EXCLUSIVE: The women speak out about the sisterhood and ‘respectful competitiveness’ on this year’s season.

The Golden Bachelor contestants spearheaded a new strategy in Tuesday night’s episode, with Lauren (right) describing it as ‘women supporting women’. Photos: Channel 9

With a new network, fresh host, and the highest ratings in years, The Bachelor franchise has well and truly entered its golden era with The Golden Bachelor. The Channel 9 reality show, which achieved a national audience of 749,000 for its premiere, has also introduced a major change to the longstanding format that’s been spearheaded entirely by the female contestants.

Tuesday night’s episode saw the women implement a strategy they called ‘permission to push’, where those who didn’t go on the group date were given priority to talk to Barry ‘Bear’ Myrden at the cocktail party. 60-year-old dressage team manager Lauren said in her piece-to-camera interview that the concept was all about “women supporting women”, and highlighted how different the reality show could be with mature-aged participants.

The show then aired a sweet montage of the women hyping one another up to speak with Bear and sacrificing their own time to allow for their co-stars to have a moment.

‘It’s a beautiful love story between the girls’

Lauren told Yahoo Lifestyle at Channel 9’s launch event on Monday that there was an incredibly strong sisterhood throughout filming, which has continued well beyond the show.

“I loved living with the girls, so much so that they come and visit and stay with me all the time now, so I’m at their place or they’re at my place and we speak daily,” she said.

“Elizete was in my bed the other day as we were watching The Block, the girls are flying down for Christmas, I fly up to them — we are close. We are seriously a family, so it’s a beautiful love story between the girls.”

Catherine (right) chose to ignore the ‘permission to push’ strategy and sought out extra time with Bear after the group date. Photo: Channel 9

Catherine speaks out about ‘respectful competitiveness’

One person who didn’t follow the ‘permission to push’ strategy, however, was 56-year-old interior designer Catherine.

Despite receiving a kiss on the group date, the mother of two whisked Bear away at the cocktail party to ask him about their developing connection — much to the annoyance of her co-stars.

Catherine, who turned to competitive bodybuilding following her divorce, explained to Yahoo Lifestyle at the launch event that there was definitely “respectful competitiveness” throughout filming.

“It’s like, ‘Well, I want this to happen, I want to make it happen’, and the other girls were like, ‘Okay, if that’s what you want, we support you one hundred per cent’,” she said.

“Once you share your stories and you bond as friends, you see that person and their beautiful talents and what they have to bring, and you don’t compete against that because that’s their own individual talent.

“So you’re cheering them on because you’ve heard their stories and you know who they are as individuals, so I think that was really, really important.”