player in the lead after this round won the game and returned as champion the next day, although all contestants kept what they had earned. Each contestant had a Citibank Visa account (later, they could choose a MasterCard) opened in their name before the show started and any money they won was deposited into that account. Contestants could also choose to receive their winnings in cash rather than open the account. Champions remained on the show until they were defeated. If only one contestant finished the second round with a positive total, he/she had the option to skip the Final Challenge. If he/she decided to play it, the category and questions were presented as before, and the contestant chose one at a time, made a wager, and answered. After each correct response, he/she could either end the round or take another question. The round ended when the contestant either played all three questions, gave an incorrect answer, or chose to stop. Ultimate Challenge The Challengers, like many game shows, employed a bonus round. The round was referred to as the Ultimate Challenge, and offered a prize of five figures to any champion who managed to beat it. Format #1 The initial Ultimate Challenge format saw the champion face a choice of two categories. Each category had three questions, which were asked in order based on difficulty. After each question, the champion was given five seconds to think about his/her answer before being prompted to give it. A wrong answer on any question ended the Ultimate Challenge and the champion won nothing extra. Outside of the pilot episode, where the winning contestant played the round, a champion had to win three games in order to play the Ultimate Challenge. Once this was done, the Ultimate Challenge would be played at the start of the next day’s program (to accommodate this, the first round would be abbreviated). Under this format, the Ultimate Challenge was played for an accumulating cash jackpot. Originally, the jackpot was started at $50,000 and was to go up by $5,000 for each time it was played and not won. Since the jackpot was not won on the pilot episode, the series began with it standing at $55,000. After two weeks of episodes, in which no champion had won the required three games to advance to the round, the rules were changed beginning with the episode airing on September