The Most Paused Tony Moment On Gold Rush

Discovery's gold mining reality show "Gold Rush" is about more than just the trials and tribulations of the gold mining profession. Rather, many of the miners that make up its core cast lacked significant experience in the trade prior to their TV stardom, meaning that a part of its appeal is witnessing relative newcomers navigate the ins and outs of a complex profession.

Season 2, however, introduces Tony Beets, who is far from an amateur, boasting decades of mining experience prior to his first appearance. Then, starting in Season 3, Tony becomes a core contributor to the series' ongoing gold mining drama (via IMDb), bringing both expertise and a colorful personality to "Gold Rush."

That said, Tony's personality has landed him in trouble on occasion. For example, Tony's crew once lit a large fire on a pond, only for him to have to pay a steep fine for pouring gasoline into a body of water. While his big blaze amounts to a spectacle equal parts impressive and inadvisable, an earlier and sillier moment, rather, is arguably the most paused and rewatched Tony scene from throughout his "Gold Rush" tenure.

In 2016, Discovery polled its viewers in order to determine fans' six favorite moments from throughout the first 100 episodes of "Gold Rush," and shared the results to its YouTube channel. One of the six winning moments comes shortly after Tony Beets' proper introduction into the main cast in Season 3. Parker Schnabel and his team are struggling to figure out how to go about determining where to find gold in their claim, and in response, Tony advises Parker to "drill holes, drill holes, drill holes."

While the advice is sound, its the simplicity and repetition that cement this moment as an all-time classic among fans. In fact, it seems to have stuck with the "Gold Rush" viewership to the extent that a Reddit user shared a photo of Tony to the "Gold Rush" subreddit with text of his iconic advice superimposed over it in December 2021, nearly 10 years after the episode in which he first said the line originally aired.

"Gold Rush" is more than 250 episodes long and counting (via IMDb) — not to mention the progenitor of countless spinoffs — so the fact that this single moment can persevere for so long goes to show that viewers are rewatching Tony's sage advice to this day.