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Nurys reveals where she stands with Jay, Olivia, Horacio and more after The Challenge season 39

The finalist gets emotional while giving an update on all her major relationships after that tumultuous season.

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Published on February 22, 2024 07:30PM EST

Warning: This article contains spoilers for the season finale of The Challenge: Battle for a New Champion.

Nurys Mateo didn't win The Challenge: Battle for a New Champion, but as the first place woman to cross the finish line after Emanuel Neagu, many fans consider her to be the people's champion of the season — especially after the emotional roller coaster she endured at the hands of her former "best friends."

Nurys began season 39 tightly aligned with fellow cast members Jay Starrett, Olivia Kaiser, and Moriah Jadea, but a fledgling romance with Horacio Gutiérrez Jr. and new friendship with Kyland Young caused her former allies to work against her, gleefully putting her in tough situations like having to choose between her friends or her showmance. Ultimately, she was forced to eliminate Horacio, Kyland, Olivia, and Moriah, as well as rethink all her relationships now that she's re-lived the entire season by watching it on TV.

Nurys Mateo from The Challenge season 39 — MTV

"Sorry, I can't believe I'm being such a crybaby," Nurys tells EW while wiping away tears over zoom. "I doubt myself a lot. But then I also love my friends, and I think the hardest part was realizing that people really aren't your friends." Thinking back to the beginning of season 39, she knows exactly what she would tell her past self, adding tearfully: "Do not trust anybody."

"You would think eight months later I would be over it," she says. "But I'm really not because I really do value my friendships. I can genuinely say this was my fourth TV show and my closest friends that I have now are people that I've met from these TV shows."

She points to her roommate and best friend Diandra "Didi" Delgado who she met (and initially had beef with in a love triangle) on Are You the One, or Nelson Thomas who was originally her ex on Ex on the Beach before ultimately becoming her ride or die last season. But she says what happened over the course of this season, with those who turned on her, has really impacted her emotionally.

"I always thought that my friends saw me in the same light that I saw them, and I guess I was wrong," she says. "I guess I was fooled. And I'm consistently now battling, 'don't trust anybody.' Even in life in just so many different aspects now, I'm consistently weary and like worried about other people. And I hate that, and I hate that they did that, because I was fine until people did those things."

She adds that watching all the episodes this season has been eye-opening because she wasn't even aware of the worst of it in the moment. "I experienced what I experienced on the show, but then you watch it back and then you see the behind the scenes stuff too, and it's just like a slap in the face," she says. "It does suck. Especially for the people that you really loved — I really did love Olivia. I really considered her a best friend, and I guess that's not what she's seen me so it sucks."

As for where she stands with everyone now, Nurys isn't holding anything back. "With Jay, there's no friendship at all," she reveals. "He was on a power trip, and I'm seeing the fact that he used me just to hurt me, not necessarily for the game because he could have gotten the same exact outcome without hurting me, but he chose that opportunity to hurt me and to make me make a hard decision. And I don't like feeling like I was manipulated or used."

Nurys says that Jay also didn't reach out to apologize until only a week before they filmed the reunion, which didn't help his case. "It's very hard for me to feel like it's a genuine apology when you're only apologizing because you're about to see me and you know I'm going to rip you a new one," she adds.

Her journey with Moriah has gone a little differently. "We [were] told that we made it to the final on a Friday and then we didn't start the final until Tuesday, so we had a few days in the house and she no longer had James," Nurys says. "So she finally felt like, 'I can be Nurys' friend again,' I guess, [so] we kind of rekindled a friendship and became close."

"She has been someone who has consistently reached out and has cared, so I have forgiven her," Nurys explains. "But watching it back has made it very, very hard, because I've already forgiven her and I don't ever want to take back that forgiveness because of what I [have] seen. I will say I have been very disappointed watching because me and her were essentially in the same place — we had these romances — but I still cared about her a lot and I never would have jeopardized her game or would have ever told anybody to pick Horacio over her, so watching it back and seeing that she cared more about a guy that was essentially a temporary guy over a real friendship, I was like 'Geez, you are all slimy. None of you actually care about your friendships.'"

But Nurys is dedicated to remaining friends with Moriah despite what she's seen on TV. "I have been battling with that because there are times where I feel like maybe she doesn't deserve my friendship either. And then there's Olivia."

Nurys lets out a deep sigh before continuing. "Olivia is another one that didn't apologize to me at all until the reunion. Never reached out. For someone that says that she cared about me and missed me and was so sorry and feeling so much remorse, she never reached out once."

Multiple people kept telling Nurys how sorry Olivia felt after the season ended, but she says that never hearing it directly from Olivia didn't help the situation. "I'm the one person that she should have been talking to," Nurys says. "Then we get to the reunion and I hear her out because I have no choice but to hear her out. After the reunion, I will say she continued to reach out which I thought was big of her and I was like 'Wow, that's nice that you're finally giving me the effort.'"

Nurys reveals that Olivia invited her to lunch to further talk things through while visiting Los Angeles, which Nurys was "willing to do that." But things changed drastically after Olivia released an episode of her podcast discussing her friendships with Nurys and Horacio and what happened throughout the season. "I feel embarrassed now that I was actually really considering forgiving her because I'm a very forgiving person and her efforts aren't going unnoticed," Nurys says. "But in her podcast, she downplays her friendship with Horacio, which actually really bothered me because he is a great guy, a great friend, and he actually did see her as a real friend. Yeah, they were not real ride or dies going into Ride or Dies, but they experienced everything together, went through these traumatic events, and they had a great friendship and he went to her house maybe once a month."

Nurys wonders if Olivia was trying to downplay the friendship with Horacio to validate her actions over the course of the season. But what really hurt her was how Olivia downplayed her friendship with Nurys as well. "She goes on to say that me and her were never even really best friends, that all we ever talked about was The Challenge, and that's so far from the truth," she says. "It was hurtful because how are you sitting here messaging me, telling the world that you miss me, telling the world that I was your best friend, and that you're so sorry, but then you go on your podcast, your opportunity to actually be very honest and just admit that you were wrong, but she took the opportunity to downplay my friendship as well. I did consider her to be a best friend and she more so made it seem as if I was a work friend, and that was a slap in the face."

Nurys reached out to Olivia as soon as she listened to the podcast. "I texted her, 'I want to let you know I do not forgive you. I will never be your friend. You don't value me as a friend. You're not someone that I could consider having in my life again,'" she says. "Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me, and I will be damned if I allow anybody into my life that doesn't deserve to be in it. That's where I stand with her now. I don't hate her at all. But I absolutely would never be her friend again."

As for Horacio, they turned their showmance into a real relationship after filming ended. "We're actually here together, he's just outside now — we're in Big Bear on a ski trip," she says. "We are amazing. Unofficially, we've been together for nine months. But officially, six months together from when he asked me to be his girlfriend."

She adds that they are "going strong," with plans to move in together by the end of the year. "We're not trying to rush anything but he lives in Texas, I live in LA, so we definitely are trying to figure that out," she says. "And, I mean, no pressure to him, but I'm like, 'Can you put a ring on it within like the next year please?'" She laughs as she adds, "I've never felt like this in my entire life, I have never felt like this towards anybody. And vice versa with him with me. He's the one. I'm excited to see what the future holds."

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

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