S37.E04: There’s No Addresses in the Jungle

[chitowngirl]

Racers travel to Bali, Indonesia, where the first team to arrive must make a difficult decision.
 

Airdate March 26, 2025 on CBS

[Rodney]

Bernie & Carrigain have Jonathan & Ana to blame for their elimination tonight, since it was beyond senseless for them to hinder them that much with the Driver's Seat.

But they also have themselves to blame for badly missing the Detour signs.  But I'll give the blame more to Bernie for not listening to Carrigain in doubling back to the start to begin with.  They might've had more of a fighting chance then.

At the same time, they've been pretty weak from jump, so they might've just taken themselves out eventually.

Jonathan & Ana won the leg tonight, but with several mistakes along the way.  They helped and hindered some of the right teams, but badly misfired on several of the others.  And then, they wasted their Express Pass.

Scott & Lori do well again!  Top three tonight!  They're really repping it for the forty-and-older teams!

I can't say which Detour I would've chosen, but Penjor looked easier since at least all of the materials were right there, while you had to look for the ones for Pagejan.

Melinda & Erika jumping out of nowhere from eighth to fourth was awesome!

Bali was beautiful!  The show made the best use of the scenery and the locale!

Tense episode.

[Skooma]

Finally the team with the endlessly screaming woman has been eliminated.

Now we need the team with the endlessly intense and loud and annoying man gone,  Yes, Jonathan, I mean you.

And of course the worst use of that Express Pass gimmick ever on the show.  The very first task and one where you gave yourselves an advantage doing it.  Way to waste it.  May the seeds of karma soon ripen into vines that trip you up.

[choclatechip45]

What a waste of the express pass. Glad the bickering team was eliminated. 

[kitkat343]

We won't miss the bickering team, although one of them (and I can't tell them apart since I just cover my ears when I hear screeching) did mention having things to work on, so hopefully they will mature in the future.

Good job by Brett and Mark in overcoming really bad taxi luck this week.

Jonathan & Ana wasting their express pass, and not thinking through how to assign the rice weights may come back to haunt them.  The screeching girls would have eliminated themselves sooner or later and this would have been a good time to strengthen their alliances and try to get rid of a stronger team.

 

Edited Thursday at 05:44 AM by kitkat343

[Dirge]

3 hours ago, Rodney said:

I can't say which Detour I would've chosen, but Penjor looked easier since at least all of the materials were right there, while you had to look for the ones for Pagejan.

Yeah, I'm not sure if teams could see that, but that's always a better choice. 

Scott and Lori with the 25 pounds really powered their way through. That was a bad decision for Jonathan and Ana. 

It did seem like some teams had stems and things in their rice sacks while others had just rice. That didn't seem fair. 

I do like how some of the native testers seem to appreciate the ebullience of the racers, though I do think the racers should be more circumspect in their hugging and whatever. 

Good camera work showing the signs while the racers bemoaned the lack of directions for the tasks. How can you not be looking out for red and yellow signs?

[Haleth]

I bugs me when teams get so offended by another team using a legitimate means to put distance between them. As if Scott and Lori wouldn’t have done exactly the same. I mean, come on, don’t act so morally superior. In any case I hate race gimmicks that allow teams to impede others. This and the U-turn are terrible ideas. Just race using your own talents!

Lori had an awful lot of straw pieces in her rice bag. She should have been told to go back and clean it up.

Yeah, in retrospect John and Ana wasted the express pass. The rice threshing wasn’t nearly as time consuming as it sounded; that is, if you weren’t too meticulous about how much straw was left in with the rice.

Thank goodness the bickering girls are gone. They were dragging down the whole show. 

Edited Thursday at 12:54 PM by Haleth

[GenerationX]

The single worst use of the Express Pass I have seen in the entire run of the show.

[freeser]

1 hour ago, Haleth said:

 

Quote

I bugs me when teams get so offended by another team using a legitimate means to put distance between them. As if Scott and Lori wouldn’t have done exactly the same. I mean, come on, don’t act so morally superior. In any case I hate race gimmicks that allow teams to impede others. This and the U-turn are terrible ideas. Just race using your own talents!

Lori had an awful lot of straw pieces in her rice bag. She should have been told to go back and clean it up.

Those are also the two things that bugged me about this episode.  They had to give some team the 25 pounds - so did Scott and Lori think they should have given it to the last  teams at the very end of the race instead of them?  I have never liked Scott very much but this segment made me feel quite anti-Lori.  Even when Scott says something complimentary to Lori - it still feels condescending.  Like he is doing her a favor by saying something nice about her.  But Lori has dropped several notches in my opinion in this episode also.    

The straw in the rice bag was really noticeable, wasn't it!  Others went to great lengths to cull out the straw, but Lori just shoved it all into her bag.  I was surprised the man who weighed the bags did not check the contents at all.  Lori obviously finished quicker by just carelessly putting everything in the bad instead of just rice.  

[shura]

1 minute ago, freeser said:

The straw in the rice bag was really noticeable, wasn't it!  Others went to great lengths to cull out the straw, but Lori just shoved it all into her bag.  I was surprised the man who weighed the bags did not check the contents at all.  Lori obviously finished quicker by just carelessly putting everything in the bad instead of just rice. 

Right?  I was thinking, why don’t you put a rock in there too, it should be good for a couple of pounds.

6 hours ago, Dirge said:

Scott and Lori with the 25 pounds really powered their way through. That was a bad decision for Jonathan and Ana. 

This is not meant to dispute it, I just want to nail down why people think it was a bad decision.  Is it because they pissed off a strong team that may hurt them later on?  And what would a good decision have been - to make life as easy as possible for their competition and to sink those who are already drowning anyway?  Again, I am not judging here at all, simply spelling things out.

 

[chaifan]

2 hours ago, Haleth said:

Yeah, in retrospect John and Ana wasted the express pass. The rice threshing wasn’t nearly as time consuming as it sounded; that is, if you weren’t too meticulous about how much straw was left in with the rice.

I agree, but it's a "hindsight is 20/20" situation here.  I think they were right in the moment.  That task looked both physically hard and that it would take a while.  So to me, using the Express Pass in the moment was the right call.  Also, if they didn't, it would be super awkward having to do the task side by side with those that you just increased their load.

While the ATV's to the waterfall gave us some stunning footage, it did nothing for the race.  Despite the "let's find a travel agent" remarks, it was clear they were all given the address for the one travel agent who was open at 2am.  And the two flights were equalized by the HOO.  It seems they all went out on the ATV's with very little time between teams, and it was obviously a closed loop that gave no chance for misdirection or any type of change in order.   So really, the "driver's seat" just went to the team that had the most competent taxi driver to get them from airport to HOO board first.  If you're going to have a gimmick like that, make the teams work to get it, not leave it to dumb taxi luck.

I think the Driver's Seat should have gone to the team that completed the roadblock first (15 lbs), not just arrived there first.  

This also would have been a good leg for self navigation, instead of the spoon fed taxis.  I'm guessing there's a reason they didn't do that, though.  

 

[bunnyface]

You know how some people will get to the U-turn and choose not to use it?  I wonder if they could have done that here.  That would have been the best thing to do.  "Nope, not gonna do it."  And then decided if using their express pass was a good idea and let someone else take the heat for the decision making.

 

[shura]

1 hour ago, bunnyface said:

You know how some people will get to the U-turn and choose not to use it?  I wonder if they could have done that here.  That would have been the best thing to do.  "Nope, not gonna do it."  And then decided if using their express pass was a good idea and let someone else take the heat for the decision making.

They probably had to assign who has to collect what weight.  Suppose a team without an express pass got there first - they couldn’t have declined to make a decision.  What amount of rice would they have to bag then?

I was also thinking, what if they just drew the numbers out of a hat randomly and just put them on the next available picture?  Scott and Lori would probably still be upset though if they happened to get a 25 randomly.  I mean, they don’t know that this is not how they did get their assignment, they just assumed J and A screwed them on purpose, right?

[seacliffsal]

I was really surprised that they did not make Ana go with Johnaton when he had to use a restroom.  I thought there was a rule that teams could not separate (other than at a roadblock, etc.).  I thought for sure they were going to get a time penalty.  Oh well, an established rule was broken on Survivor tonight, so I guess the Amazing Race is right there will not following established rules.  IMO anyway.

Lori, Scott, Carson and his partner (don't have everyone's names yet) talked about if making the driver's seat more difficult for someone to try to make it for someone who may then be eliminated otherwise racers may try for revenge down the road.  This is what seems to have happen throughout the series as U-turning, Yields, whatever, don't necessarily eliminate teams and then that gives the decision makers potential problems down the road.

Bali was beautiful.  Doubtful I'll ever be able to go there, but it was just amazing and the people seemed kind and helpful.

[Dirge]

26 minutes ago, seacliffsal said:

I was really surprised that they did not make Ana go with Johnaton when he had to use a restroom.  I thought there was a rule that teams could not separate (other than at a roadblock, etc.).  I thought for sure they were going to get a time penalty. 

Oh my gosh, I forgot about this but that's just what I was thinking. If they weren't going to give a penalty, then why even show all the times he talked about it? Other than to help fill the 90 minutes of the show.

[aghst]

Phil tried to stir the pot with every other racer about Jonathan and Ana using the Driver's Seat.

It's really not a good look for TAR resorting to such tactics to gin up drama between cast members.

Alyssa had a good attitude about having to 25 pounds of the rice but then she threw shade at Scott and Lori for trying to fly under the radar.

Yeah fatigue is starting to set in.  People are missing obvious clues and nerves are more frayed.

Otherwise I liked the designs of the detour and road block and the scenery.

It looked like the quads didn't go that fast that there was a chance of one team overtaking another just by driving more aggressively or recklessly, because those things are known to flip over and with inexperienced riders pushing it, it could lead to risky actions.

But looks like they got to enjoy a fun ride through a tropical forest.

Interesting to see all those taxis.  Traffic can be really bad in some parts of Bali with tons of people on scooters kind of preventing cars from moving freely.

They hired the taxis and had them at the venues so the racers didn't really have to go looking for any.  In the country side, it would probably be difficult, especially with the taxi mafia in some parts.

I wonder why they still use travel agencies.  The show is sponsored by the biggest online travel agency.  Why not use the computers at the hotel?

I guess the tickets were already purchased by the show.  They must choose departures from the previous pit stop to coincide with certain flight schedules, so that there would only be a finite number of flights right after they depart and maybe a few teams would have to take later flights which depart a couple of hours at the most after the earliest flights.

[iMonrey]

3 hours ago, chaifan said:

While the ATV's to the waterfall gave us some stunning footage, it did nothing for the race.  Despite the "let's find a travel agent" remarks, it was clear they were all given the address for the one travel agent who was open at 2am.  And the two flights were equalized by the HOO.  It seems they all went out on the ATV's with very little time between teams, and it was obviously a closed loop that gave no chance for misdirection or any type of change in order.   So really, the "driver's seat" just went to the team that had the most competent taxi driver to get them from airport to HOO board first.  If you're going to have a gimmick like that, make the teams work to get it, not leave it to dumb taxi luck.

Yeah we both commented on this in the live thread. Sometimes the scenery porn on this show amounts to a lot of pointless filler. 

I'm really annoyed that the show seemed to think adding some new twist or gimmick every week would somehow improve the race. It doesn't. I hate to think the show is taking its cue from Survivor. Just let the teams race. May the best team win. Gimmicks like the "Driver's Seat" and the U-Turn are designed solely to make teams resent each other. This isn't Survivor. It's not Big Brother either. Can't it just be a race? Why is that not good enough?

There hasn't been much of a shakeup in the leaderboard after four legs. Some combination of Jonathan and Ana, Scott and Lori and Carson and Jack keep staying in front. Meanwhile, Brett and Mark continue to breeze through challenges but someone keep falling behind due to navigation issues. Otherwise they'd be real contenders. I'm hoping they can break their unlucky streak.

[Netfoot]

I must say TAR is rocking the locations/scenery and the challenges have been pretty good as well.

I'm not sure why any team would believe it was a benefit to be in the Driver's Seat.  It grants two 'advantages'. The first is to give yourself the easiest/fastest option and the second is to delay others by giving them the hardest/slowest option.  But by definition the Driver's Seat will fall to team #1. They don't need to delay another team so as to avoid elimination for themselves. And since they are the front-runners presumably they are doing well enough that they don't really need a special advantage. So the real goal of the Driver's Seat would seem to be to generate animosity between the Driver's and those they are required to disadvantage. Even if they chose who got delayed completely at random, there would still be hard feelings as a result. No, this is just another effort by TPTB to artificially create antagonism between teams in the hope that it will inrease viewership.

Glad the Banshees got eliminated.

Respect to Gamer Jack who let the cat out of the bag by giving us the incredible revelation that there were those who unspeakably believed that "if you're in the front let's stay in the front!"  This flies in the face of all 36 previous seasons of TAR and indeed competitions everywhere. Because as all right-minded people know, if you are in a race and you are doing well, your duty is to strive your hardest to come last and get yourself eliminated!

[bunnyface]

1 hour ago, seacliffsal said:

I was really surprised that they did not make Ana go with Johnaton when he had to use a restroom.  I thought there was a rule that teams could not separate (other than at a roadblock, etc.).  I thought for sure they were going to get a time penalty.  Oh well, an established rule was broken on Survivor tonight, so I guess the Amazing Race is right there will not following established rules.  IMO anyway.

 

At the very least she should have been made to stop working and (I think) move away from the sight line so she couldn't study the project while she waited.   If that happened, I don't remember seeing it and it should have been shown with as much time as they spent with him saying he had to go over and over.

[KeithJ]

5 hours ago, GenerationX said:

The single worst use of the Express Pass I have seen in the entire run of the show.

Let’s just hope they get stuck on a task next week where they really needed the Express Pass. I still don’t know why they didn’t even take five minutes to try the task.

[mertensia]

I could never walked and balanced that offering on my head.

What a waste of an Express Pass. 

[Rodney]

3 hours ago, Netfoot said:

Glad the Banshees got eliminated.

The only "banshee" was Bernie.  I thought that Carrigain was a sweet girl who just wanted to be heard and treated like a teammate, only for Bernie to treat her like the exact opposite.  She was no banshee.  Only Bernie was.

It was good for her sake that they got eliminated, because I don't know how much longer Carrigain could've taken Bernie's shit.

[Ilovepie]

I cannot believe they didn't even attempt to try that rice thing before just blowing the Express Pass! It wasn't actually that hard, they gave themselves the lowest weight and they were already in first place! Totally stupid.

7 hours ago, chaifan said:

While the ATV's to the waterfall gave us some stunning footage, it did nothing for the race.  Despite the "let's find a travel agent" remarks, it was clear they were all given the address for the one travel agent who was open at 2am.  And the two flights were equalized by the HOO.  It seems they all went out on the ATV's with very little time between teams, and it was obviously a closed loop that gave no chance for misdirection or any type of change in order.   So really, the "driver's seat" just went to the team that had the most competent taxi driver to get them from airport to HOO board first.  If you're going to have a gimmick like that, make the teams work to get it, not leave it to dumb taxi luck.

I so agree with all of this. I so miss the teams actually being responsible for finding own way to the destination. Despite the teams being allowed to "book their own" travel, it is now being done within whatever guidelines the show has given them. It doesn't add anything to the game when they are just all being shuttled between countries en masse. The Driver's Seat should have been awarded AFTER completing a task, not just on arrival.....

So far, I have hated all of these new gimmicks, including this drivers seat. I was happy to see the Express Pass back, but then these two boneheads wasted it. 

Bali looks amazing though. I need to add that to my list!

[iMonrey]

3 hours ago, KeithJ said:

Let’s just hope they get stuck on a task next week where they really needed the Express Pass. I still don’t know why they didn’t even take five minutes to try the task.

My best guess is that they just didn't want to face the other teams they had just hit with a disadvantage. And they knew they were right on their heels. But they will still have to face them eventually so it was still a dumb move.

[Netfoot]

1 hour ago, Rodney said:

The only "banshee" was Bernie.  I thought that Carrigain was a sweet girl who just wanted to be heard and treated like a teammate, only for Bernie to treat her like the exact opposite.  She was no banshee.  Only Bernie was.

 

Thanks for that correction!

[eel2178]

14 hours ago, GenerationX said:

The single worst use of the Express Pass I have seen in the entire run of the show.

Long, long ago and far, far away (aka I don't remember exactly, and I'm not interested enough to search for it) there was a team who was eliminated because they didn't want to use their Express Pass even when they were dead last.

[Rodney]

30 minutes ago, eel2178 said:

Long, long ago and far, far away (aka I don't remember exactly, and I'm not interested enough to search for it) there was a team who was eliminated because they didn't want to use their Express Pass even when they were dead last.

Jessica & John from TAR22.  Jessica rightly wanted to use it and kept telling John that they should use it, while John kept insisting that they were fine when they were very obviously not.

Coincidentally, that also happened in Bali.

[30 Helens]

There clearly wasn’t a lot of thought going into the use of that express pass.

First, they forgot to assign themselves a time. Then they reassigned the times, but got confused in the process. (The Banshees were not supposed to get the heaviest weights.) Then they impulsively decided to use the pass. Then they realized they shouldn’t have given themselves an advantage (low weight) they weren’t even going to use.

It was all so mishandled. I do not blame them at all for assigning heavier weights to their strongest competitors. It’s not a Friendship Tour, it’s a Raaace. But at least be strategic about it. Decide in advance if you’re going to use the pass. If yes, give yourselves one of the 25# cards. That would have gone a long way to quell the resentment. 

But in the end, I cannot understand why they wasted the pass. They literally threw away one advantage (the lower 15# weight) for another. Did Jonathan think he was so weak that he couldn’t thresh 40% less than another team? Did they think it was that important to stay in first place? I was so hoping that other teams would pass them and they’d end up at the mat mid-pack. With everyone sneering at them, as they should. Not for being strategic backstabbers, but for being mindless idiots.

[Browncoat]

5 hours ago, 30 Helens said:

Did Jonathan think he was so weak that he couldn’t thresh 40% less than another team?

Ana took the challenge, so maybe he didn't think she could?

I think I heard Scott say that he and Lori were only 20 minutes behind Jonathan and Ana.  That probably isn't quite accurate, but, even given Jonathan's potty break, I suspect it was close.  So they didn't even save much time by using the pass.

[NaughtyKitty]

2 hours ago, Browncoat said:

Ana took the challenge, so maybe he didn't think she could?

I think I heard Scott say that he and Lori were only 20 minutes behind Jonathan and Ana.  That probably isn't quite accurate, but, even given Jonathan's potty break, I suspect it was close.  So they didn't even save much time by using the pass.

Maybe he had "Bali Belly" and it was a bit longer than a quick pee.....

[meep.meep]

On 3/27/2025 at 6:31 AM, chaifan said:

 

This also would have been a good leg for self navigation, instead of the spoon fed taxis.  I'm guessing there's a reason they didn't do that, though.  

 

When use of the "spoon fed taxis" nearly cost one team the race, maybe it's not the mindless advantage you seem to think it is.

[Guigoaoshi]

Yep... Jonathan and Ana didnt needed to paint such a target on themselves so early, against some strong teams. But thats part of the game, no rule about who you should use it. Their major mistake, that might bite than in the ass later, the combination of using the express pass (Jesus, save for when you are in dangerous, only use for 1st place when you still have it in the last leg you can use it). Made even worse they taking the lighter weigth for themselves and not making the task. At least they admitted they didnt put the right thought about it.

Now, it seems Scott and Lori also painted a targed on their back aswell by trying to come off as weak to the other teams and doing so well. They all noticed it. Also, they getting so hot headed with other teams using something against them and even between themselves during the detour, might be a sign of some crack at how they try to show to be calm, cool and collected. 

Edited Friday at 06:53 PM by Guigoaoshi

[dgpolo]

On 3/27/2025 at 10:56 AM, seacliffsal said:

I was really surprised that they did not make Ana go with Johnaton when he had to use a restroom.  I thought there was a rule that teams could not separate (other than at a roadblock, etc.).  I thought for sure they were going to get a time penalty. 

In season 16 Brent really had to go and Caite kept saying no when they were at a task where they had to look at the bottom of hundreds of figurines to find one with their name. She finally gave in and went with him, so I did think they had to stay together. At least Ana should have stopped working while he was gone.

[Silver-hyren]

The editing around the potty break is so clunky, we can’t say for sure Ana didn’t go with him/step away from the challenge until he came back.  We hear the voice over of him saying he has to pee and then see him running toward her afterward under a VO of her asking if he feels better.  IIRC there was a building right next to the grassy area they were working in - I assumed there was a restroom in there he used while she stayed outside on the grass (close enough to satisfy the teams must stay together rule).

[chaifan]

@Silver-hyren I agree.  I don't see any shenanigans in this.  I think it was funny that the editors chose to focus on Jonathan's need to pee, over and over, but I don't think we've stumbled upon PeeGate.  I think this is just what happens when you have 90 minutes of air time to fill.

 

[springbarb]

23 hours ago, Guigoaoshi said:

Yep... Jonathan and Ana didnt needed to paint such a target on themselves so early, against some strong teams. But thats part of the game, no rule about who you should use it. Their major mistake, that might bite than in the ass later, the combination of using the express pass (Jesus, save for when you are in dangerous, only use for 1st place when you still have it in the last leg you can use it). Made even worse they taking the lighter weigth for themselves and not making the task. At least they admitted they didnt put the right thought about it.

Now, it seems Scott and Lori also painted a targed on their back aswell by trying to come off as weak to the other teams and doing so well. They all noticed it. Also, they getting so hot headed with other teams using something against them and even between themselves during the detour, might be a sign of some crack at how they try to show to be calm, cool and collected. 

I think that Scott and Lori were complaining less about getting hit with the harder task--though they weren't happy about it, of course--and were more annoyed with Jonathan and Ana's Express Pass usage while also taking the 15# for themselves. Express Pass usage was dumb dumb dumb.

It was interesting to hear the other teams talking about Scott and Lori. S/L are clearly a strong team; I wonder how much is that they've created a storyline in their own minds that they're the "old, underdog" team and are annoying everyone else by talking about it.

[realitytvfan1017]

On 3/26/2025 at 11:04 PM, Rodney said:

Bernie & Carrigain have Jonathan & Ana to blame for their elimination tonight, since it was beyond senseless for them to hinder them that much with the Driver's Seat.

But they also have themselves to blame for badly missing the Detour signs.  But I'll give the blame more to Bernie for not listening to Carrigain in doubling back to the start to begin with.  They might've had more of a fighting chance then.

At the same time, they've been pretty weak from jump, so they might've just taken themselves out eventually.

Jonathan & Ana won the leg tonight, but with several mistakes along the way.  They helped and hindered some of the right teams, but badly misfired on several of the others.  And then, they wasted their Express Pass.

Scott & Lori do well again!  Top three tonight!  They're really repping it for the forty-and-older teams!

I can't say which Detour I would've chosen, but Penjor looked easier since at least all of the materials were right there, while you had to look for the ones for Pagejan.

Melinda & Erika jumping out of nowhere from eighth to fourth was awesome!

Bali was beautiful!  The show made the best use of the scenery and the locale!

Tense episode.

Great recap on this episode. I heard an exit interview with Bernie and Carrigan , that they switched roles and that Carrigan was supposed to be doing the navigation and Bernie the roadblock, no idea why they changed though. Bernie is better at physical tasks and Carrigan at navigation but Bernie should have still listened to Carrigan if that is her strong suit. 
 

Love seeing the over 40s repping it out there like that and doing so well as a fellow Gen xer myself. 
 

That was awesome for Melinda and Erika to jump up in the rankings and Karson and Jack too. Not sure what’s going to happen to Nick and Mike as the hot mess express team of the season, as I named them.

On 3/27/2025 at 1:12 AM, Skooma said:

Finally the team with the endlessly screaming woman has been eliminated.

Now we need the team with the endlessly intense and loud and annoying man gone,  Yes, Jonathan, I mean you.

And of course the worst use of that Express Pass gimmick ever on the show.  The very first task and one where you gave yourselves an advantage doing it.  Way to waste it.  May the seeds of karma soon ripen into vines that trip you up.

To be fair, it was Bernie being stubborn and not listening to Carrigan, who was mainly right. 
 

I’d be happy if Jonathan and Ana leave soon. At least they are likely getting U-turned next episode.

On 3/27/2025 at 1:43 AM, kitkat343 said:

We won't miss the bickering team, although one of them (and I can't tell them apart since I just cover my ears when I hear screeching) did mention having things to work on, so hopefully they will mature in the future.

Good job by Brett and Mark in overcoming really bad taxi luck this week.

Jonathan & Ana wasting their express pass, and not thinking through how to assign the rice weights may come back to haunt them.  The screeching girls would have eliminated themselves sooner or later and this would have been a good time to strengthen their alliances and try to get rid of a stronger team.

 

Bernie was the one I think causing most of the conflict but yes she realized that and admitted she needed to work on it . 
 

I love how several teams surprised us in their standings in this leg like Karson and Jack, Brett and Mark and Melinda and Erika.

On 3/27/2025 at 8:50 AM, GenerationX said:

The single worst use of the Express Pass I have seen in the entire run of the show.

Actually that is Jessica and John for not using it but thud is a close second. 

[Quilt Fairy]

IIRC - and maybe I don't and I'm just having a senior moment - at either the beginning of this ep or the tail end of the last, when the top 3 teams (J&A, S&L and the gamer guys(?)) found out about the Driver's Seat, they figured one of them would get it and agreed that whoever did get it would not screw the other 2 teams.  And then J&A got it and proceeded to screw S&L.  Under those circumstances, I would be furious at them, too. 

[QuantumMechanic]

On 3/27/2025 at 9:31 AM, chaifan said:

I think the Driver's Seat should have gone to the team that completed the roadblock first (15 lbs), not just arrived there first.

That would be another one of my decrees if I were fortunate enough to ever become the God of TAR: any "modifier" that can disadvantage other teams at a task can only be activated by a team that has finished the task.

So, for example, a U-turn could only be handed out by a team that had completed the Detour.  (Of course, if I had my way there wouldn't be U-turns in the first place).  And this Driver's Seat thing would be after the task (and if that means some teams got there before a team finished the task they'd only have to do 15lb unless another team finished while they were still working and gave them a higher target weight, so be it).

On 3/28/2025 at 10:51 AM, NaughtyKitty said:

Maybe he had "Bali Belly" and it was a bit longer than a quick pee.....

That's what I figured too.

Edited Yest. at 02:23 AM by QuantumMechanic

[chaifan]

On 3/28/2025 at 10:51 AM, NaughtyKitty said:

Maybe he had "Bali Belly" and it was a bit longer than a quick pee.....

 

38 minutes ago, QuantumMechanic said:

That's what I figured too.

As someone who has suffered "Bangkok Belly", I can tell you 100% certain there would be no telling your race partner 3 times "I have to go" if that were the case.  When that type of stomach ailment hits, there is no waiting for anything.  Jonathan would have been shitting his pants by the second mention of needing to go.  And if Ana were making him wait if he were in a "Bali Belly" situation, then wow, she would deserve to go down as the most horrible race partner ever.  

Sorry to be graphic.  I just really don't think this was anything more than a genuine "I have to pee" situation.  I give Jonathan credit for staying hydrated enough in Bali to have to pee - that's the bigger problem people have when traveling in those areas.  

 

 

[Skooma]

5 hours ago, Quilt Fairy said:

IIRC - and maybe I don't and I'm just having a senior moment - at either the beginning of this ep or the tail end of the last, when the top 3 teams (J&A, S&L and the gamer guys(?)) found out about the Driver's Seat, they figured one of them would get it and agreed that whoever did get it would not screw the other 2 teams.  And then J&A got it and proceeded to screw S&L.  Under those circumstances, I would be furious at them, too. 

The Utah couple and Team Green Shirts agreed to that and assumed Jonathan & Ana (can't even remember her name) would join in with that scenario because the three teams were pretty friendly with each other they were saying.

So they never mentioned it to Jonathan & Ana, just assumed it and you know what they say about assuming.

Still I'd be pissed too.  You can't get all the teams eliminated on one leg and to screw around with lead teams you had good relationships with and that you knew would still arrive way before The Screamer and Her Victim Team was ludicrous.  They gave Screamer 25 lbs too and since they were last to leave to start with it was obvious they would be out of the Race.

Also I want to commend Rodney here for not only knowing the names of the team eliminated but also who was yelling at whom over whatever.  I never bothered to tell them apart.  I just knew one was an annoying screamer always yelling at the quiet one and I wanted them eliminated as a result.

[iMonrey]

23 hours ago, chaifan said:

@Silver-hyren I agree.  I don't see any shenanigans in this.  I think it was funny that the editors chose to focus on Jonathan's need to pee, over and over, but I don't think we've stumbled upon PeeGate.  I think this is just what happens when you have 90 minutes of air time to fill.

Yeah, I couldn't figure out why the show made such an issue out of Jonathan saying he had to go to the bathroom over and over again, it's not like it affected anything. 

I'm not ready to paint them as the villains of the season, which seems to be the narrative the show is trying to create. That "Drivers Seat" gimmick had no real advantage for whoever had to take it, it just put a huge target on their back and made other teams resent them. Where's the upside? And yeah, they pretty much had to take it because otherwise they would have had to stand there and wait for another team to arrive and assign the poundage. 

It's telling that Phil had all the bunched teams at the mat talking about Jonathan and Ana. It's like the show realized they had no real villains this season and had to create some.

Also, on rewatch it seems unlikely nobody went over the prescribed pounds of rice after multiple weigh-ins but with one exception that needle hit dead center every time. I think there was just some crafty editing going on.

[Ancaster]

On 3/26/2025 at 11:48 PM, Dirge said:

I do like how some of the native testers seem to appreciate the ebullience of the racers, though I do think the racers should be more circumspect in their hugging and whatever. 

 

I've said it before and no doubt I'll say it again, IMO the racers should be prohibited from hugging the locals.  I don't care whether or not the locals are warned it might happen, it looks bad and can give the wrong impression to viewers about different cultures by making it look okay everywhere in the world.

 

[PurpleTentacle]

Really not sure why Jonathan & Ana burned the express pass. Sure the challange was kinda hard, but everbody had that hard challange and they were in the lead. In fact, a lot of the other teams had a far harder challange than them. Do they really play by the maxim that they have to win every leg? That's going to break their necks sooner or later.

We see all these challanges in excruciating detail, because of the way too long runtime for the current state of the race (if they want to make it this long, they need more budget for more intricate legs) but we don't see how Carson & Jack overtook Scott & Lori? What gives? Were their camera teams not following them at that point?

[Netfoot]

2 hours ago, iMonrey said:

I think it was funny that the editors chose to focus on Jonathan's need to pee, over and over, but I don't think we've stumbled upon PeeGate.

I'm sure that in 37 seasons, this has happened before. 

 

[Red Bridey]

5 hours ago, Ancaster said:

I've said it before and no doubt I'll say it again, IMO the racers should be prohibited from hugging the locals.  I don't care whether or not the locals are warned it might happen, it looks bad and can give the wrong impression to viewers about different cultures by making it look okay everywhere in the world.

 

It sure looked to me like one of the judges/locals was throwing herself at the teams after she handed them their clue for a big hug. I laughed because she looked So.Happy and some of the teams seemed surprised by the bear hug...and may even have wanted to get going. But she was going to get her hug, no matter what!

[dgpolo]

1 minute ago, Red Bridey said:

It sure looked to me like one of the judges/locals was throwing herself at the teams after she handed them their clue for a big hug. I laughed because she looked So.Happy and some of the teams seemed surprised by the bear hug...and may even have wanted to get going. But she was going to get her hug, no matter what!

I thought the same, she really wanted her hug but those hats made it very difficult.

[Lantern7]

I rewatched the episode. It didn't pull me in.

If there HAD to be a crap gimmick for a leg, Driver's Seat wasn't too bad. It produced the proper result of Jonathana getting shit talked about them by other teams on the mat. And, yeah, that was a waste of an Express Pass . . . though tis better to use it in haste than not at all. #OyVey

I like the massive pile-ups on the mat. Everyone's usually so happy to just have completed the leg.

[tv echo]

I do think that Jonathan chose to use the express pass, even though they were in the lead and in no danger of being eliminated, because he wanted to make sure his team stayed in first place. Same reason he loaded the other leading teams with the heaviest weights. Fear of being passed by Scott and Lori.

IIRC, he said something about wanting to put more space between his team and the other leading teams. We've seen him say in a previous episode that being #1 is very important to him. It's a short-sighted strategy at this point in the race.

Edited 7 hours ago by tv echo

[cowgirlwen]

On 3/28/2025 at 2:44 AM, 30 Helens said:

But in the end, I cannot understand why they wasted the pass. They literally threw away one advantage (the lower 15# weight) for another.

I think, in Jonathan's world, if you're not in first place, you're a loser.  He displayed that attitude in one of the first legs of the race when they came in 2nd.  To most of us, and the other teams, it makes sense to save the Express Pass just in case you're in dire circumstances and at risk of elimination in a particular leg.  But Jonathan and Ana had just used the Drivers Seat advantage and were already leading the pack.  So they already had a HUGE lead on most of the other teams, and could assign the weights to stretch the lead even further.  At that point, they were definitely not at risk of elimination.  Doesn't make sense to waste the Express Pass unless you're really gunning for 1st place.

On 3/27/2025 at 12:26 PM, aghst said:

Phil tried to stir the pot with every other racer about Jonathan and Ana using the Driver's Seat.

It's really not a good look for TAR resorting to such tactics to gin up drama between cast members.

I agree.  It felt icky to me.  I've LOVED Amazing Race since the very first episode  because of the beautiful scenery, interesting customs, and the generally fair and friendly competition amongst the teams.  I don't want gimmicks, and I certainly don't want trash talk at the mat.  Let the racers race, give them organic opportunities for position changeups, and let the chips fall where they may.  Save the unnecessary created drama for Survivor.