The Amazing Race: Season Finale recap

There is nothing like the final leg of The Amazing Race in all of reality television. I’ve watched a lot of them, from Survivor to American Idol, but none of them seem to give you the adrenaline rush or nail-biting action of the final leg of a race around the world.

Of course, it helps when you still have a favorite team left in the race, and I did: T.K. and Rachel. I’ve been pulling for them since the beginning and I was just psyched that they were in at the final three, to give it a shot.

And with that being said, let’s get into the frakking finale of The Amazing Race!

First off, congrats to Donald, who they said at the beginning was the oldest person to ever make the final three in the race. Nice job, Mr. Bleeped Mouth.

Ron and Christina left the pit stop at 9:47 am, and had a bit of a head start on T.K. and Rachel who left at 10:30, and they were followed seven minutes later by Don and Nick.

The goal was to get to the airport and fly to their final destination: Anchorage, Alaska. Cool site, and the outdoorsy music they played helped us realize that it was in the boondocks or something.

So Ron and Christina get their tickets and ask for an upgrade so they can use the airline’s internet connection to find the direction to the Six Avenue Outfitters, their next clue location in Anchorage. They had to grab a bag of supplies while there and pick up their next clue.

Meanwhile, the other two teams sit at the gate, freaking out that Ron and Christina aren’t there yet. Did they get another flight? No, but they did get the directions they wanted.

While on the flight, T.K. talked to Rachel about how it could be a footrace now and that they could probably outrun everyone, yet he’d seen Ron run like a ninja.

Curious what nightmare he was having when he saw that scary image.

The clue at the Outfitters location told them to grab the bag of survival gear and head off to the Ship Creek Boat Yard. At least, that’s that the clue said. I swear that the censor police sure let this slide, because it didn’t sound like the word “ship” half the time they said it.

A little slower next time guys!

And speaking of slow, Nick forgot to pick up their gear, making it all the way to the Shit, erm, Ship Creek Boat Yard before they found out that they were supposed to have gloves and a fillet knife! Don conveniently blamed Nick for the mistake, telling him he didn’t pay attention and using his first blurred out F-word of the leg.

The Detour was one that actually made me glad the show isn’t filmed in high-definition. Teams had to choose between Cut the Cod or Grab the Crab, one of the race’s more unfortunate named challenges.

In Cut the Cod, you took your little fillet knife and dig through fish guts until you found a little canister holding your clue. Even in standard definition, that was one disgusting Detour.

Ron and Christina got there first as was their MO on this leg, and it took Ron only one fish to gut before they found their clue.

They next had to race off to 20 Mile River and take a super fast boat up to 20 Mile Glacier where the next task was to climb a wall of ice.

While they rushed off to that, T.K. and Rachel decide to Grab for Crabs and dropped into tanks where they quickly got bitten and pinched by a bunch of frakking crabs. They almost gave up to go to the other one because it ends up being difficult, but at the last second they find it!

It was good too, because Nick and Don had already made it back from going to the Outfitters to get their stuff and had drawn even with them after they gutted the cod.

T.K. and Rachel left first, but Don and Nick were only three minutes behind, and they are both around 20 back from the leaders.

With our hearts pounding and myself short on fingernails, the show decided to slow down and give us some deep thoughts from each of the teams while they shot up the river in some seriously sick fast speedboats.

Aww, thanks…nice moment, now, can we get back to it?

Ron and Christina get to the glacier first, and Ron is scared of heights and has a tough start, but then quickly gets to the top. Christina on the other hand can’t get up over the lip of the wall, and allows T.K. and Rachel to make up all 20 minutes.

But Christina scrambles up quickly and they rush off in a helicopter to Gooselake Park wherein lies the mother of all Road Block challenges.

I’d love to explain the Road Block to you, but I honestly don’t even know how the teams figured it out and they had DETAILED INSTRUCTIONS. Suffice it to say, they had to place 10 items that represented other items they had seen or had on the race in previous legs.

There were two ways to do it, but they had to place stuff on there is a specific combination. I don’t know how any of them did it without kicking that donkey all over again and throwing the guy that apparently was an animal through the nearby wall.

I’d have lost it.

Christina arrives first, but gets Ireland wrong and that allows Rachel to catch up and join in the fun. T.K. said she was smart and she must have been, because she quickly got most of the correct items up there, but was still wrong on her first attempt. Next Don and Nick showed up, with Nick deciding to do the Road Block.

It was here where the nerves got higher, as the other three had to sit and wait for their teammates to finish the challenge. This was the point where Don let out his second blurred F-word of the night.

I’m going to miss that old f***.

One thing though, it seems either they just don’t mention it anymore, or it’s not a requirement, but it used to be that each team member had to do an equal amount of Road Blocks on a race. Not sure if that’s gone now or what.

Rachel finally figured out what the red stick was, the pole vault from Ireland and that helped her solve the puzzle. She and T.K. are the first to leave and they are practically giddy with excitement.

And me too. I believe this was the first part of the race where I erupted in applause.

After they got to Cook’s Eye View of the Sleeping lady for their next clue, they had to take a taxi into town to find a Salmon Hooker, which was not what I originally thought it was. Again, I have to comment on the choice of names for things on this leg. Grab the Crap? Salmon Hooker?

But T.K. and Rachel get there before Ron and Christina and this is where my heart was really pounding, because my team was sooooo close to actually winning this thing. Could they do it?

Of course!

T.K. and Rachel finally got the clue that directed them to Girdwood Airport and said “Hurry!!! GO, GO, GO!!” as it directed them to the Finish Line where all the glory was waiting them.

And while the editors made it seems like it was neck and neck, T.K and Rachel got there first and Rachel almost lost it before she landed on the finish mat.

“I think I’m going to cry already” she cried out as the sprinted up between all the eliminated teams.

Me too Rachel…me too.

Phil let loose his trademark call:

“10 cities, 4 continents…and over 30,000 miles…T.K. and Rachel, you are the official winners of The Amazing Race!“

Wooo! Thank you Phil!

The moment of euphoria lasted only a second when Jennifer yelled at Phil, “Why do they ALWAYS finish first and not us???”

Okay, that didn’t happen, but damn it would have been funny.

Christina and Ron finished second, while Don and Nick came in third. It was a fantastic final leg and I was thrilled that T.K. and Rachel pulled it out.

There is something so exhilarating about the finale of this show, because I really think that unlike other competitions out there in reality land, this one really deals with pure human drive, and not the silly games and alliances and gadgets that you get with the others.

It’s a huge emotional adventure to go so hard and so long mentally, that at the end you just break down and laugh, cry and hug people.

My wife was laughing at me, so I hugged my dogs.

Well, it’s over now and congrats to T.K. and Rachel, they were a fun team, a cute couple and they did it without freaking out and yelling at each other the whole time.

And now we get to the results of our contest here. Which is actually pretty amazing, because four of us had the winning team from the get-go.

So what does this mean? The original contest was that I’d write a blog on anything you want me to. Nothing fancy or amazing, but that was the deal. So if you won and have an idea of what I can write about, let me know here!

Mike: Azaria/Hendekea, Rachel/TK, Lorena/Jason

Jina: Azaria/Hendekea, Rachel/TK, Marianna/Julia

Tracy: Ari/Staella, Rachel/TK, Jennifer/Nathan

Scott: Kynt/Vyxsin, Nicholas/Donald

Nicky: Jennifer/Nathan, Azaria/Hendekea

Kat: Nathan/Jenny, TK/Rachel

Well, it was a fun year, thanks for reading the recaps of this show and I can’t wait until the next one.