The Amazing Race Canada hits the beach
Fileting, chair building, surfing were challenging
The Amazing Race Canada is going where it’s never gone before: outside the borders of the True North strong and free. Next week, the remaining nine teams travel to Hong Kong.
Tuesday’s episode started in Victoria as the competitors set out on another whirlwind leg. How crazy was it? An unprecedented number of teams switched tasks midstream, one couple decided to take not one but TWO penalties, and there was a shoulder “pop” that had a nation wincing in sympathy.
The front-of-the-pack teams (Natalie and Meaghan; Alain and Audrey; Bob and Rex; Nicole and Cormac) made the first flight to Tofino, a small town in the wilds of Vancouver Island’s west coast. The Tofino challenges were daunting, to say the least. Some teams stayed strong, others faltered and others rose to the occasion.
The first task — a detour where teams had to choose between fileting 30 pounds of fish or sorting 1,000 pounds of rock fish into five species — was so hard that teams ping-ponged back and forth between the two tasks, trying to get ’er done.
Despite their background in biology, siblings Sukhi and Jinder were no further a head than other teams when it came to sorting the fish. They stuck with it, though (despite the fish that somehow made it inside Sukhi’s coveralls), unlike Nicole and Cormac, Mickey and Pete, and Nat and Meaghan.
Alain and Audrey also switched it up ... wisely.
The next challenge was surfing on North Chesterman Beach, and Rex and Bob couldn’t manage it. After many failed attempts, they decided to take the penalty and move on. Just up the sand, teams had to create a beach chair out of driftwood, netting and rope. Bob took on the job, but wasn’t happy with any of his efforts.
Rex wasn’t happy, period. “I should just walk out into the water and never come back,” he sighed.
But he wasn’t the only drama on the beach: as Shawn started to stand up on his surfboard, his face twisted in pain and he went down. His shoulder popped out and was dislocated. It meant a trip to the hospital and having sedation so it could be put back in place.
Meanwhile, the Olympians — gold medal hockey players Natalie and Meaghan — dominated the surfing and beach chair challenges, and landed first on the mat once again. Host Jon Montgomery rewarded them with two round-trip tickets to Hong Kong.
“I should just walk out into the water and never come back.” REX, ON HIS AND BOB’S FAILURE IN THE BEACH TESTS
Audrey and Alain were hot on their heels, followed by Mickey and Pete, who also destroyed the last two challenges. The dudes moved up to third, from their seventhplace start. Cormac and Nicole held steady in fourth, while Michel and Pierre rocketed to fifth from eighth.
And Rex and Bob? They finished third last week, but failing to complete two challenges (they also quit the beach-chair task) meant a six-hour penalty, which put them in last place.
Luckily for them, Shawn’s shoulder issue meant he and Jen couldn’t continue. It’s game over for the married couple from Nova Scotia, but they went out with a winning attitude.
As Shawn pointed out, “We just got eliminated from The Amazing Race Canada. Well, the only way you can do that is to be here in the first place.”