Sometimes it seems like techies are just taking over the world, doesn’t it? The latest cool example of this: Chris Cheng, the Google project manager who also happens to be an expert-level marksman, just took the grand prize on the History Channel’s popular reality TV sharpshooting competition show Top Shot.
TechCrunch TV talked to Cheng last month when there were still four episodes left until the finale, and you can watch that interview in the video embedded below. At that time, of course, filming was over and Cheng already knew he was the winner — but obviously, big legal contracts kept him mum until the finale episode aired last night. As the winner, Cheng receives $100,000 and a professional marksman contract with Bass Pro Shops.
Cheng, who lives in San Francisco and works at Google’s headquarters in Silicon Valley, was an unexpected Top Shot winner in lots of ways. The sharpshooting world is often thought of as the realm of people with experience in law enforcement or the military, or perhaps folks from rural areas where hunting is popular — not urban-dwelling IT professionals. But after beating out 17 other competitors over the course of a six-week-long filming cycle filled with some seriously daunting shooting challenges, Cheng may have finally shattered the stereotype of who can be an expert marksman for good. So, yay for “geeks”!
You can watch the finale episode on History.com right here, and embedded below is the second-to-last Top Shot episode (the finale has yet to be uploaded to Hulu):