TAR S33 E4: The world is waiting for you again!

Grüezi wohl! Well that's the most common Swiss-German greeting but you wouldn't have known it from watching this episode of TAR because none of the contestants made an effort to even speak one word of German whilst in St Gallen, Switzerland. I usually like starting each of these posts with a greeting from the country where the leg was run but the first three legs were ran in the UK and we speak English here. So we rejoin the race after a hiatus of 19 months because of the pandemic and pick up in St Gallen, Switzerland. We found out that four teams couldn't rejoin the race and two of the teams which had already been eliminated were invited back - there's so much to talk about but as always, let's begin with the current average statistics and see how the teams line up now after four legs of this season as the statistics never lie. 

TAR S33 average statistics after E4

• Ryan & Dusty 1.5
• Kim & Penn 3
• Raquel & Cayla 4
• Arun & Natalia 7
• Akbar & Sheri 7
• Lulu & Lala 7.75
• Michael & Moe 9 (eliminated in Altstätten)

Q: Do we know why four teams didn't rejoin the race?

A: Frstly, we know that Connie & Sam had a baby during this period when the race was suspended - Connie was in fact heavily pregnant when filming for TAR S33 resumed so that is completely understandable of course. Caro & Ray didn't return because Caro has a German passport (though she is resident in the US) and according to her official statement, that stopped her from returning as the US borders were still closed then but of course there were rumours circulating that it was more because Caro & Ray had simply split up. Taylor & Isaiah revealed that Taylor's big brother tragically died of Covid just two days after they departed for Switzerland to rejoin the race thus quite understandably, they chose to return home to be with their family. As for Anthony & Spencer: we know that Anthony had just started a new job and it simply wasn't possible for Anthony to get that much time off work to do TAR, so sadly they could not resume racing despite winning the first leg in London. If you thought Covid-19 didn't wreck enough havoc on this season, I felt especially sad reading about Taylor losing his brother to Covid and I want to send Taylor my deepest condolences for his sad loss. 

Q: Is this the first time they have let eliminated teams back on the race? 

A: The hardcore fans of TAR will know that this happened in TAR Australia S5 - despite coming in 2nd on the first leg, models Alex & Jack had to drop out of the race due to 'mental health issues'. The production team then decided to bring back Dwes and Katherine who were eliminated on the first leg, they didn't even take part in the second leg but rejoined the race in the third leg. So yes, this has been done before, albeit under quite different circumstances. Teams have had to drop out because of injuries and health reasons before; such as in season 22, when Dave tore his Achilles tendon in a foot race to the pit stop - Dave & Connor struggled on for another two legs but eventually had to drop out on leg 5 because of the injury. This led to a traditional elimination but no 'replacement' as such. But hey, we are in the middle of a pandemic and after seeing how heartbroken Arun was after getting eliminated in Glasgow, I was so thrilled for him when he got a second chance to do the race. I know he actually reads my blog Arun, I'm definitely for cheering you and Natalia!

Q: But wait, were these two teams let back onto the race without a speed bump?

A: Well there was a speed bump for them: both teams had to do a speed bump after the detour before they could continue racing. It was a Swiss game which involved them rolling a ball resembling a cabbage and knocking down haystacks before they could continue. I would have liked to have seen that but once again, that didn't make the final edit. 

Q: What was the point of the first part of the episode where they had to race to the bus? 

A: It was totally pointless. The teams had set off from St Gallen cathedral and race to find three buses which would take them to the cable car station - the buses set off almost at the same time, drove up to the cable car station within minutes of each other (in a convoy) and when the teams got there, given that they all had to wait for the next cable car to take them up the mountain, they all ended up on the same cable car. That was entirely predictable of course so what was the point of all that? You may as well just put all the teams on the same bus and drove them up to the cable car station. Otherwise, they could have staggered the departure of the three buses by making them depart in ten minute intervals, so as to give the teams that found the buses first a substantial advantage. I would have also made the buses a little harder to find, like a bus is way too obvious - make them hunt down something more obscure like a shop in town where they can get tickets to the next bus. I would have done a much better job in planning things like that than the production team. Do you know how hard I rolled my eyes when all the teams ended up in the same cable car? That's just really bad planning. 

Q: How bad was the first roadblock? 

A: Not as bad as I thought it was going to be, thankfully. For most of the roadblock, the racer had to be clipped onto the safety rope as there was no safety railing to stop them plummeting down the side of that mountain, but that also meant that it was virtually impossible (and very unsafe) to overtake the person in front of you as you had to stay clipped into the safety rope. At least for the last part of the trek, racers could do it without being clipped in and thus the moment Penn realized that, he took full advantage of that window of opportunity and overtook a few teams. This was almost as bad as TAR S31 E7 which incidentally, was also in Switzerland whereby there was a few 'first come, first serve, no overtaking' detours and roadblocks. The production team needs to give teams the chance to perform really well in these roadblocks in order to overtake other teams, because this would make the outcome a lot more unpredictable. I felt bad for Sheri who struggled with the physical nature of the task but if you're going on TAR, you need to do your homework, watch loads of previous seasons and know exactly what to expect on the race. Of course I'm not denying that it was a difficult task, I'm just pointing out that most tasks on TAR are very difficult so all racers need to be prepared to face their very worst fears. 

Q: The cable car went over 8,000 feet above sea level - is that enough for altitude sickness? 

A: The cable car actually went up to 2,502 meters above sea level (that's 8,209 feet) and that's high enough to feel substantially colder of course and we could see small patches on snow still clinging on to some of the cliffs at the summit. But no, you're probably not going to get altitude sickness that 2,500 meters - that's just not high enough even if you live at sea level all the time. Let's say a tiny, really tiny proportion of people will feel very, extremely mild symptoms of altitude sickness at 2,500 meters but if we went up above 5,000 meters than the majority of people will experience moderate to severe symptoms of altitude sickness. Doing any kind of physical activity will make you tired and breathless of course but at 2,502 meters, it's not like the air is so thin you can't breathe - no, that kind of thing only happens above 8,000 meters and you will encounter that if you're trying to climb Mt Everest which is 8,849 meters high. I often ski in the Alps at above 2,500 meters and have absolutely no problems breathing whilst exerting myself on my skis. Thus if someone claims they can't breathe at 2,500 meters, then I'm afraid that has nothing to do with altitude at all - no actually they are simply unfit. 

Q: What about the detour then? 

A: The flag throwing side of the detour is very Swiss indeed, I remember my first trip to Switzerland way back in the 1990s and my Swiss host insisted on bringing me to see a flag throwing performance in the mountains. But oh come on, they did that in basketball court - seriously? Who is your location manager and why did they pick a basketball court to do the task? As for the other side of the detour, I'm sure it is an integral part of the local tradition there but sorry, no disrespect to the Swiss but I found it really quite boring. So you put some ornaments on a belt, how's that suppose to be exciting? The only excitement arose when it was clear that Michael & Moe were placing their ornaments in a different order compared to Arun & Natalia, so there was some suspense building regarding "one of these teams has got it completely wrong, but which team will it be?" Without Michael & Moe's mistake, that side of the detour would have been so utterly boring. It started raining and they could have at least allowed the teams at the farm to move indoors but nope, they just got wet. Seriously, I was not impressed by what the production team did on this detour - this was disappointing. 

Q: How did Akbar & Sheri somehow survive this leg despite a poor start? 

A: Many viewers might have assumed that they would be eliminated when we saw how Sheri was struggling on that mountain but they managed to beat two teams on this leg. They ran the rest of that leg pretty well and avoided further mistakes, as long as there aren't too many physically demanding tasks coming up, if they can support each other, then they may continue to defy the odds  - statistically, they are at the back of the pack but when there are only six teams left, anything could happen so just think, Ryan & Dusty nearly made that fatal flaw of switching detours but phew, they didn't. 

Q: Ryan & Dusty won again, any surprises there? 

A: No, hardly. Well done to them for their brilliant performance. The statistics never lie and they are clearly the strongest team by a long way. The production team may have made a big deal in the edit to include that brief moment when they contemplated switching detours but actually, that's probably something that happens to most teams during the detours the moment they realize how difficult it is - the temptation is always there to switch rather than persevere and push through. Ryan & Dusty did the right thing of course and that's why they won. The only surprise for me was that they actually picked up the choreography faster than Kim & Penn who are famous for their Youtube videos involving song and dance routines - they did win the last leg in Glasgow because they crushed the singing and dancing detour. It shows you how strong a team they are which almost makes the season a bit boring as their victory is then almost going to be a foregone conclusion. Would the producers throw in a game that involves a lot of luck to try to make things more random?

Q: On the other hand, how do you feel about Michael & Moe getting eliminated? 

A: Sigh. The first time round I thought they were really unlucky but I assumed that given a second chance, they would be a lot wiser. It all went wrong when they placed the ornaments on the belt in the wrong order and that was a mistake they could have avoided. If you watch the episode carefully, the first thing Natalia said when she got to the work station at the farm was, "let's watch the demonstration" and that was why Arun & Natalia got the order right. Michael & Moe arrived a moment later but rushed into the task without watching the demonstration or paying attention to the details. There was a lot of confusion on their part but rather than turning to the demonstration to try to figure out the correct order for the ornaments, they just rushed into the task whilst ironically, wasting precious time by speaking to the camera, explaining their confusion. Oh my goodness me, haven't they learnt their lesson from leg 1 when they messed up on the Artist Den detour? You need to pay attention to detail! But this mistake wasn't necessarily the final nail in the coffin: Akbar & Sheri were so far behind and Arun & Natalia got hopelessly lost again when they failed to ask for directions - it is a shame Michael & Moe were eliminated again but that's how one silly mistake can result in elimination on TAR. Quite frankly, I was expecting a non-elimination leg so when Phil eliminated Michael & Moe, I almost fell off my chair in shock. We only have seven teams this early in the season and now we're left with only six?! Are we going to have many non-elimination legs coming up or is this going to be a really short season? Oh my. Guys, I have a very bad feeling it would be the latter. 

Q: We didn't see many masks on this leg - take the judge of the flag dance for example, he didn't wear a mask?

A: No, actually, we did see some teams wear masks in the cable car as it was a crowded, enclosed space but the racers were socially distanced in the flag dance challenge thus I suppose it was a judgment call that the production team made. 

Q: Who is going to win the next leg? 

A: Undoubtedly Ryan & Dusty. It is rare to see a team dominate a season like that - out of four legs ran so far, they have finished in the top two with an average ranking of 1.5, they were even able to beat famous Youtubers Kim & Penn at a detour which most of us thought was right up Kim & Penn's alley.  Will they beat the record of 1.83 which was set by Rachel & Dave, winners of S20? Even if they didn't win the next leg they would be second and I'd be shocked if they didn't win this season - it's just how prizes they will win along the way as they win leg after leg. Look, I think they're really awesome and don't get me wrong, I love strong teams like that but the fact that their victory at this stage is but a foregone conclusion kinda makes this season a bit boring and predictable. Mind you, I'd really love to see a team like Lulu & Lala or Arun & Natalia win this next leg simply to make this season more unpredictable - nothing against the boys!

Q: Who is going to be eliminated next? 

A: Well the next leg in Lugano (Italian-speaking Southern Switzerland) has got to be a non-elimination leg as there are so few teams left in the race. But even if a team is last and is spared elimination, it does mean that they would have a speed bump in the next leg, increasing their chances of elimination so nobody wants to finish last even if it is a non-elimination leg. I'm afraid it is evident from the statistics that it will be either Akbar & Sheri or Arun & Natalia. These teams have different weaknesses - Akbar & Sheri struggle with more physical challenges but Arun & Natalia can't navigate and keep getting lost. There's not much Akbar & Sheri can do about their state of fitness - it is what it is but Akbar & Natalia can hopefully learn their lesson - they just need to stop and ask for help when it doubt. I know that sounds simple but it really is that simple. There's no rule against asking for help or directions on TAR. Will Arun & Natalia learn their lesson quickly?

Okay that's it from me on this episode, what do you think? Feel free to leave a comment below, many thanks for reading.