The three week long nationwide search for would be contestants in this year’s edition of  Gulder Ultimate Search 7, will on Saturday, September 18, 2010 produce the top 10 finalists  who would eventually make it to the jungle to square up against one another in a bid to  become the Last Man Standing this year.

The final ten will be revealed at the final selection party holding at the Lagoon  Restaurant, Ozumba Mbadiwe, Victoria Island, Lagos. They are expected to be picked from a  total of 18 contestants who scaled through the regional selection concluded in Lagos last  week.

The journey for the search started on August 10, 2010, when the sponsoring brand, Gulder,  held a press conference to kick-start the highly celebrated Tv reality programme. The press  conference  also served as the media launch where a mock Gulder Ultimate Search was  conducted for the 50 journalists invited for the event.

The journalist that went home with the winning prize was Mr. Babatunde Akinboro, a reporter  from Africa Independent Television (AIT)

Gulder Ultimate Search 7 has been specially packaged in a way that all the 10 contestants  that emerge after the rigorous regional screening would go home with a winning prize, the  least of which is N450, 000 for the first evictee. The last man standing will smile home  with a winning prize of N7 million, a N10 million worth SUV and a wardrobe allowance of  N500,000.

To ensure fair participation from prospective youths across the nation, the country was  divided into four geographical zones namely, Abuja for the North zone, Benin for the South  South zone, Owerri for the East zone and Lagos for the West zone.

Admission, which was through a publicised web address, was free, as long as the applicants  met the set criteria among which were age, height, health, marital status and educational  qualification.

The regional screening, that started on September 1, 2010, came to an end in Lagos on  Friday, September 10, 2010. Screening activities, according to the Gulder Brand Manager, Mr.  Oluseun Lawal, included physical test through running, squatting, swimming, mental alertness  and medical fitness.

At the end, Lawal says, “out of the over  fifty thousand young, athletic Nigerian men and  women who entered for the programme from across the country, 41 of them have made it to the  final screening which comes up at a final selection party in Lagos on Saturday, September  18, 2010.”

The 10 finalists, will be taken to the undulating plains of the Ogun State Forestry  Plantation Project, Area J4, Omo Forest Reserve in Ijebu East LGA, Ogun State to search for  the missing ultimate treasure. “Only these League of Ultimate men and women will enter this  forest so dense even sunlight struggles to permeate. These men and  ladies will battle  against nature and the wild. At the end, one of them who finds the missing treasure will be  crowned ‘THE ULTIMATE HERO’,” said Yusuf Ageni, Nigerian Breweries Corporate Affairs  Adviser..

The maiden edition of the Gulder Ultimate Search was held in 2004  on Snake Island in Lagos  State . The second edition in 2005 was at the Obudu Hills, in Cross River State . Nifor in  Benin , Edo State , played host to the third edition in 2006. The fourth edition was held in  2007 at the famous Sheri Hills in Jos, Plateau State . Awgu Hills in Enugu State was host to  the fifth edition in 2008, while the sixth edition in 2009 brought out the tourism potential  in Omodo forest in Osun State .

In May this year, the Gulder brand came up with the celebrity edition of the Gulder Ultimate  Search which was held at the La Campagne Tropicana Resort, in Ajah, Lagos.The winner was  Emeka Ike,a celebrated Nollywood actor.