‘Beard Bros’ go from beach to ‘Amazing Race’
Volleyball pros say show was test of brains, brawn
Riley and Maddison Mckibbin traveled enough to circle the globe three times while playing on the international beach and snow volleyball tours last year. As professional athletes, they also know a little bit about performing under pressure.
Even that couldn’t prepare them for “The Amazing Race.”
“I will tell you that on the race, it’s a completely different animal,” said Riley Mckibbin, who with his brother will be competing on the travel challenge reality show that premieres for its 32nd season on Oct. 14.
“You know what to expect” as a pro volleyball player, he said. “When you’re on the race, you have no idea if the challenges are going to be playing to your strengths or to your weaknesses. … So just trying to harness those nerves and adrenaline and try to put it into a productive way was probably the biggest thing.”
First airing in 2001, “The Amazing Race” sends pairs of friends or relatives around the world to eat bizarre foods, learn local dances, decipher a riddle or bungee jump from a bridge or skyscraper. The team to finish last in each episode is usually eliminated until there are just three left racing to the finish line and a $1 million prize.
The Mckibbins said they watched the show growing up and would yell at the contestants on TV about all the mistakes they were making. They applied unsuccessfully once or twice before being cast for this season.
“It’s just the ultimate test of brains and brawn,” Riley Mckibbin said. “Finally being able to put all of your theories to the test, and really measure up against all of the trash that you talked as a little kid to the contestants on the TV — I think that was like the most special part for me.”
This season, 11 teams left the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles in November 2018 and headed to Trinidad and Tobago, with future stops including France, Germany, Kazakhstan and Brazil for those that last that long. The brothers aren’t allowed to say where they went or how long they lasted, though they estimated that between volleyball, vacation and the show they’ve now been to 50 countries; they keep track on a map that was out of view of the camera they were using for the Zoom interview with The Associated Press.
“We had this plan, we just want to see as many different countries as we possibly can,” said Maddison Mckibbin, who is two years younger and the bushier of the siblings known on the AVP beach circuit as “The Beard Bros.”
“We kind of had this motto of, ‘Just don’t get last. Don’t get last, and you’ll advance,’” he said. “And that was our thing, because I think we just didn’t want to miss out on any opportunities that we could have seen to travel the world.”
In addition to the Hawaii-born Mckibbins, competing on “The Amazing Race” this season are former NFL players Deangelo Williams and Gary Barnidge, Olympic hurdlers Kellie Wells-brinkley and Lavonne Idlette, and a sprinkling of dating couples, siblings and spouses.
The show often highlights the conflict between teammates. The Mckibbin brothers say they’ve had their share of those through the years, but on the volleyball court they usually have a few weeks before the next tournament to get over it.
On the show, they needed to solve their problems quickly.
“You’re normally super exhausted after a tournament. And there is a good chance one of you is mad at the other one and you just want to chill and, like, not talk about what just happened,” Riley said. “But the race showed us that, yeah, we need to do that.”