By Arthur Perkins

Amazing Race 14, Episode 10 Recap  by  Arthur Perkins
 
This episodes starts in sight of the Sun and Moon Pagodas in Guilin. After what may have been a 24 hour pit stop or slightly more, teams are released from the pit stop as follows:
Kisha/Jen 148pm
Tammy/Victor 149pm
Margie/Luke 150pm
Jaime/Cara 212pm
 
Their destination in Beijing and a specific foot massage parlor there. All team race to the airport and get tickets on the 510pm China Southern flight to Beijing. There was much jockeying for position in taxis, both to the Guilin airport and from the Beijing airport, but the relative positions of the racers changed only a little. Victor attempted to use his Chinese language skills to get 2 opposing teams seated near the back of the plane. Jaime/Cara were stuck there, costing them valuable time in getting off. The flight arrived at 805pm.
 
The taxi ride to Jia Guo Men outer street and the foot massage parlor there means the ROADBLOCK "Who's feeling manipulative?" starts. It is a 10 minute foot massage with lots of pain involved (and highlighted on television in CBS' pathetic attempt to heighten the drama) starting with drinking a cup of Chinese herbal tea. There are lots of grimaces but no cries of UNCLE (which triggers a temporary end to that session and the restart of another 10 minute session, making it a foolish option to elect). Jen, Cara, Tammy, and Luke elect to do this ROADBLOCK and teams finish with exactly the same time differentials that they entered with. What a stupid ROADBLOCK if it is designed to have all time differentials stay identical to coming to it! IN the middle of this, Victor tells Margie "They'll be all right. Noone has died from this foot massage
 
The next task is a DETOUR at the natatorium (basically indoor water sports center with 2 pools) found at the north gate of (get this name) "Guang Cai Ti Yu Guan Bei Men Yi You Yong Quan". Next time you're in Beijing you find it if you can remember how to spell all of it. The DETOUR is a choice of Sync or Swim. Sync is the more interesting, teams putting on regular swim trunks and ascending the 3 meter (10 foot) diving board for a synchronized jump into the pool. No effort was made to force teams to attempt even a swan dive. Both divers had to enter the water together in good form to receive a score of 5 from each of 2 judges. Only two 5s would earn them the next clue. Swim was to put on a spandex SPEEDO LASER full-body suit like the one worn by Michael Phelps at the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics and each teammate had to alternate 2 sets of 2 laps in what appeared to be a modified relay format. I saw the freestyle, some backstrokes, and some using the lane markers to pull themselves along. Teams were encouraged match Michael Phelps' gold medal time of 4 minutes 3 seconds (what a farce to even suggest that despite the teams having the edge of not having to swim the slower breaststroke).
 
This was where all the excitement took place. Tammy/Victor arrived first, considering swimming but rejected it and went to the board to dive. Unfortunately the best they ever scored was 4 and 3, not good enough to get the clue. They finally decided that swimming wasn't so bad after all and they switched and finished with 10:29 well after Jaime/Cara and Margie/Luke. Kisha/Jen arrive second and Jen says she is scared of the water and cannot do the swim: "The thought of water makes me extremely nervous." So they try diving but are poor at it and after the other 3 teams are finished they start the swimming and finish in 18:19.  Jaime/Cara arrived third (with the clock at the entrance gate showing 9:31pm) and they swam quite well at 9:30.  Margie/Luke arrived fourth and they set a blistering 8:05 pace, double that of Phelps but who cares? They were rightly very pleased with it.
 
So the departures from the natatorium were I the order Jaime/Cara, Margie/Luke, Tammy/Victor and Kisha/Jen, with I am guessing about a 30 minute spread from Jaime/Cara to Kisha/Jen. Victor had what looked like a severe cramp that had to die won before he could get his leg into the waiting taxi. They go to the expected pit stop at the north gate of the Drum Tower. Phil is there with a mat and no greeter in sight. Amazing Race veteran viewers know exactly what that means. Jaime/Cara, who expected their first victory ever, find that they get a clue instead and a directive to KEEP RACING. The not-often-seen-on-Amazing-Races ToBeContinued (TBC) has just been invoked. Since it is now approximately 1030pm, teams can now expect hours of racing in the middle of the night unless they hit an Hours of Operation restriction.

(Photo courtesy of CBS)

For more The Amazing Race Links visit Sirlinksalot.net