7-DAY TV GUIDE

The pandemic was just another obstacle for the contestants on The Amazing Race Australia to overcome, host Beau Ryan tells Holly Byrnes

JUST getting this year’s season of The Amazing Race Australia off the ground was an epic challenge worthy of the show itself. As borders shut and flights were grounded due to coronavirus, host Beau Ryan says, it looked like the adventure series might need to scale back its ambitions.

“People started joking, ‘What … are you going to do it around Cronulla?’ And in all honesty, the way borders were closing, it probably looked like that at one stage … just do 50 laps of Cronulla,” the former NRL star says with a laugh.

But thanks to some extraordinary planning, and a few logistical nightmares, the Race’s production team were finally able to outrun a global pandemic and get the show on the road by filming the entire show on Australian soil.

It wasn’t without a few false starts, as Ryan explains, but the determination and agility of Channel 10 and Eureka Productions to keep rolling with the punches finally saw the race get off the ground. Of course, that involved locking down the entire cast and crew in a 14-day quarantine as soon as they all landed in Queensland – the starting line – from all parts of COVID-affected Australia.

While originally scheduled to film in May last year – at the peak of the pandemic here – producers were forced to abandon plans to take filming on a global adventure, including through coronavirus-ravaged Europe, the US and Brazil.

The scheduling upheaval meant some of the teams had to be recast before filming begin last September, as some contestants found themselves unable to compete due to work or family commitments.

On the upside, his experience with season one gave Ryan the confidence to stand tall in the role as host this time around.

“I’ve been in a lot of highpressure situations, in both sport and live TV and live radio, but I felt last year when we were doing the show a lot of us didn’t know what we were doing,” he admits.

“Channel 10 and Eureka were great, they just gave me the freedom to be me … this year I felt so much more comfortable.”

When restrictions lifted, the show was able to skip from one state to another without quarantining multiple times – opening them all up to the majesty of our own country.

For Ryan, it was an eyeopening gift. “The middle of Australia, I didn’t realise was that good and, you know, full of wild animals. I think we do take it for granted as Aussies … We see the pictures, but until you get to Alice Springs and see all that stuff first-hand, it made me realise just how lucky we are.”

THE AMAZING RACE AUSTRALIA

7.30PM, MONDAY, 10