| Episode 14.02: Your Target is Your Partner’s Face
Wonder Women and Men
So the 2nd leg of the Race brought us a few more “fresheners” as the, I guess, extended recap at the beginning of the episode had the teams commenting on how amazing Margie & Luke are. All right.
The 2nd leg of the Race begins with Margie & Luke receiving their first clue telling them to fly to Munich, Germany. Once there, they’ll drive themselves to the town of Ruhpolding where they will take a cable car up the mountain to get their next clue.
  
Margie talks about Luke growing up. Tammy & Victor leaving 2nd discuss how they will try to get that big brother, baby sister dynamic to work well for them as a team. Mark & Michael say they are at 98% and think they don’t have to be GO all the time while Mel & Mike say Mel is still hurting from pulling his groin last leg.
Amanda & Kris are keeping up their sweetness, Kisha & Jen relate that they too have to get over that older sister, baby sister dynamic. Steve & Linda realize they have to do things differently this leg and get emotional relating their experience from the first leg.
On the way to the airport, all the teams except Margie & Luke and Mel & Mike use the taxi driver’s cell phones to reserve seats on the 7:10am flight, the earliest one. The next flight is 8:45am.
All the teams except Mark & Michael and Christie & Jodi make the first flight.
Miracle Eagle
In Munich, Tammy & Victor arrive in Ruhpolding first and are up the mountain while Amanda & Kris just miss the first car and have some of the other teams catch up to them.
At the top, the teams find the Road Block, Who’s ready to fly like an eagle?
In this Road Block, the team member must paraglide down in tandem with an instructor while their partner takes the gondola down to the landing area to meet them. However, conditions have to be right for them to do accomplish the task. If it gets too windy, teams can either wait for conditions to improve or trek a 60 minute hike down the mountain to their waiting partners.
(Sounds like a Detour, yeah?) And also of note, the clue specifically read that the person must be able to hear cues from the instructor, which of course defaulted Margie into doing the task.
Very much still ahead of the others, Tammy decides to get a head start and run down. As the rest of the teams arrive, one by one they also decide it’ll be better for them to hike down than to wait an unknown amount of time for the wind to change direction.
  
With a worried Mike looking on, Mel hopes for at least one other team to stay and wait it out with him, but he is left the only one standing at the top of the mountain, his injury partly keeping him up there. After saying God has enough to do than to change wind direction for him, a calm suddenly fell across the valley and they were ready for take off.
It was a miracle “straight from God,” they say.
As Mel takes to the sky, Tammy, Margie, Kris, and Victoria reach their partners and they’re off to the next route marker at a field in Schönau am Königsee in Bavaria.
Linda, meanwhile, wowed by what she sees as she rides in the gondola chooses to do the Road Block but takes a wrong turn end ends up on the other side of the mountain.
Exasperated and worried about Steve’s reaction when they reunite, Linda reaches a road and gets a ride from a nice lady. She meets back up with Steve who to her surprise, isn’t yelling at her for getting lost.
Scooters and Cakes
Tammy and Victor, still ahead, reach the clue box and find the Detour. In this Detour, teams choose between Balancing Dolly and Austrian Folly.
In Balancing Dolly, teams will each have to navigate a Segway scooter on an 2-mile obstacle course to get their next clue.
In Austrian Folly, teams enter a party tent where they must throw pies at each other’s faces until they find the one with a cherry filling. After presenting themselves to the band leader, they’ll get their next clue.
The siblings choose Austrian Folly and quickly finish. They get their next clue telling them to walk to two nearby Tyrolean Woodcutters where they’ll have them cut a small piece of wood which will be stamped with their next clue.
They find the next clue tells them to head to the Pit Stop at Schloss Hellbrunn in Salzburg, Austria.
Tammy & Victor have no problem the rest of the way and arrive first at the Pit Stop, winning hybrid go-karts.
  
Back to the rest of the teams, Amanda & Kris arrive at the clue and decide to do Australian Austrian Folly. They too breeze past and are off to the Pit Stop.
Mel & Mike arrive and are apparently Segway experts and Margie convinces a reluctant Luke to do the cakes.
Brad & Victoria choose the cakes and back on the road, Kisha & Jen are lost for a 2nd time this leg. Kisha grows increasingly annoyed and frustrated by Jen acting like the “big sister.”
Happiness in Life
They eventually arrive with Cara & Jaime, Mel & Mike and Christie & Jodi right there with them.
The first three take the Segways while Christie & Jodi do the cakes.
Mel & Mike manage to pass Amanda & Kris to take 2nd at the Pit Stop. The young couple settle for 3rd with Margie & Luke finishing 4th.
Brad & Victoria take 5th and Jaime & Cara finish 6th and we are told that it’s been 14 hours since the Race start. (Should it be LEG start?)
Steve & Linda finally arrive as Christie & Jodi are the only ones left at the Detour area. With Christie & Jodi concerning themselves with hooves and wood, Steve & Linda finish the Detour feel they are still in it.
The last four teams race to the Pit Stop. Jen & Kisha are surprised to be 7th, Mark & Michael are surprised to be 8th.
It comes down to the flight attendants and our married couple with Christie & Jodi escaping elimination again in 9th (Dandrew in the making?).
  
And Steve & Linda arrive in last place and are eliminated. They are emotional on the mat, but Linda leaves a lasting quote…“You could have a million dollars and still not be happy, and having him makes me happy.”
Overall
It was a great leg. The Road Block provided great drama and the Detour was much more fun than it looked on paper and the previews.
Didn’t really notice any more new stuff except for the extended recap which is kind of like Survivor’s post-Tribal recaps they started using the last few seasons, as well as the new Detour graphic and the almost randomly placed fact of how long since it’s been since the start of the leg. It’s great that they actually tell us, it’s definitely an interesting thing to think about, but I just wonder why it was placed at that time and not another time in the leg or maybe several times in the episode?
Anyway, TAR14 is off to a great start! |
Jennifer
