Recap: The Amazing Race Canada 10, Episode 3 – “Don’t Soil Yourself”

Recap: The Amazing Race Canada 10, Episode 3 – “Plot Twist It’s a U-Turn Vote”

Michael & Tyson begin the Leg at 6:43 am, opening the first clue directing them to drive to the town of Sechelt. The clue also warns of a U-Turn Vote with the first team to arrive at the board receiving an advantage.

Lauren & Nicole are the first team to arrive at Salish Soils where they must mix a specific blend of different soils and transport it to a community farm one kilometer away where they will transfer the load to bags until they weight 160kg.

Michael & Tyson and Katie & Taylor arrive right behind them. Colin & Matt arrive next and hope to tell the other teams they should U-Turn Kevin & Gurleen.

But when Kevin & Gurleen arrive, they tell Lauren & Nicole and Michael & Amari to target Katie & Taylor. Later, Kevin & Gurleen tell Julia & Oliva that teams have mentioned voting for Lauren & Nicole. Gurleen reminds Kevin to stay humble.

Michael & Tyson move into the lead and must drive to the Langdale Ferry Terminal to catch a ferry to Horseshoe Bay and then drive to Granville Island in downtown Vancouver.

At the terminal, Kevin & Gurleen tell Michael & Amari they want to be in an alliance and that other teams have mentioned Lauren & Nicole as vote targets. Michael & Amari take the twin aside and they compare notes on Kevin & Gurleen, realizing they are being played.

All teams make the 10:20am ferry. And while on the water, Kevin & Gurleen talk to Colin & Matt Julia & Olivia to encourage voting for the twins.

Lauren & Nicole then talk to Colin & Matt who tell them about Kevin & Gurleen and the two teams agree to vote for the couple at the U-Turn board.

Michael & Tyson are the first to arrive at Granville Island Public Market. Here, teams must find Winnie who will hand them a Public Market on Granville Island tote bag with a list of six different ingredients they must purchase and deliver to six different restaurants in three different neighborhoods. One team will win The Assist by Desjardins for this task.

Colin & Matt meet a local who offers to guide them to all the stalls selling the items they need.

As the other teams arrive and get started with their shopping, Lauren & Nicole arrive in 7th and are treated with The Assist by Desjardins which will require them to only deliver four ingredients. As they get started, they tell Brad & Sam they will vote for Kevin & Gurleen. Vancouver-natives Brad & Sam quickly make their first deliveries and then take a taxi to three of the other restaurants.

Kevin & Gurleen ask Lauren & Nicole if they know where one of the stalls is, but the twins say they don’t, much to Gurleen’s shock.

Michael & Amari hop on a water taxi and the driver recognizes Mike for his all-star days.

Meanwhile, Brad & Sam zoom into first place and must now make their way to Parker Place in Richmond. Here, teams must unscramble and sort an entire set of Mahjong tiles. With only the help of local players, they must arrange their set of 42 tiles in the right direction, suit and numerical order.

After Mona hands teams their next clue, they can run to the U-Turn Vote board. The first team to arrive will get an extra vote to give.

Elsewhere, Michael & Tyson are already in their taxi, but have to go back to the market to get their Japanese rice which they left on the counter.

As Brad & Sam and Colin & Mat6t get started figuring out the Mahjong tiles, the other teams finish their deliveries one after the other. Lauren & Nicole. Michael & Tyson, Taylor & Katie, Michael & Amari arrive and start learning the Mahjong. But Colin & Matt move into first place and run to the U-Turn board.

Colin & Matt give both votes to Kevin & Gurleen. They open the next clue directing teams to Penticton, BC where they will find a surprise on the SS Sicamous.

Lauren & Nicole also decide to vote Kevin & Gurleen who just arrive at the Mahjong before Connor & John who have been in last place all day.

Taylor & Katie are next to get the thumbs up and hurry to the U-Turn board to vote for Lauren & Nicole. Michael & Amari vote for Kevin & Gurleen. Brad & Sam are next to get their tiles approved and they give Michael & Tyson the critical tip that gets them approved as well, all in the hopes that they will get the Express Pass in return. Julia & Olivia finish in 7th followed by Kevin & Gurleen.

Julia & Olivia run into Michael & Amari and tell them they’ll be voting Lauren & Nicole. The father and son tell them about Kevin & Gurleen playing all of them.

Taylor & Katie call for a cab, but Kevin & Gurleen manage to steal it with Gurleen lying that they are “Katie and Taylor”. Kevin & Gurleen move into 3rd with Michael & Amari, Michael & Tyson, Brad & Sam, Julia & Olivia leaving in taxis next. Connor & John find a taxi next, pushing Taylor & Katie to last.

Taylor & Katie now regret not voting for Kevin & Gurleen at the U-Turn board.

Episode Thoughts

Okay, this was a weird episode and it seems to be a pretty weird Leg. The show definitely was able to bring about maximum U-Turn drama. But the Leg itself is really awkward.

Okay, let’s get to the good stuff first before we go whining about the rest of it lolol

The tasks were fine. All Active Route Info tasks and yet it felt like it was more than a typical TARUS Leg. Lolol Even in the 90-minute Era. The soil task was a nice showcase of an indigenous-led company. And a good physical task to start the Leg.

Some faux ferry drama after that. But a shopping and delivery task (coincidentally?) reminiscent of the double episode Leg last season in Toronto. This task is obviously also modeled after the shopping tasks on international-traveling TARs where language and cultural barriers would make it much more interesting. But this is TAR Canada. So it loses that extra bit of fun. What’s good though was that the task seemed to shuffle the teams up. So that’s very welcome.

The Mahjong task was another task that you probably would see on a visit to maybe Singapore or, like TARAu7 last year, Malaysia or somewhere else in Asia. When the spoilers for this Leg came out while filming, I expected this Leg to maybe feature more Asian-related tasks because of the area. But I expected wrong lolol

The task itself is familiar for me just because of TARAu7, but certainly different for TARC.

I think halfway through the episode, I realized that this would be some form of a To Be Continued episode. And then the shopping task reminded me of last season and that pretty much confirmed to me what would happen. Especially since there was only about 15 minutes left in the episode and no U-Turn vote board.

Which brings me to my criticism of the episode and Leg I guess.

So the first thing was how, while fun to see lots of U-Turn drama, I was also confused at times. The show would insert convos of teams discussing the U-Turn or throwing out names of teams at random times. But they felt repetitive. Like, early in the Leg, for example, two teams would have already told each who to vote for. Then later, they’d come together and act like they hadn’t already decided on who to vote for. Like, mentioning a team like it was the first time they’d ever brought their names up. And this happened multiple times too.

So it was fun to see teams seemingly active in discussing who to vote for. But the way it played out felt awkward and weird and repetitive somehow.

Then there’s the Leg design. This is certainly more of a traditional TBC/KOR Leg than last season’s was. The Toronto Leg last year felt more like a regular Leg stretched out to fill two episodes.

This Leg feels like the typical KOR Leg where teams are told to keep racing and then get bunched up in the middle of the Leg/end of the episode. Which it appears to be the case here as teams end up equalized on the flight to Penticton.

Which then basically negates this episode and first half of the Leg. And then in turn gives the U-Turned team the best case scenario where they could conceivably complete both Detours before another teams has even completed one.

I think when TAR fans say they want to have U-Turns, but still give that team an opportunity to catch up in the end, I don’t think we mean this lol

So to have three pretty good tasks basically be staged only to drive U-Turn drama, the whole thing kind of falls flat. And a bit contrived too.

TAR Canada almost implemented the U-Turn vote in a good way. We’ll see how the U-Turn unfolds next episode. But as great as this episode seemed to start out, it kinda got muddled by the end.

Team Thoughts

Teams were all alright this episode. Very interesting having seemingly strong female teams like Lauren & Nicole and Taylor & Katie being perceived as threats to even be considered for a U-Turn. Especially when a team like Kevin & Gurleen is right there. I suppose CTV would want them to stick around though. So I certainly don’t think the U-Turn, if it’s them, will knock them out of the Race.

Episode Quotes

Route Info: “Don’t soil yourself.”

Nicole: “I think I got fish compost in my mouth. Ugh, dude, I’m dead.”

John: “Call me Santa Claus, baby.”

Man: “Yes, you can count.”