintained a slight lead over Brittain over the next few sections. However, Brittain managed to overtake Devon at the second gate at the musical section. Though Devon managed to get past said second gate herself soon after, it was too late as Brittain went on to complete the linguistic section. Ultimately, Devon stopped at the musical section as Brittain hit the buzzer, which signalled his victory and his spot in the season finale. After the challenge ended and Brittain was declared the fourth finalist of the season, Devon and Brittain celebrated onstage with Jessi.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 https://www.cbc.ca/smartestperson/participants/brittain