Hosted by Bart De Pauw and Tom Lenaerts viewers were shown three video reports about three different topics.

The people in the studio and viewers at home had to vote whether they believed each individual video to be real or staged.

At the time Schalkse Ruiters was notorious for their sensational reports, unpredictable atmosphere and enjoyable comedy.

The final episode of the first season, when managing director of the Vlaamse Radio-en Televisieomroep (Flemish Public Radio and Television) Bert De Graeve was their guest, was watched by 2.166 million people.

The show also started with images of De Pauw and Lenaerts riding horses through a green field while soundtrack music from the film Flight of the Intruder by Basil Poledouris was playing.

That's why each episode showed three reports about which their special guest, the studio audience and the viewers at home had to guess whether they were real or fake.

The studio audience (named Klein Vlaanderen (Small Flanders) by them always received a few seconds time to vote.

When this was over, usually around 22.30h, the second part followed in which the correct answers were announced and which viewer at home won the full-screen television set that episode.

Schalkse Ruiters started in December 1996 on TV1 (nowadays Eén) and starred Bart De Pauw and Tom Lenaerts as hosts.

Since both men were relatively unknown TV stars Schalkse Ruiters only reached a small number of viewers.

At a certain point the city council decided to name one of their new streets Koekoekstraat and painted a door with house number 70 on the wall.