Introduction → Meet the Teams → Race Tracker → Leg 1 → Leg 2 → Leg 3 → Leg 4 → Leg 5 → Leg 6 → Leg 7 → Leg 8 → Leg 9 → Leg 10 → Leg 11 → Leg 12
Leg 22.07 – “Gold medal sa pagiging bobo.”
During the Pit Stop, teams are driven back to Copenhagen where they will hop back on the special Cebu Pacific A330neo to take them to Milan, Italy!
The 7th Leg of the Race will start in the Piazza del Duomo at 3am. The first clue of the Leg tells teams to make their way to San Siro Stadium.
As this season is filming, the Winter Olympics are ongoing in Beijing. And the next Winter Olympics will be hosted here in Italy by Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo. San Siro Stadium will host the Opening and Closing Ceremonies. Here, teams will pick up an LED Amazing Race Philippines torch which they must keep with them all the way until the Pit Stop. The LED torch must remain turned on at all times and must also be in the hand of at least one team member at all times. If not, teams will incur a penalty.
Teams must also now sign-up for one of two charter buses leaving as soon as they arrive. The first bus carries three teams while the second bus carries four.
Those charter buses will take tames to Fondamente Nove, a ferry hub in the city of Venice. From here, teams will take a public vaporetto, or water taxi, to the island of Murano.
And here, teams will encounter the Detour: Through the Fire or To the (Ceiling) Wall. For both Detours, teams will get to work with traditional Venetian glass on the island of Murano.
In Through the Fire, teams must head on foot to this factory where they will learn how to make millefiori, a type of mosaic design using this glass.
In To the (Ceiling) Wall, teams will assemble a Venetian chandelier using Murano glass.
After competing the Detour, teams can take a solo water taxi back to Venice and search the area for a brand-new 2023 Kia Sportage which they will drive to Cortina d’Ampezzo.
In the clue, teams are given a photo of a young musician in the streets of Cortina. Using the photo as their only clue, teams must find the musician in order to receive the next clue.
Teams must now make their way to the iconic Cinque Torri.
Here, they will traverse an alpine rescue bridge before then taking a zipline across a ravine to search for the cluebox below.
At that cluebox, teams will find another Detour: Need for Speed or Taking It Slow.
In Need for Speed, teams will hop on a snowmobile and search a 250-acre area for their next clue using only a small pair of binoculars. There are six potential clue locations, but only two of them have clues.
In Taking It Slow, teams will set up a campsite in which they must pitch a tent and fill it with supplies to match an example. They must then build a protective snow wall beside the tent to receive the next clue.
After this Detour, teams must make their way to Olympic Ice Stadium in Cortina where they will find the Road Block: Who can brave the elements?
For this Road Block, teams must learn and then correctly perform several figure skating elements.
When their routine is approved by the judges, teams can make their way on foot to Cable Car Tofana at Freccia Nel Cielo.
They will take the cable car up and look for a pair of fat bikes which they can ride to the Pit Stop somewhere on the snow-covered slopes.
The first team to check-in here will win P200,000 courtesy of Shell V-Power Nitro+.
The last team to check-in here WILL be eliminated.
“Director’s” Commentary
I was finalizing this route back in February and of course the Winter Olympics were ongoing at the time. So aside from this route having a Lenten theme at points, I was also inclined to include some Olympic-related locations and tasks as well.
Also in putting the route together, I wanted to have a snowy location for teams to visit. I like to have at least one very cold and one very hot Leg in every season. So choosing 2026 Winter Olympics host Cortina d’Ampezzo (and Milan) was a no-brainer.
It seems like there’s enough to actually have two Legs here in Italy. One Leg focused on Milan/Venice and the other Leg in Cortina. But Google scouting didn’t yield enough for its own TARPHDME Leg.
As this is an Olympic-themed Leg, we of course should start in Milan. Especially at the location of the Opening Ceremony. The torch was a last-minute addition to this Leg. I think it’s just a random thing for teams to do. But it could also provoke some drama as well. It will at least be annoying for teams to have to pretend they’re in a torch relay or something.
We start this Leg early in the morning in order to give teams enough time to drive from Venice to Cortina.
But we also can’t just leave Venice without doing something there. So Google scouting led me to Venetian glass from the island of Murano. Murano, in particular, stood out to me because my first car was a Nissan Murano. (I miss it!)
I decided to put a Detour here so as to help shuffle teams a bit more after the charter bus equalizer. And I think both sides of the Detour are challenging enough to do that.
After another long drive for the teams, the rest of the Leg is basically recycled somewhat from TAR4’s visit to Cortina. I don’t even remember where the musician Route Marker came from, but I had it in my notes so I kept it in. lol
The alpine rescue bridge/zipline is lifted from TAR4. And both sides of the Detour are from many different seasons of TAR around the world. Just simple, straightforward snow tasks.
Also typical is the figure skating Road Block. But what I envision is teams struggling mightily with figure skating elements, including spins and the like. So it should provide some great end of Leg drama.
Finally, one last physical task to have teams bike to the Pit Stop in the snow. But in putting together the Race Tracker for this Leg, I realized there is a possibility some teams could finish the Leg after dark. Not sure how safe it would be for teams to bike in the snow in the dark. So how crazy would it be to have teams wait overnight before being able to continue on with the biking to the Mat!
Overall, I think this has good potential as a Leg.