Tom & Tyler: 1.44
Tim & Rod: 3.11
Jasmine & Jerome: 3.67
Viv & Joey: 4.22 (spared elimination in Mphere because of NEL)
Femi & Nick: 5.55
So as expected, Tom & Tyler blitzed through this leg to win again in fine form, despite not running a perfect leg. They winnowed way more peanuts than needed and took far longer than necessary on the Chichewa language challenge but to be fair, everyone really struggled with that challenge and I'm like, guys, seriously? How hard was that challenge? All the teams struggled with it, apart from Femi & Nick who got through the puzzle quickly. It was a puzzle - you just had to listen carefully to the first part, maybe like the first 3 or 4 words, pick out those words, then move on from there systematically and methodically. It had nothing to do with the ability to speak another language, it was all about remaining calm under pressure to figure out a puzzle. I'm kinda shocked at how poorly Viv & Joey did in this leg which landed them in last place: they struggled with the sewing task, then took a while to figure out the right mix of clay and water to produce 50 bricks and then at the lake, Viv gave such poor instructions that Joey was basically just searching around aimlessly in the water. Why didn't Joey just copy what Nick and Tim did and follow them into the water? Or why didn't Viv just run to him at the start and say, "just start searching, I'll go listen again." Joey was searching for ages in the water with no clue where to look. I love these two but they ran such a poor leg that they finished last - but fingers crossed, they will bounce back in the next leg given that they did perform very well in the first three legs. I always trust in these statistics and the weakest team thus far is still Femi & Nick and I still think that they are a worse team than Viv & Joey - though Viv & Joey have the massive disadvantage of not being as tall and strong as Femi & Nick and a lot of these challenges are physical.
Okay, this is a hot topic of discussion on social media: let's look at both sides of the argument. Tom & Tyler were the strongest team so far having dominated this season and without the burden of the U-turn, they cruised to yet another win. It seemed that only Jasmine wanted to U-turn Tom & Tyler whilst the others voted according to their friendships and alliances - Tim & Rod had previously worked with Sid & Ash and that left them somewhat isolated from the rest of the teams, that left them vulnerable to the U-turn. So conventional wisdom would dictate that you would try to get rid of the strongest team so far and looking at the statistics, Tom & Tyler's average ranking at this stage of the race is so good that they would blow any team from any of TAR's global franchise out of the water - so of course you should try to use an opportunity like this to get rid of your greatest competition. However, look at what happened: Tim & Rod merely worked hard to complete both sides of the detour and finished third in this leg - well done guys. My guess is that Tom & Tyler would have probably done much the same thing and finished in the middle of the pack if they did get U-turned, so perhaps there is a good argument that it would be a waste of a good U-turn to try to U-turn Tom & Tyler and instead, the teams did something more strategic: they targeted the second strongest team instead. However, was there a lot of thought that went into this process? No, Beau surprised them outside the airport and they just went with their gut instinct - perhaps I overthink things sometimes but I do think it was the wrong decision. I would have U-turned Tom & Tyler. Compare this to in TAR US S31 when the vote was conducted in public - now that would have created a lot more drama.
Was there anyone checking the quality of the peanuts at the first task?
At the first task in Lilongwe, the teams had to winnow 5 kgs of peanuts to receive their next clue: however, we simply see the lady weighing the bag of peanuts the teams produced without actually checking for shells in the bags. There didn't seem to be any kind of quality control at that point, so if I was behind, I might even have chucked a few big stones into that bag (okay that's a bit extreme) since no one seemed to check. So, how could they have actually checked it? They needed a judge to check the teams each time they filled their bag and whilst that may have been possible, it wasn't done so there was definitely some inconsistency when it came to the standards and that meant that if a team was too careful, if they were perfectionists trying to product the most perfect bag of peanuts, then they would fall to the back of the pack.
I was left rather puzzled by how the order of the teams were randomized in this leg by the taxis. Jasmine & Jerome left Lilongwe airport in third place but arrived at the Mgona market in last place for no obvious reason. Did they hit traffic? Did their taxi get a flat tyre? Did the driver take a wrong turn and get lost? Did they get pulled over by the police? Did the driver stop for a snack? No explanation was given. Nick & Femi left Mgona market with quite a lead over Tom & Tyler, but somehow they arrived at Chezi market together? How did that happen? Then Viv & Joey left the brick making challenge in fourth place with a lead over Nick & Femi, but somehow Nick & Femi managed to arrive at the Lake Retreat ahead of Viv & Joey? Good grief, even Viv couldn't explain how that happened. Surely the production team must have a good idea what happened, but no explanation was offered. Even if it was simply a question of the drivers' skill and/or knowledge of the area, then at least try to offer us an explanation rather than just present the random shuffling of teams' position as a function of luck and chance. Oh I blame the production team, taxis are a major part of TAR but do tell us what happened.
Detour: Sewing or packing?
The packing task does look far more straightforward and perhaps Viv & Joey should have done it - once you've packed all the charcoal into the basket structure, you didn't have to carry it very far in order to receive the next clue. It definitely was more physically demanding, but goodness me, the amount of skill required to complete the sewing challenge made it insanely difficult if you had never handled a sewing machine like that before. It was obvious that packing charcoal side of the detour was easily than the sewing - unless you've done some sewing with a sewing machine before, the learning curve is just way too steep under pressure. Hats off to both teams who managed to complete the difficult sewing detour.
Good grief. I have already discussed how Viv & Joey totally messed up the last task - it's not that they are too stupid to figure it out, but it was evident that they cracked under pressure and floundered as a result. We saw the same thing with the clay bricks task, Femi & Nick and Viv & Joey fell behind because they didn't realize that they were not mixing the water and the clay in the right proportion to get the perfectly shaped bricks as required. They wasted a lot of time producing substandard bricks without pausing for a moment to think, "hang on, are we doing it right? Are the bricks acceptable in this state?" The tasks themselves are not that difficult - they are definitely physical but Tim & Rod have shown that they can keep calm under pressure to do well in these tasks, that's a vital skill in TAR. I did cringe however, when I heard Tim & Rod say, "I swear Malawi is in Hawaii." Good grief. That's almost as bad their previous gaffe about the 'Zimbabwean bobsled team in Cool Runnings'. And then they called the Malawian shirt a 'kimono shirt'? Good grief. Sorry guys, they seem like really nice guys but they just don't strike me as particularly intelligent. They picked the wrong team (Sid & Ash) to get into an alliance with and don't seem to know that much about the places where they are going. But what they lack in brains, they do make up in muscle power - but would that be enough to take them into the finals?
An openly gay couple racing in Malawi?
Big fans of TAR would remember how Tyler & Korey were very emotional during TAR S31 E6 when they raced to Uganda - one of the world's most homophobic countries. I am surprised that Tim & Rod didn't mention anything about gay rights in Africa - it is a sliding scale, so far they have visited three African countries: Zambia, Zimbabwe and Malawi and none of them are gay friendly at all. However, Uganda does stand out as one of the worst when it comes to homophobic attitudes. I noticed Tim & Rod holding hands when they ran to the pit stop in this episode in Malawi and I thought that's good but I do wonder if they were warned not to go too far in terms of their public displays of affection especially when they are in crowded places like the markets when they did their detour? Given that they originally thought Malawi was in Hawaii, I'm wondering if they realized just how homophobic these African countries can be? Don't get me wrong, I'm an openly gay man too and I had just returned from Africa myself with my husband, but when we were there, we were very careful as we were in a rather conservative Muslim country and we just wanted to get through our holiday in one piece.
It is pretty obvious that Tom & Tyler are probably going to win the next leg, but look just how close Jasmine & Jerome got to them in this leg - that shows that they are not superhuman, that other teams can beat them with a bit of luck. Their average ranking of 1.44 after 9 legs and their ability to dodge the U-turn vote by successfully playing the social game (they are so confident about their ability to always win that they are always happy to help other teams) demonstrates just how they are unstoppable. And after a non-elimination leg in this episode, the next leg will end with an elimination and unfortunately, given that they will have a speed bump, it looks all but certain that Viv & Joey will be eliminated in the next leg. Having said that, we have seen Tim & Rod bounce back from a U-turn, so if they can pull something similar off, then statistically, the weakest team is Femi & Nick. However, in the preview, we do see Tim hurting himself and bleeding with a blade, would that be enough to slow them down or is that just a bit of drama that's good reality TV? The preview makes it look as if Tim gets into serious trouble in the next leg in Malawi, so it may be a spoiler that it may be them who go home. Channel 10 have been pretty bad with all these leaks, so let's see - they are strongly suggesting to me that Tim & Rod will be eliminated next but I am guessing that it would be Viv & Joey instead. After all, both Rowah & Amani and Sid & Ash failed to overcome their speed bumps and got eliminated and I am guessing it will be 3 out of 3 unfortunately.
This is a very rushed recap as Monday is usually a very busy day for me at work but I hope you found this interesting and insightful. Let's hope Tim isn't too badly hurt in the next leg in Malawi! And as always, many thanks for reading everyone.
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