The Amazing Race
Season 35, Episode 6
By Jim Memmott
Jaipur, India – No team this season has enjoyed and needed the Race more than the Hykel brothers, Liam and Yeremi.
Enthusiastic travelers, the military veterans liked being in Viet Nam and India. And Liam (far left) and Yeremi cherished their time together, healing the wounds of past differences. In interviews, they shed tears and laughed. You had to love them.
Alas, in Episode (or Leg) 6, Liam and Yeremi got stuck with the wrong rickshaw and lost far too much time going from destination to destination.
Thus, they finished last and were eliminated, taking poolsters Emily and Drew along with them. Liam, 23 and Yeremi, 24, were the season’s youngest team. So much for youth.
Wait a minute. The second youngest team, the Franklin brothers, Greg, 25, (far left) and John, 27, finished first on a leg that, like the previous outing, required a lot of exercise on a really hot day.
Good heavens, one challenge involved either carrying heavy bundles of flowers or carting a load of bricks and sand through crowded streets, dodging motorbikes, cars and cows along the way.
That made for good viewing, but some of the episode’s action was overshadowed by the Double U-Turn that host Phil Keoghan had been doomcasting since the start of the season.
Before they took off in Episode 6, each duo had to vote for the team it wanted to do both challenges on the Roadblock – that would be flowers and bricks – rather than just one. The votes were anonymous – to the teams, but not to viewers at home.
The Double U-Turn, and a mistake along the way, did slow Steve and Anna Leigh, but they survived, Steve doing OK on the last challenge, block printing a layered image of a peacock. They finished seventh out of nine, good enough.
The Texans were irked that their fellow competitors had turned on them, and they talked of payback. Really? It was an honor to be identified as the biggest threat. They should have just taken a bow.
Overheard:
Steve Cargile: Now we’ve got a target on our back.
Chelsea Day: Initially, I wanted to U-Turn Greg and John, but they’re too likeable, and I don’t want to disappoint their mom.
Todd Martin: We’ve been together so long I know how to deal with her; she (Ashlie) knows how to deal with me.
Corey McArthur: I might throw up on this leg.
Joel Strasser: I am so thirsty and so hot.
Chelsea: Our significant others didn’t choose us because we’re arm candy. They chose us because we can carry a barbeque up the stairs.
Robbin Tomich: After I survived a brain tumor and the death of my husband, I got this peacock (tattoo) on my harm to symbolize the beauty of the world.
Order of finish:
Greg and John Franklin, brothers
Corey and Rob McArthur, son and father
Joel Strasser and Garrett Smith, best friends
Morgan and Lena Franklin, sisters
Todd and Ashlie Martin, married, high school sweethearts
Andrea Simpson and Malaina Hatcher, college friends
Steve Cargile and Anna Leigh Wilson, father and daughter
Robbin Tomich and Chelsea Day, childhood best friends
Eliminated:
Liam and Yeremi Hykel, brothers
