Introduction → Leg 1 → Leg 2 → Leg 3 → Leg 4 → Leg 5 → Leg 6 → Leg 7 → Leg 8 → Leg 9A → Leg 9B → Leg 10 → Leg 11 → Leg 12
Leg 16.02 – “You should’ve stopped it with your face!”
The Race is in full swing now. And teams begin the 2nd Leg by learning they will be flying across the Pacific Ocean to Buenos Aires, Argentina!
All teams will be flying via Auckland on Air New Zealand, arriving in Buenos Aires at 4:50pm.
Once in Buenos Aires, teams are merely directed to “Find Evita Peron.”
They must figure out that their next clue waits at the grave of former First Lady Eva Peron in Recoleta Cemetery. BUT HOURS OF OPERATION! The cemetery has closed at 5:30pm and will reopen at 7am.
Teams camp outside the cemetery overnight before entering the next morning.
That clue only says: “The greatest of all time scored at this location and once called it home.” Teams must figure out that this clue refers to all-time football and soccer great Diego Maradona. And the clue is pointing them to his once home stadium, La Bombonera.
And at La Bombonera, teams will find their first Duel Duel of the Race!
For this Duel Duel, teams must score as many penalty kicks as they can in 30 seconds. Both team members will kick while both opposing team members will play goalkeeper. The winning team will then choose a random piece of paper which will reveal the seat number in the stadium where their next clue is waiting. The losing team must face off against the next team. The last place team must do two laps around the stadium and then kick 20 goals to receive their next clue.
This is also the first Trigger Point of the Race. If any team fails to score a single goal during a face off, the U-Turn or Yield will be activated on the next Leg.
After the Duel Duel, teams will open the next clue to reveal the Detour: Polo or Perro.
Argentina is considered the polo capital of the world. In Polo, teams must make their way to Campo Argentino de Polo where they will choose a color and then search the stadium for all polo mallet pieces with that matching color. Teams must find enough pieces needed for 25 polo mallets. Once they have correctly assembled all their mallets, teams will receive their next clue.
You would be hard pressed to find more skilled dog walkers than those in Buenos Aires. In Perro, teams will get to experience the popular occupation by walking ten dogs along a mapped course in the city. They must pick up numbered flags at four checkpoints along the course before bringing the dogs to their final destination. Teams can then exchange their flags for the next clue.
That clue directs teams to Plaza de Mayo where they will find the first Road Block of the Race: Who can be a good matchmaker?
The tango was born in Argentina and Uruguay in the mid-19th century amongst the working class of Buenos Aires and Montevideo. Today in this plaza, more than 162 dancers are dancing the tango… alone. For this Road Block, teams must choose four solo dancers waiting in a separate area and then search amongst the 162 for their partners who will be dancing the exact same steps sequence. Once they have partnered up the correct four couples, teams will receive the next clue.
And that clue tells teams to find the Pit Stop along the waterfront of Puerto Madero.
The first team to check in here will win P200,000 courtesy of the ever generous Shell V-Power Nitro+.
The last team to check in here WILL be eliminated.
“Director’s” Commentary
I am really excited about this Leg. Basically half of it is recycled from TAR5’s Buenos Aires Leg, but as a whole I think this could make for a great and exciting Leg.
First, I think a visit to Evita Peron is a must for any Buenos Aires visit. And who knows, this could be our first and only visit to Argentina. So we gotta make the most of it of course.
In TAR5, teams arrived in the morning, so there was this frenzy to find the right cemetery with some teams correct and others wrong and falling behind. That might happen here on TARPHDME, but all teams will be equalized anyway.
Of course, being in Buenos Aires, we must also tip our hat to Diego Maradona. You could do anything with soccer (TARPHDME definitely has recycled soccer tasks before lol). But I think using the excellent La Bombonera location as the site of a Duel Duel would be great.
And for this Duel Duel, it is a fresh take on the basic kicking into a goal-task. Instead, teams will really face off and have to work to stop the other team from scoring. We put it only at 30 seconds to keep things quick. And it should be interesting to see just how successful teams can be with two people guarding the goal. The Trigger Point might easily be activated lol But there’s definitely some interesting strategy to be used here.
Finding the clue in the stands is just a bit of random luck and extra task to fill out the Leg, but also create some drama if teams can pass each other. Also nice to help tire the teams out as well.
The Detour recycles TAR5’s dog walking Detour because it really is a great task. It is always great to have animals on TAR of course. And dog walking is definitely not easy, especially with so many. So we hope for some nice meltdowns.
The polo mallet side of the Detour gives a nod to Argentina’s polo history of course. But since we already have a goal scoring task this Leg, assembling mallets is our task here. It should be a nice, tedious task for teams.
Finally, I think the highlight of the Leg will be the Road Block. This task looks great on paper (hope you can understand what I want to do here lol), but I don’t know if it could actually work. Needing to search through a sea of people is always a good way to frustrate and upset teams. But this could be a very difficult task as I don’t remember any TAR ever having teams match people through dance moves and movements instead of costume. It could be insane and awesome.
And we of course want to nod at Argentina’s tango roots. But instead of having teams dance, this needle in a haystack task is much more intriguing and fresh. And again, hopefully frustrating for teams!
The Pit Stop is at the Puerto Madero waterfront development merely because I like that shot of the cranes and the idea of the Mat being right under them. The original Pit Stop location was the Parque Centenario Amphitheater. Which would be a nice choice too.
Overall, I think this is a really great and possibly exciting Leg!