Brains beat brawn when BJ Averell and Tyler MacNiven won the $1 million prize in The Amazing Race 9. But it turns out the close friends' fun-loving hippie image almost did them in — off camera. How? Read on.
TVGuide.com: We never really saw you guys having to go through customs, but you obviously had to. Did you ever get delayed?Tyler MacNiven: In Japan we got held up in customs because we fit the hippie stereotype. Often you'll have hippie guys try to smuggle in drugs because they're very hard to get in Japan. In customs there we had to go into this backroom to get strip-searched — and it was all in Japanese, like some movie where these officers were getting us naked and going through our bags.BJ Averell: Dogs were sniffing through our bags. Tyler: That
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Amazing Race 9If we did some sort of analysis of all the Races' results, which would turn out to be the biggest factor in determining winners and losers: uncooperative airline-ticket agents, taxi drivers' senses of direction or contestants' ability to read a map? In this leg of the race, it really looked like the former two would be the undoing of someone, between the cabdrivers who couldn't find the trolley park and the two separate Russian ticket agents who refused to issue tickets just seconds after another team had bought some. But things nearly evened out again at the Mercedes-Benz test track. Who else was disappointed that the racers themselves didn't have to drive on it? I guess even Jerry Bruckheimer doesn't have that kind of insurance. Interest
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The Amazing RaceTonight's episode was brought to you by Acme Climbing Ropes. Why else would they be rappelling down a building and climbing up a waterfall in the same day? Also, what's up with these mornings when everyone is assigned different start times but then the place doesn't open until after everyone gets there? It's a cheap way to squeeze some suspense out of another cab ride. I'm glad they got out of São Paolo early on. Last week's helicopter ride was pretty, but it sure doesn't have much else in the way of telegenic tourist attractions.
I'm guessing that the partnership of Eric and Jeremy and BJ and Tyler will last as long as they stay at the front of the pack, but the minute they're in jeopardy, it's history. Eric and Jeremy
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The Amazing Race Whew! Two hours and 11 teams to discuss in my first crack at covering TAR — I think I need a bit of that Race fuel hippie boys B.J. and Tyler were running on. It's time to erase the awful memory of the way-less-than-Amazing family edition and fasten our seatbelts. And in the spirit of Sunday's Oscars, I'm going to hand out some awards here. The aforementioned shaggy duo get Best Narrators for naming "Barbie and Ken" (Monica and Joseph) and the "Double D's," for actually learning a few Portuguese phrases, and for coming up with the best metaphor for their pit-stop anxiety: "clawing at our teeth." They just barely beat out leg-wrestling "Glamazons" Lisa and Joni. I can't tell those two apart
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