It has been a rather strange Sunday for me but I made it home just in time for the next installment of THE AMAZING RACE 14 and as I watch I compose this, my weekly Amazing Race blog.
Some changes in the appearance of the show include an updated theme song and some fantastic editing that allows you to watch two teams at a time with smooth transition from one scene to the next. It has
The first pit stop was in the Swiss Alps and the team in first place is MARGIE & LUKE, a mother and son team with Luke being the first ever contestant on The Amazing Race who is deaf.
Margie & Luke left at 2:45am, siblings Tammy & Victor at 2:47am, brothers Mark & Michael at 2:59, father and son Mel & Mike at 3:19am and dating couple Amanda & Kris at 3:47am. Married couple Brad & Victoria and the former Miami Dolphin Cheerleaders Jaime & Cara each left at 3:56am followed 6 minutes later by siblings Kisha & Jen. Then the married couple from Virginia left at 4:04am and the final team to leave was Christie & Jodi at 4:12am. So we have a 90 minutes spread in departure times from the pit-stop. But as usual for a middle of the night departure, the AMAZING RACE EQUALIZER as (I call it) could have come into play because of flight schedules.
Most teams made their airline reservations while traveling to the airport thanks to the use of borrowed cell phones from their taxi drivers. Teams first had to fly to Munich, Germany then drive themselves to the town of Ruhpolding and most teams were able to get on the earliest flight to Munich leaving at 7:15am. However MARK & MICHAEL did not call ahead to make their reservations and found themselves having to wait for a later flight along with last place team Christie & Jodi who did call ahead and discovered the early flight was booked so they already reserved the next available flight. Mark, Michael, Christie & Jodi were going to be at least an hour behind everyone else but they had an opportunity to catch up with everyone at the next task.
Once in Munich, teams drove Mercedes-Benz automobiles on the Autobahn to Ruhpolding and Tammy & Victor surged ahead to first place. Kisha & Jen got lost along the way. Once in Rupholding teams had to ride a cable car to the top of a 6000 foot mountain to locate their first clue, THE ROADBLOCK
The “roadblock” task had teams paraglide to the bottom of the mountain or if wind conditions were too severe, they could take a hour long hike down the mountain. For those who don’t know, the “roadblock” task is actually a task done by ONE of the team members. The other either waits or performs another task while meeting their partner at the end of the task.
The wind conditions were too severe for the paragliding so most teams chose to do the hike down the hill while MEL, who hurt his groin during the last leg decided to wait for the winds to calm. In doing so, all the other teams caught up and left to hike leaving Mel & Mike at the top of the hill.
Mel, who happens to be a former minister talked about praying for the wind to change and (possibly through creative editing) the wind did change so he was the only one who paraglided and landed in time to leave the roadblock in 5th place. Tammy hiked down the mountain and left the roadblock with her brother Victor in 1st place, a position they would maintain all day.
I was not surprised that the ONE team member to screw up during the roadblock would be LINDA, the whiny other half of Steve and the major reason I predicted their elimination for this round. She made a wrong turn along the marked hiking path, ended up on the other side of the mountain crying and a local woman kindly drove Linda back to the correct path. By then they were in last place.
Next was a 25 mile drive to the “detour” task choices of “Balancing Dolly” where teams would have to ride a SEGUE vehicle through a 2 mile obstacle course or “Austrian Folly” where team members would have to throw a pies into each other’s face until they discover a pie with a cherry filling. Can you say “food fight”? And those pies looked so good. If I were there, I wouldn’t want to throw anything. I’d want to chow down in that dessert wonderland.
After the “roadblock” teams had to run to a wood cutter who would saw a log and stamp the next clue onto the wood. That clue would send the teams to the next pit-stop which was a drive to a castle called the Schloss Hellbrunn
The first time to arrive at the pit-stop was TAMMY & VICTOR and for their arrival, they each won a hybrid go-cart.
SECOND: Mel & Mike
THIRD: Amanda & Kris
FOURTH: Margie & Luke
FIFTH: Brad & Victoria
And these teams arrived after dark
SIXTH: Jaime & Cara
SEVENTH: Kisha & Jen
EIGHTH: Mark & Michael
NINTH: Christie & Jodi
And I GOT A PREDICTION RIGHT EARLY IN THE RACE! Yes I am happy!
OH, the country bumpkins from rural Virginia, STEVE & LINDA were last and they were eliminated.
If anyone has ever read my Amazing Race blogs on MySpace, then you know I predict the elimination every week and I have usually a poor track record in making these predictions. But this one was easy to predict last week. Linda was in no way capable of doing this. All the Amazing Race was going to be for her and her husband Steve was a really cool vacation of a lifetime. I do hope they enjoyed it. I am also glad to have a major whiner like Linda eliminated EARLY.
I am starting to see the weaknesses in teams that I feel are ingredients for failure on The Amazing Race. Teams that bicker with each other or have where one partner is bossy over the other often don’t do well on the race. Their attitudes take away from good teamwork and distract them from their mission. With that I we saw a relationship struggle between the siblings Kisha & Jen. We also see this in the current first place team Tammy & Victor. In both cases, the older sibling appears to assume the dominant role which leaves the younger sibling having problems with it which turns into problems for the team. Tammy & Victor seem to be the stronger team physically and may make it very far in this race despite any developing relationship issues.
I often refer to teams by some not-so-nice nicknames for good reason. Sometimes those teams admit on the show that they play the part of that nickname. So if I call Christie & Jodi “blonde bimbos” for their performance on this week’s broadcast I believe I am quite accurate. They completely misunderstood the directions leading them to the wood cutter for their final clue. Part of that misunderstanding had them thinking they actually had to cut their own wood. So they remain in last place with what appears to be many hours to catch up.
With that, I make my prediction for next weeks elimination for CHRISTIE & JODI. We don’t know just how many hours behind they are from the rest of the teams but to be in last place with half of the teams having arrived at the pit-stop during daylight is not a good place to be. Being a couple of “blonde bimbos” making mistakes don’t help either. So again, I predict Christie & Jodi for next elimination.
The previews for next week’s broadcast indicate that one team loses their money and passports. This happened to a team last season and it proved to be a fatal mistake. But previews don’t always give any strong hints. So we will just have to see next week. And I will blog about it.
So see you next week, same Amazing Race time, same Amazing Race channel.
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