The Traitors winner shares tips for triumphing in the show

The Traitors winner Hannah Byczkowski has advised this year’s contestants to “take your time, observe, be friends with everyone and make your presence very hard to be without”.

The psychological reality show, hosted by Claudia Winkleman, will return to BBC One on Wednesday night with a new batch of contestants hoping to win a game of deception and detection and take home £120,000.

Byczkowski, who shared the prize pot with Aaron Evans and Meryl Williams in the first series, said it will be a different experience for participants in the second instalment.

She told BBC Breakfast: “I think it’s going to be worse for them because they’re going to think they know what they’re letting themselves in for and be like, ‘I know the game’, but having been in it, the game is not as we remember it at all, it’s going to change.

“When I went in I desperately wanted to be a traitor. So when I found out I wasn’t going to be I was absolutely raging, I couldn’t believe it, I was annoyed. I had it in my head that, ‘I’m going to throw everyone under the bus, it’s going to be brilliant’.

“And then I realised I couldn’t so my game plan was then just not look for traitors, let somebody else do it. And I’ll just relax and enjoy myself.”

Sharing her tips on how to win the show, she said: “Small weeds and tall poppies get picked first so take your time, observe, be friends with everyone and make your presence very hard to be without”.

Byczkowski said the experience changed the way she lives her life, adding: “To go in and play a game for the length of time that we did, not many people get that experience.

“There was no, ‘What am I going to make for dinner? I’ve got to go get the shopping’.

“There was none of that kind of mundane part and I think it just made me realise that I just wanted to enjoy myself more and not take things too seriously.”

The line-up for the new series includes a British Army engineer, a retired teacher, an insurance broker who survived a near-death experience, a disability model, a sonographer and clairvoyant and a parliamentary affairs adviser.

– The Traitors returns on January 3 from 9pm on BBC One and BBC iPlayer, and episodes 2 and 3 will be available on iPlayer immediately afterwards.

The show will air on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday nights.