'The Amazing Race' speed-cap: Water torture
We actually guessed which team was going home based on the talking-head interviews at the beginning. That never happens!
But before that…
Detour
The choices: Pick a Pearl (contestants must dive, out in open water, to retrieve strings of oysters and retrieve two red pearls) vs. Take a Trunk (unpack a picnic lunch underwater, wearing dive helmets that look like TVs).
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Our favorite moment of the Detour was actually Phil Keoghan wearing the TV helmet while demonstrating the Take a Trunk task, and as Detours go, it was fairly easy for everyone -- except the doctors, who struggle with Pick a Pearl, want to switch, decide not to, then decide they'd better quit Pick a Pearl before one of them drowns. Everyone mostly exclaims over how cool Take a Trunk is (and it is; there's even an underwater concierge in a tux to give teams their next clue).
The BFFs flail a little bit during Pick a Pearl, accompanied by humorous clarinets, but they REALLY flail when trying to get to the Roadblock, jet-skiing in circles for a very long time without thinking to check the map.
Roadblock
A team member has to get up on stilts and kick a coconut about thirty yards over a finish line. Phil is once again the highlight when he cheerily notes that "once their nut rolls over the line," teams can head to the pit stop.
Most teams do fine with the task, but the late-arriving BFFs run into trouble when Pam gets a blister and bleeds all over the stilts, and newlywed Katie isn't very supportive of Max as he falls off…maybe twice? The humorous piccolos aren't so sure about their decision to do the Race as their honeymoon.
The Finish Line
The hockey brothers come in first, followed by the father/son team. It's unclear how much farther the father/son combo will be going, though, because on the run to the mat, dad Dave pulls up lame. He says he's ruptured his Achilles, and if that's true, he's likely out of the Race.
Twin doctors Idries and Jamil finish last, but in classy style, playing hard to the end. Too bad they let their pre-fear of water do them in.
Drama
Not much yet, just a few intra-team snappish moments -- but Dave's injury may jeopardize the Second Express Pass Alliance. (Someone, please find us a catchier name for that.) Dating couple Jessica and John offer up a variation on "we're not here to make friends" and say they don't know what's going to become of that second Pass if Dave and Connor have to drop out.
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The newlyweds, meanwhile, are cautious about ANY alliance, which is usually a smart play…although we're not sure who would ally with them when they keep finishing at the back of the pack.
"The Amazing Race" airs Sundays at 8 PM on CBS.
