Monday, November 22, 2010

The Amazing Race Season 17 Episode 9: Double U-Turns Send Chad & Stephanie From First to Last & Eliminated from the Race

Yet one more entertaining leg of the most entertaining season of The Amazing Race in a long, long time.

This week, Chad & Stephanie, who had a euphoric week last week, getting engaged and coming in first, got U-Turned last night, coming in last to the Pit Stop, with Phil Eliminating the couple.

First to leave the previous Pit Stop, Chad & Stephanie read the clue telling them to fly to Dhaka, Bangladesh, the most densely populated city in the world.

In Dhaka teams had to find a sugar cane press and produce a glass of sugar cane juice. First at the airport, Chad & Stephanie found a Jet Airways flight that got to Dhaka at noon the next day. Jill & Thomas and Nick & Vicki soon booked the same flight.

Chad & Stephanie then proceeded to gorge on fast food, while Jill & Thomas worked an agent to get a better flight. Eventually the agent found a flight that got  them into Dhaka 7 hours earlier. Brook & Claire saw Jill & Thomas doing a happy dance, so they accosted the same agent, to no avail.

While Chad & Stephanie continued to pig out, Brook & Claire told Nick & Vicki that Jill & Thomas now had a 7 hour lead. This sent the pairs off to try and find a better flight, with Nick & Vicki successful at getting on a plane that would land in Dhaka at 8:40am.

Brook & Claire were stuck landing at noon with Chad & Stephanie. Along with Nat & Kat who took a more circuitous route to Dhaka.

After Jill & Thomas cranked out the sugar cane juice the next clue was a Detour. Balanced Meal or Balanced Bricks. Jill & Thomas opted out for bricks and a wild rickshaw ride. Balancing bricks in a basket on their head, the pair delivered the 100 bricks and got their next clue.

While Chad & Stephanie, Brook & Claire and Nat & Kat were en route from Mumbai to Dhaka, Jill & Thomas arrived at the Double U-Turn. Without much debate, Jill & Thomas U-Turned Brook & Claire, forcing them to do both detour tasks.

As Nick & Vicki were arriving in Dhaka, Jill & Thomas were at a Roadblock in Nazira Bazaar where one team member had to piece together a rickshaw. Again, Jill did the Roadblock. Thomas does not seem to like to do the manly things, like scale down cliffs and build things.

Jill put together the rickshaw and got the clue sending them to the Pit Stop where they got a $15,000 gift card from Discover.

Nick & Vicki arrived at the U-Turn after completing the Balanced Meal Detour option of delivering food to dockworkers. Nick wanted to U-Turn Nat & Kat, Vicki did not. Vicki won the argument with Nick saying she was too nice. When they came in 2nd at the Pit Stop Vicki remarked that being nice pays off.

The final 3 teams were in dead heat mode through the sugar cane press. All three opted to deliver meals, with Chad & Stephanie's rickshaw driver getting lost.

Nat & Kat made it first to the U-Turn and U-Turned Chad & Stephanie, sealing their fate.

Chad & Stephanie had all sorts of woes trying to completing the food delivery Detour. When they finally made it to the U-Turn Chad was all happy to see Brook & Claire U-Turned, then he saw that he and Stephanie had also been U-Turned.

The pair got the bricks delivered, and then made it to the rickshaw assembly spot to see Claire still working on it, while Nat & Kat were on their way to a 3rd place finish.

Stephanie and Claire were in a race to get the rickshaw built. Claire finished hers with Stephanie seconds behind. The teams were now in race to find Lalagh Fort, as darkness fell on the city. Brook & Claire got to the Pit Stop first, with Brook whining to Phil that they'd been U-Turned by a man, prompting Phil to say, "Don't even pretend you guys aren't a threat."

Then Chad & Stephanie showed up, taking the bad news well. The end of another good episode of The Amazing Race.

And might I add. I HATE the U-Turn gimmick. I have HATED it ever since it was introduced. I double HATE a Double U-Turn. The Amazing Race needs to lose the U-Turn.

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