after a day's rest, the winner of the elimination challenges moves on to face the skullbuster, a 1/2-mile-long obstacle course with ten obstacles. some of the obstacles are identified as "restart elements"; if the contestant fails to complete one of these satisfactorily, he/she must return to its beginning for another attempt. if at any time the contestant decides not to continue, the current champion wins by default. the skullbuster has been modified at the beginning of each season after the first, and the previous season's champion is given the first opportunity to run it and set the time for future contestants to beat.