Kara Kay finished Survivor: David vs. Goliath in fourth place during Wednesday night's finale broadcast of Survivor Season 37 on CBS.

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Kara, a 30-year-old realtor from San Diego, CA, lost the $1 million grand prize to Nick Wilson, a 27-year-old public defender from Williamsburg, KY, who currently resides in London, KY.

Kara finished the game in fourth place after she lost the fire-starting challenge to Mike White, who ended up finishing as Survivor: David vs. Goliath's runner-up after the jury cast their votes.

"I'm proud for the Final 3 but disappointed it's not going to be me in there," Kara said following her elimination.

"But I'm taking my spot as the tenth juror very seriously and I'm proud of the game I played. I came out here to play as hard as I possibly could, and I know I did exactly that."

During an exclusive interview with Reality TV World on Thursday, Kara talked about her Survivor experience. Below is what she had to say.

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Reality TV World: Why did you cast your jury vote for Mike and would you have voted the same way had you been able to watch the entire season play out on TV first?

Kara Kay: Yes! Voting for Mike wasn't an easy decision. I went into it really open-minded. I assessed every single person's game because everyone's was so different.

But it was a little bit of a tossup between Mike and Nick, and the reason being, they both played the game I had set out to play.

Mike heavily relied on his social game, which in my opinion, is really hard to play because you have to switch gears depending on whom you're speaking with and being the main factor in decision-making, you can't really look that way or you'd be considered a target.

And Nick played a game where he won all of the immunities at the end, which I wanted to do too, while being a target along the way. But Nick won when he really needed it and it really counted.

So, I remember being really tossed up between the two, but I really remained open-minded about each person's game. The reason I voted for Mike in the end, it was a personal decision for me. He played a game I really respected and it was a hard game to play.

And in my opinion, it's kind of the age of Survivor where we have to be in this [dynamic] where you are making a decision but it's not known until it comes to light at the right time at Final Tribal.

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Reality TV World: When you were trying to convince Nick to take you to the end, you told him your game had been "plain Jane" and you kind of got dragged to the end. Did you think there was any truth to that or were you just lying so he'd take you to the Final 3? And if you had made it to the end, how would you have convinced the jury to vote for you?

Kara Kay: Of course I didn't truly believe I had done nothing. I will admit my game wasn't outwardly flashy; I never intended on playing that type of game. But of course you're going [to say that] when you're trying to make it to the Final 3.

Your argument always is, "You can win over me." That's the standard argument. There's just no way around that, so of course I was undercutting my game on purpose.

And I knew it was a good argument because Nick didn't know truly the relationship I had with each person who had gotten me to that point.

So it was kind of a soft sell, anyways. When it came down to it, I saw myself making fire and winning and adding that to my resume.

And at Final Tribal, I would say, "You know what? I was an underdog at certain points in the game, I managed to make myself higher each time. And now I got myself to the Final Tribal, firemaking."

So I simply wanted to be in the Final 3 and undercutted my game by saying that, but on the same token, I really did want to prove my way into it by competing in fire and getting that final docket I needed for votes to go my way.

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Reality TV World: What made you decide to not try and team up with Alison Raybould and vote off Mike? You were shown saying that you felt Mike was the biggest threat to win against anyone in the Final 3, so can you explain why the plan to vote out Mike fell through? Could you just not convince Nick or Angelina Keeley to join you?

Kara Kay: Sure, well Nick and I got together and talked about Alison and tried to figure out what would be the best.

And it just so happened, for both of our games, it was better for Alison to go -- the reason being, I liked the fact Mike and I had played such a similar game that I felt like at Final 3, I would have been able to explain my game over Mike's and been able to explain why different moves were more accredited to me than him.

It felt like both of us were in the backseat, kind of like trying to tell someone where to go. It was like, we didn't make the move, but it couldn't have been done without me type of thing. So I felt I had the best shot against Mike and Nick.

I thought I had a really strong shot against Mike, whereas with Alison, she was really good the entire time speaking up about herself to the point where the jury was considering her a threat over things that -- I mean, don't get me wrong, she played an awesome game and was a threat, but no one was entirely sure why.

That's because she was so good at highlighting the awesome parts of her game, and I knew her speaking at Final Tribal would have been really difficult for me to win over the votes.

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Reality TV World: Do you think Davie Rickenbacker would've won had he made it to the Final 3 with any combination of the Final 6 castaways?

Kara Kay: My gosh! Yes! I think Davie would've won if he made it to the end. Man, and that was why we had to -- there was a conversation I remember having with Angelina. We had to heavily rely on her vote and she was really passionate about taking Alison out.

"I was like, let's break it all the way down. If we make Final 3, Davie is well liked, he has found idols, he has played a very dynamic game. And up against him, we don't really have a shot."

So, I really believe it would've been quite the showdown had Nick and Davie been in the Final 3 together.

Reality TV World: You had a couple of tough breaks in the Survivor finale. Was it more difficult and emotional to lose the last Individual Immunity Challenge to Nick or the firestarting challenge to Mike? And why?

Kara Kay: I had tears while watching it back! (Laughs) But it was more heartbreaking to lose the Immunity Challenge. That's why I got so emotional, because I knew going into that challenge, I had to win that in order to have a shot at going to the Final 3.

That was the objective of my game the entire time. It was to have control over whom I sat next to. And when I saw that go away, the other three, they were in the former Jabeni tribe, so I knew I was going to fire regardless, which I was okay with.

But in that moment, my heart just realized, like, "Oh my gosh, it all came down to this moment, and I failed myself and I failed my game." So it was really heartbreaking.

The fire actually made me feel awesome because it was a second chance after I had failed. I knew I still had a chance to get to Final 3, not my desired Final 3, but I definitely had another shot to get in there.

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Reality TV World: How much of Nick's victory do you think had to do with his overall gameplay vs. the fact he was the last David standing? And do you think Mike being wealthy already was a factor in the jury not wanting to give him $1 million?

Kara Kay: Well, your identity out there in the game sort of goes out the door. And after 39 days out there on the island, sure it was David vs. Goliath, but the lines start to get blurred a little later than I think a lot of people wanted it to be.

So the David vs. Goliath thing... I don't think that was intentionally a factor in everyone's voting. I think everyone had enough respect for the game to voting for the person, not for how much money they have outside of the game.

It truly was, in my opinion, an objective vote on the person's heart whether it was a David or Goliath or you had money outside of the game or not.

It truly was about respecting gameplay and analyzing whom the winner should be and whom we'd be the most proud of. So, I think people did a really good job of separating it, regardless of what tribe you were on or what you had going on outside of the game.

To read more interviews with the Final 6 castaways of Survivor: David vs. Goliath, click here to visit our Survivor: David vs. Goliath show page.
About The Author: Steven Rogers

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