The Amazing Race Season 16

Victor’s Amazing Race Blog: It’s All About Preparation

March 1, 2010

Sometimes there is nothing you can do to fight fate. This week, the nine teams remaining in the 16th installment of The Amazing Race traveled to Bariloche, Argentina, for the third leg, where teams played five-card stud with a gnome, roped cattle made of hay, and either searched for buried treasure or played polo with wooden horses. In a leg designed for cowboys, it seemed fated that the cowboys Jet and Cord, who took the lead last week, would win — and they did, quite easily. It also seemed like no matter what mom-trepreneurs Monique and Shawne did, they were doomed. So, spoiler alert! In a leg far too physical for them, Monique and Shawne were eliminated. I was impressed, however, by the moms’ persistence and support for each other.
In hindsight, there really was no question Jet and Cord would win. That said, I don’t think the leg was unfair. As Jet and Cord put it, just as there’s no reason for them to complain about the advantage Carole and Brandy get as fluent Spanish speakers with the first three legs being in Latin America, others shouldn’t complain about the advantage the cowboys get in “cowboy” tasks. (Of course, I have to take this position since my sister and I got to compete in China as fluent Chinese speakers.)
So in a leg whose outcome was more an issue of fate than any mistakes, I’m going to focus my blog this week on mistakes in terms of race preparation.
Anyone who has studied The Amazing Race knows that you have to learn how to drive a manual transmission! It is laughable how bad Dan and Jordan are at driving stick. But I have to call out Brent. He should have learned how to drive stick, instead of relying on Caite! Teams know that on the Race, one person will need to be the driver and the other person will need to be the navigator. Since they know Brent is “horrible” at navigation, he should have learned how to drive stick. It is also clear Brent does not like the role of navigator since as soon as they get lost, his first instinct is to yell at Caite to figure out where they were supposed to go. (Of course, the irony here is that Caite is the one who was ridiculed nationally about geography.)
However, the biggest mistake I see in preparation this week lies with the Big Brother team — as much as I like them. As this leg highlights, Jordan defers to Jeff, who makes almost all of the decisions for the team. Most of the time, this works. Jeff makes really good decisions (like trying a different bus route last week). This week, though, he made really bad decisions. Even though he found the loot quickly, he kept taking it to the wrong person. He couldn’t figure it out even when the answer was thrown in his face — he didn’t know to take it to the train station even when Joe asked him, “Where’s the train station?” (Jeff realizes how stupid their decisions were and declares he and Jordan definitely should not reproduce.) But I don’t blame Jeff. Given fatigue and stress, there will be times where people will not be able to think properly. So I blame Jordan. As a teammate, she is supposed to be the person who steps up when her partner cannot figure things out. Going into the Race, though, it seems like Jordan and Jeff decided that Jeff would always take the lead. Though it’s good to have a leader, you cannot expect the leader to be perfect, and in those moments of imperfection, Jordan needs to be prepared to step up and contribute. Luckily, it did not prove disastrous here, but it may in the future. –Victor Jih


I liked his take on TAR. I agree with him people should not fault the Cowboys if there was a task that was to their advantage. I'm sure it was by coincidence and many times certain teams do tend to have the advantage with speaking a language or physical skills. Not to mention I believe these tasks are thought out many months prior to actually doing them.

I saw a new promo where Jordan & Caite are paired for a task and they end up going the wrong way on a train. Ruh roh. Could this be the end of J/J? Hope not!

BLESSED BE!!!! BLESSED BE!!!! I WAS SO NERVOUS!!! BLESSED BE!!! LOL

lol Colton, I was worried for them as well and hoped that it was a non elim leg. The realization that the race would become extrememly boring if they were eliminated set in so I was glad they stayed in the race for at least one more week. Its going to be difficult for them to overcome the speed bump though but hopefully they can pull it out. They couldnt eat sauerkraut???? come on!

Same here i was worried they were going home. Hopefully next leg there will be some thing to get all the teams caught up to each other and hopefully who ever was u turn will work in Jeff and Jordans benefit. I hate it when teams lose because of the taxi drivers.

I literally couldn't watch the teams eating all that sauerkraut, Lorraine. It was making me sick! :( I never could've done it.

My favorite quotes of the episode:
"Hopefully somebody go lost."
"Hopefully somebody fell off a bridge!"

"I knew when I saw that it was a beer drinking contest he'd be great because he likes to drink beer!"

Thankfully the Cowboys are still in it!

The other teams are pretty forgettable I don't even recall some of their names yet.

Seriously, Jeff and Jordan couldn't eat a plate of sauerkraut? For a chance at a million dollars? Unreal!

Colton wrote:

I literally couldn't watch the teams eating all that sauerkraut, Lorraine. It was making me sick! :( I never could've done it.

My favorite quotes of the episode:
"Hopefully somebody go lost."
"Hopefully somebody fell off a bridge!"

"I knew when I saw that it was a beer drinking contest he'd be great because he likes to drink beer!"

Jordan is so insightful.

So, on the preview, did it not show someone using the Roadblock on J/J?
If so, that'll SUCK! First, they'll have the disadvantage Phil told them about, then a Roadblock? WTF?
I hope they make it through this next leg, but it's looking rough.
Meanwhile, why is the lesbian couple still on there? They annoy me!

sammyf wrote:

Same here i was worried they were going home. Hopefully next leg there will be some thing to get all the teams caught up to each other and hopefully who ever was u turn will work in Jeff and Jordans benefit. I hate it when teams lose because of the taxi drivers.

Problem is that J and J may be the team U-turned to assure they finish last. I agree Sammy, losing because of a stupid ass cab driver has got to be the worst. Jeff at the pitstop to Phil "It hurts". I could have sworn he was going to follow up with "We lost, its over, it hurts" ala Big Brother...lol

That's exactly what I thought, someone will probably Uturn them b/c they're already in last & whoever the team is probably won't piss anyone else off b/c they were already probably leaving anyway.

I don't think its them that gets u-turn. Lorraine I was thinking the same thing about "it hurts" lol. I notice he says a couple of the same sayings as in BB. Have you guys looked at the extra scenes on the web page

sammyf wrote:

I don't think its them that gets u-turn. Lorraine I was thinking the same thing about "it hurts" lol. I notice he says a couple of the same sayings as in BB. Have you guys looked at the extra scenes on the web page

I havent looked at the extras....anyway you can post them here?

Thanks for the info Sammy! I hope you're right!!

They have been pissing me off with their "previews" for the following week. First with the lesbian meltdown which was pretty much NOTHING and did not effect the race at all and then last week with their previews of the cowboys and making it look like they were plastered. Whatever, the footage of the cowboys in the bar was SECONDS and again, did NOT effect one thing! TAR is better than that and shouldnt have to stoop to trying to fool us into thinking something major is going to happen.

Completely agreed on the previews, Lorraine!
A lot of reality previews are misleading, but TAR has never been SO bad before.

I have been meaning to ask you TJ, how is the little one doing?

Here's one video of Jeff and Jordan its an extension of their mat arrival

Here's a video to why I think it might not be Jeff and Jordan getting u-turned.

'Amazing Race' Star Linked to Drug Investigation



Posted Mar 9th 2010 1:10PM by TMZ Staff

One of the Rhode Island police officers competing on the current season of "The Amazing Race" has been taken off the streets in the wake of an internal investigation into a major cop-operated cocaine ring.

According to the Rhode Island State Police, Louie Stravato has been put on "desk duty" -- after his name came up in a "four month" investigation into a "large-scale" cocaine distribution operation.

Three officers were arrested in a sting operation -- but Stravato was not among them.

According to law enforcement, Stravato was among 4 officers assigned to the desk work following the investigation. The RISP would not comment on the nature of Stravato's involvement in the case.

Calls to CBS were not returned.

Thanks so much for asking Lorraine!
Cameron is doing well. She is almost 5 months now. I can't believe it!

On another note, that doesn't surprise me at all that Louie was involved in something w/ coke. I don't know why, it just made perfect sense to me.

Wow TJ, time flies huh? Glad Cameron is doing well!

Thanks Sammy for posting the vids!

I was so glad that Jeff and Jordan were able to overcome their speed bump and continue in the race. Even though I was not a Joe and Heidi fan, I couldn't help but feel bad for them. Had it not been for the U-turn, they would have easily made it to the pit stop before Jeff and Jordan. I guess a huge thanks is owed to the detectives, who are starting to grow on me by the way...lol. I just don't see anyway that Jeff and Jordan could have overcome the speed bump to finish ahead of anyone. I thought they were done for right from the start. Plus, there was no road block last night...strange.
My least favorite team is Brent and whatsername or dumb and dumber and I hope that they go home next week. I know how CBS likes to pimp their previews so I won't get my hopes up too high after seeing their tower of champagne glasses crash.
Team Big Brother FTW! (although I don't think it happens...lol...I can still hope!)

The crazy thing to me, is that I don't think the morse code task would be that hard. But, obvs it was. I wasn't a Joe/Heidi fan, but they're def smart people and if they couldn't figure it out, I'm guessing it would have been difficult for most. I wish the lesbians would've picked it, since the one bitched and moaned that only DUMB people picked the crawling, SMART people picked the morse code. Well, no one picked morse code. J/H were u-turned to do it. I would've loved for the morse code to be the lesbians demise. They really irratate me! Go J/J!!! I agree, I don't think they'll win, but I'd like to see them go a long way!