'Wheel of Fortune' player wins $64,000 after he gets an easy 1-word puzzle in bonus round

“Wheel of Fortune” contestants know that the games on the show are more about luck, but they still come prepared to employ all their puzzle-solving skills. But some of them are blessed with more luck when the puzzles that they play for, especially in the bonus round, turn out to be as easy as they get. That’s the kind of surprise Rich Rinaldi got when he made it to the final round of the show.

He had done extremely well before he reached the bonus round, as he racked up an incredible $24,365 and a trip to Aruba until that point, according to a TV Insider report. Now, it was his chance to win big.

After the introductions were done, Seacrest got down to business and informed the contestant that he had a wild card that would give him an extra consonant to solve the puzzle after which he chose the ‘Places’ category for his game. As usual, the contestant was given R, S, T, L, N, and E to start with.

After those letters were added to the puzzle, it read, “___E__.” The contestant then opted for the letters B, G, H, O, and D. His choice was perfect as this revealed most of the puzzle and made it a walk in the park for the player. After the letters were displayed on the screen, the puzzle read, “G__EBO.” Rich looked at this and laughed out loud. Seacrest even had to interrupt him in case he answered too early out of excitement.

“Well hold on, let me go through all the spiel,” the host said and then it was his turn to answer. “Gazebo,” the contestant said with the utmost confidence and it turned out to be the correct answer. This meant that Rich had won $40,000 which took his grand total to an incredible $64,365. This was in addition to that trip to Aruba that he had won earlier in the show. It was such a wonderful experience for the contestant that he posted it to his LinkedIn profile as well.

“A personal update and break from my typical project management content… this Tuesday, March 18, I will be a contestant on hashtag#WheelOfFortune! It’s been a hashtag#bucketlist item for me, and I’m thankful to my fellow contestants, crew, and of course hosts for a fabulous experience,” the post read.

His friends and other users serenaded him in the comments section with messages congratulating the contestant. “Congrats man! I remember when you were on another game show years ago. This is freaking awesome,” one user commented. “Ooo. Can't wait to hear what fun anecdotal information they share about your life on the air. Hope you get to keep the name tag... Congrats!” added another.