Hi guys, goedden middag! I am back to review another season of TAR but this time, I can do it quite differently because I can now reveal that I was on S2 of 007: Road to a Million. I'm not American, I'm British and we don't have the TAR franchise in the UK and 007: Road to a Million is the closest thing we have to TAR and there are quite a lot of similarities. It was released in August 2025 so you can watch it on Amazon Prime, my contract with Amazon Prime states that I can't talk about what happened in my show here but at least you now know that I have actually been there, done that and taken part in a programme like that - for a superfan like me, that was an absolute dream come true. Many of you will know that I have blogged about TAR for many seasons now and I've had the haters who have been like, well how can you judge the racers so harshly, can you imagine what it would be like to compete on TAR? Well, now I can say, I've been there and done that, so that gives me a whole new perspective about what it is like to do something like that. And if you wanna judge me, then go and watch 007: Road to a Million S2 on Amazon Prime now, check out team Rob & Alex (that's me, I'm Alex). I am currently traveling in Asia so pardon the slightly shorter post for this week.
How do we feel about the whole BB USA theme?
So onto S38, I am not a fan of Big Brother USA (henceforth shortened to BB USA), I have never watched it before and so I have no idea who these people are - fans of BB USA may be delighted but I'm just gonna treat these people as folks who are ordinary racers. After all, a lot of reality TV stars simply slip back into their old lives, go back to their old jobs after they have their 15 minutes of fame and I can see how some of these former BB USA contestants would be delighted to do TAR. I am in two minds about this casting decision to be honest: firstly, not everyone would have watched BB USA and would care about whom these people are. It's not like they had gone on to have incredibly successful acting careers after doing well on BB USA, the best case scenario for these people is to then go on to do loads of reality TV shows (oh how I would be loved to be invited to do another reality TV show now that I have done my reality TV debut) and thus whilst this might appeal to some fans of this kind of reality TV programmes, I think the appeal is limited. For example, I love TAR so much but I don't like BB at all. So it is like the TAR producers are trying to get BB fans to watch this season and I am wondering just how successful that strategy would be since it is a rather niche market and I feel it would be easier to simply do a really exciting TAR season with something fresh to attract new viewers. As long as these racers make a good cast, then I think it will still be a decent season and for me, a good cast means having loads of really strong teams - I don't really see that in this first episode but perhaps it is way too easy to judge for now.
Why only Europe in this season?
So according to the introduction in the first episode, TAR was inspired by the adventures of two friends on their travels in Europe but we weren't given any more details. It seems a bit lazy and low-budget to be frank because we're quite used to TAR going to exotic places and if you're currently watching TAR Australia, you would have seen them go to countries like Nepal and Uzbekistan which look a lot more colourful and interesting than anything Europe has to offer. I think part of the fun of TAR is to see the racers get taken really far out of their comfort zone to the point where they will struggle, but how are Americans going to struggle in a rich, Western European country like the Netherlands where it is safe, clean and practically everyone speaks English fluently? Of course the Netherlands is a beautiful country and great for a holiday, but you're hardly going to get an epic episode there - more like an instantly forgettable episode that people won't even remember by the end of the reason and that's what we go in TAR S38 E1 I'm afraid. It was alright but kinda meh. I've traveled to all of these countries featured in TAR S38 and thus I'm in a really good position to guide you through this season.
So we're back in the Netherlands!
Yes, this is the 8th time TAR US went to the Netherlands and we were last there in TAR S31.
Did we like the pre-starting line task?
It's always nice to see a little plot twist to keep things fresh and in this season, teams got to do a task in the Dutch town on Hoorn before they even met Phil on the starting line where they had to compete not only for an Express Pass, but to avoid being hit with a hazard for this leg - at first I thought, oh isn't that just like a speed bump in past seasons for teams who were spared elimination? But no, a speed bump is simply an additional task you had to do before rejoining the race like everyone else. In this case, Jack & Enzo had to eat a herring then ride a clog-shaped cargo bike (which was very hard to steer) whilst the other teams got regular tandem bikes - so it was a major disadvantage that went far beyond having to do an additional task like a speed bump. The winners of the Express Pass Kyland & Taylor had to give away their extra Express Pass at the starting line, so that fueled more drama about the group dynamics but quite frankly, it wasn't such an interesting plot twist. So, nice effort producers but try harder. Ice bowling may have created some funny scenes with teams slipping over on the ice but it is not something that is typically or uniquely Dutch.
Is the Dutch soused herring kinda gross?
Oh I really like it. We eat fish like that in Europe all the time and I certainly enjoy it. If you were to look up a list of Dutch dishes to try when on holiday in the Netherlands, this would most certainly be on that list and many tourist do try it (and love it).
Why did the teams get so lost trying to find Volendam?
The drive from Hoorn to Volendam is 22.8 km (14.1 miles) and should have taken about 27 minutes, for the teams who knew how to read a map or at least had the common sense to ask for directions, it was a fairly uneventful journey through the Dutch countryside. But good grief, why did some teams take so long to get to Volendam? Surely they could've asked for directions in a country where practically everyone speaks English fluently. It would have been so easy to ask for help there. Or is it because these racers are of a generation who are so reliant on technology that they freak out once they do not have their mobile phones on them? Once again, like in other recent seasons, the ability to navigate is playing a disproportionately large role in the outcomes of each leg.
Do we like the edam cheese challenge?
Well it is typically Dutch and yes there was some effort and skill involved - but I think the task was relatively straightforward. Sure, some teams struggled more than others to build a pyramid of edam cheese blocks that was completely stable, but there wasn't a single team that got really stuck there for a really long time, unable to complete the task. By that token, this task was actually quite simple and straightforward, if not a bit time consuming. I don't like it when tasks are too easy like that, I like it when there is a really hard task and teams are stuck there for a long time - this would give teams who are lagging behind some hope and a chance to catch up on a task that requires a lot of skill. So whilst it was visually stunning like a postcard from Holland, I felt it was too simple for TAR if the teams were mostly going to depart in the order they had arrived in.
Shouldn't this have been a detour?
Well, I guess they only had one task set up so there wasn't a choice in the matter - but typically, there ought to have been a detour in this leg. But we had two tasks (the ice bowling and the edam cheese) where both team members had to participate in the task. It's their race, they get to make the rules.
Do we like that greenhouse roadblock?
Yes and no! I liked it because it was very difficult, some of the flowers were so similar that quite a few teams struggled to complete the task, whilst those with an eye for detail were able to jump ahead of the pack, thus totally mixing up the order of the teams at that point. This is exactly the kind task we want on TAR, where the teams never leave in the order they have arrived in. I did feel it was somewhat unfair though that the teams at the front of the pack got to do the task in bright sunshine whilst the teams at the back of the pack had to do it in darkness, with the help of a torch. It was so much harder in the darkness and I felt they could have levelled the playing field in the name of fairness, by making all the teams perform this task in the darkness.
Let's talk about Kat & Alex.
Oh dear. Kat made a silly mistake by not returning part of her costume after the Edam cheese task and they lost some time going back to return that bandana - she was already crying and upset by the time they arrived at the roadblock. Yet despite the fact that she had been so emotionally rattled already by that point, she still chose to do the roadblock and in my opinion, that was a poor choice. Alex had stayed relatively calm through the previous mistake about not returning the bandana and really, I feel he should have been the one doing the roadblock not her.
Were we surprised about Jack & Enzo being eliminated?
Not really, they started at the back of the pack after failing miserably at the ice bowling challenge. They just never got out of first gear, making one silly mistake after another. I was just rolling my eyes at them because there were a few other weak teams around at this stage, they could have overcome the hazard to have survived this leg but it was just one silly mistake after another. This is why I dislike the idea of celebrity casting for TAR, maybe Enzo had certain qualities that enabled him to thrive in the BB format but these brothers totally lacked the basic skills to even survive a relatively easy leg in TAR. I accept that there will always be weaker teams that get eliminated very early in the season, but Jack & Enzo's incompetence was comical at times. They were only cast because of Enzo's record on BB, not because they were right for TAR and this is when I'm not even angry with Enzo - no, instead I am pointing the finger at the casting director for TAR S38 and saying, "you should have never ever cast these two in the first place and I'm not surprised they were the first to go." This was a bad casting decision.
You say that but this is supposedly a BB crossover season.
Well some of us hardcore fans of TAR are treating this like a regular season as we don't watch BB so we really don't care about the background stories of these BB contestants. The fact is we want to see teams compete on a level playing field to appeal to our sense of fairplay when it comes to watching the show, it would feel unfair if some of the teams are so incredibly weak that they have no chance at all in lasting long in this process. We also want to see teams who are actually well prepared for the race, not BB contestants who are just looking for another 15 minutes of fame. I have started watching another American programme called Match Me Abroad where they get older Americans who have failed in the dating game in America and are trying to find love abroad with the help of a matchmaker as a last ditch attempt to find a life partner. These Americans wouldn't go on the show unless they really need help so there is a certain morbid curiosity I suppose when we watch them go on these blind dates and they go horribly wrong, they say the wrong things, they make a fool of themselves and it gets awfully awkward for everyone. Yeah, there's a certain guilty pleasure associated with that kind of reality TV and I must admit, I enjoyed that too with Match Me Abroad especially when it delivered those cringe inducing moments. But should TAR be that kind of TV, featuring clueless Americans getting lost abroad and struggling in this process? There is always an element of that in TAR but I would rather see a competent team rise to the challenge and ace those challenges. So the question is this: what do you want as a fan? Do you want to see the racers struggle and fail in these challenges (as seen in Match Me Abroad) or do we want to see them do really well to win a million dollars on TAR?
Who will be next to go?
Megan & Matt really can't navigate and they'll be so vulnerable the next time they have a self-drive element but we also saw a fundamental error of judgement by Kat & Alex in this leg. I then turn my attention to the older racers as age could be an issue for the more physically demanding tasks: Jack in 58 and Angela is 51. Hey I have nothing against older racers, when I did 007: RTAM S2 I was 48 and my partner Rob was 57 - we were the oldest team yet we were physically a lot stronger than some of the younger teams who weren't as well prepared. But as we have seen on TAR, older racers over the age of 50 rarely last long in the process and those who do are exceptions to the rule. So right now I predict that it will be any of these four teams to go next, but it is still early days.
Who are the potential winners of this season?
Obviously, Jas & Jag and Tucker & Eric did extremely well in this leg. But really any of the teams in the top five have done well so far and remember, even a strong team can have a bad day in the office and at this stage of the race, they can still get away with a poor showing so let's not rush to make any predictions about winners for this season based on just one leg.
Wait, is it Holland or the Netherlands?
Holland is a part of the Netherlands, the same way England is a part of the United Kingdom. But it is a common mistake that many make when they refer to the Netherlands as Holland when they really should be using the term Netherlands - this is why Phil was quite careful to use the term the Netherlands in this episode to avoid confusion.
Did this episode do the Netherlands justice?
I think so. We got a taste of what village life is like in small town, rural Netherlands whilst so many tourists barely make it out of the big cities in the Netherlands. The pitstop though is in Amsterdam, the capital city but everything else on this leg was run in the countryside.
OK sorry for the slightly shorter review of E1 but like I said, I'm currently traveling so this is not the usual quality I would like to put out, but a shorter blog post is better than none at all. Thank you so much for reading.
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