Andy Wood, Golden Road Aquatics Member, Appears on ‘Jeopardy!’ Tournament of Champions

Andy Wood has always loved “Jeopardy!” He tried out for the show’s teen tournament in 1993, but didn’t make it onto the show.

The Golden Road Aquatics member and U.S. Masters Swimmer gave it another try when Alex Trebek announced he had cancer in 2019 and the future of the show was in question. Wood wanted to try again.

“That lit a fire under me again and reminded me that this is a possible thing you can do,” Andy Wood said in a U.S. Masters Swimming story.

Wood made it onto the show and was a four-time champion, winning nearly $92,000. He then appeared on the show’s Tournament of Champions on Friday.

During his run on the show, Wood made it onto five episodes, all of which were taped in one day, he said. The normal procedure for “Jeopardy!” is to shoot a week’s worth of episodes over two days. All of Wood’s episodes were taped on Sept. 9, 2020, and aired Nov. 16–20.

The quick turnaround didn’t allow for downtime between episodes. For Wood, he’d win an episode, rush to the dressing room, throw on some new clothes, and be back in the studio ready to film the next one.

Although knowing trivia is of the utmost importance, what matters more is the buzzer, Wood said in the story.

“If you can’t get in, you’re screwed,” Wood said. “And you can’t really practice that.”

Andy Wood grew up in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and majored in electrical engineering at Cornell University, and after getting laid off from a consulting job, pursued a career in standup comedy. He also plays the guitar and joked that he’d use some of his “Jeopardy!” winnings to buy a new one. His skill set later led him to opportunities in TV writing and production in Los Angeles, specifically for science shows. He’s writing for the second season of the YouTube original “Could You Survive the Movies?” and “The Great Debate” on the Science Channel.