Mara Lejins: meet The Chase Australia’s 27-year old ‘Smiling Assassin’

TV’s newest Chaser appreciates that at 27, she doesn’t know as much as the “other old, white males of the quizzing world”, but says she might know things that they don’t.

Aspiring The Chase Australia contestants shouldn’t be fooled by the sweet smile of the game show’s newest chaser, Mara Lejins.

The 27-year-old Elle Woods lookalike might be 10 years the junior of her colleagues, but she plays to win.

Lejins took on Australian quizzing royalty Brydon Coverdale, Issa Schultz, Matt Parkinson and Cheryl Toh in 2020 to win the $58,000 she needed for a new car.

The lawyer’s game was so good, they invited her to join their ranks.
As a kid, Lejins would memorise all the dates she learned in Horrible Histories books, and play Trivial Pursuit with her grandmother.

Mara Lejins is the newest chaser on The Chase Australia. She's a 27-year-old lawyer from Sydney. Supplied

Lejins bears a striking resemblance to the Elle Woods charcter played by Reese Witherspoon in Legally Blonde.

“By the time I got to university, I discovered pub quizzes and realised you could win things,” she said.

To stay in form, Lejins goes to pub trivia every Tuesday with friends, voraciously consumes newspapers, novels, and TikToks, “which I get flack for, but TikTok is so good.”

“I come off as nice and pleasant to deal with, but that doesn’t mean I’m not competitive. Some of the stereotypes around age aren’t wrong. I try not to roll my eyes when I get a 1980s music question, or anything about golf.”

But with a degree in International Relations, Lejins said she’ll be hard one to beat on geography, politics, and history. “Plus, like to think I have an advantage on present-day pop culture.”