The Amazing Race recap: Raise a Glass

I’m filling in for Jessica Shaw this week, and brother, did I luck out! I spent six months studying abroad in Germany, so I was loving last night’s sauerkraut-infused episode. Jet and Cord did not share my excitement: the move from South America to Central Europe definitely put Team Cowboy off balance. Early in the episode, perhaps anticipating the trouble they’d soon be having with subways and beer halls, Cord told his partner, ”There’s cities all over the world, Jet. We’re from the country. We can’t tell.”

The Brothers McCoy charmed a travel agent with some broken Spanish, and landed on the same flight as the Detectives. Detectives and Cowboys are usually natural enemies, like the mongoose and the rhino. But Louie and Michael seem to have a real affection for the Oklahoma Kids. On another flight, Carol and Brandy affirmed their new devotion to not freaking out all over each other: ”You get two strong-willed women together, and they think they’re right… the word for the day is RESPECTFUL.” Dan confirmed what some of us were already expecting, admitting that he doesn’t like traveling; he’s on the show because Jordan loves Race, and ”I saw an opportunity to help my brother achieve his dream.” So, just so we’re clear, people named Jordan always get what they want. Thanks for the lesson, TV!

The Cowboys and the Detectives arrived at the Bahnhof mere minutes ahead of the stragglers. ”Man, I just watched the movie where the lady fell off in the tracks,” said Jet. Or was it Cord? I can’t quite tell them apart, except by the color of their hats. (Is the one wearing the black hat the bad guy?) The stragglers were told by the helpful ticket-taker that the train was leaving in three minutes. Brent and Caite got lost (this is Be Kind to Airheads month, so I should point out that the Frankurt train station was designed by Dr. Caligari.) The stragglers all missed the train by just a few seconds. German trains always leave on time. Thanks for another lesson, TV!

In Hamburg, the teams had to find a street called Jungfernstieg, which roughly translates as ”young distant path” according to my internet translator. It was Intersection time: two teams had to merge, and one person from each team had to go bungee jumping. ”City and country are gonna work together today!” said Michael, patting Jet on the back. Jet, for his part, admitted that he wouldn’t have been able to find the subway without Michael: ”When we say Metro, that means City.”

The other alliances were interesting, and seemed to point toward future tension. Joe and Heidi paired up with Steve and Allie. Heidi: ”They come from a good family, we come from a good family.” Dan, on Carol: ”She’s like the lesbian aunt I never had.” Jordan and Jeff reached the Intersection point right before Brent and Caite arrived attractively in last place. ”Brent and Caite are like our alliance,” said Jeff. How can I put the awfulness of the JJ/BC alliance in geopolitical terms? It’s as if Luxembourg and Lichtenstein teamed up and bragged that they could totally kick Monaco’s butt.

Brent explained to the camera, ”Caite lived in New York for awhile; I got a feeling she can figure the subway out.” Jordan was equally confident in Caite’s ability to navigate Hamburg’s U-Bahn. Cut to: Caite, marveling at all the pretty colors on the subway map and getting on a car going in the wrong direction. ”The metro is not too specific about which places it goes to,” said Caite. Yes, as we all know, the Germans are an imprecise species, preferring ambiguity to cold hard facts. How else could there be so many German poets and so few German engineers?

NEXT: Keep your hat on!

Jet and Michael arrived at the 150-foot bungee jump. ”You will lose your hat, I think,” said the Bungee professional. Jet insisted that it would stay on. He was right: the hat didn’t leave his head, even when he was hanging upside down. Jet, my boy, you just broke the laws of physics! ”I’ve just proved to the world that you can bungee jump with a hat on,” said Jet, sounding like he’d just discovered penicillin. ”That was scarier than any door I’ve ever kicked,” said Michael, clearly angling for his own A&E reality show.

The rest of the bungee jumps were pretty perfunctory, except for Brandy’s screeching, I’m-gonna-die performance. (Further cementing the alliance, Dan managed to help keep her calm: ”We’re fine. We’re fine. We’re fine. I’ve got you.”)

The next instruction: find the statue of Germany’s first Emperor. Or, as Michael yelled at a taxi driver, ”We’re looking for Kaiser Wilhelm!” (Just don’t mention the war!) The Cowboys made a serious mistake: instead of springing for a Mercedes taxi, they attempted to take the subway. This decision seemed to send them into a tailspin for a few hours. In the meantime, the Detectives arrived at the statue first, and got to choose between two challenges: sports and eating. Or, as Phil put it, ”Germany’s two greatest traditions: soccer and sauerkraut!”

The soccer challenge was fairly straightforward and impossibly difficult: hit five targets from the penalty-kick area. Wisely, the Detectives chose the Sauerkraut: As a band played the Sauerkraut Polka, they had to finish a mountain of Sauerkraut. If they didn’t polish it off before the song ended, they had to start all over again. ”I’ve eaten things as big as Jet and Cord,” bragged Michael. They quickly housed the dish. Said Louie, handlebar mustache still damp with sour cabbage, ”I imagined it was pasta, and that was it.”

Somewhere in all this confusion, Father-daughter team Steve and Allie leaped into second place. This episode did nothing to solve the conundrum that Jessica pointed out last week: Who are these mysterious people who keep on acing all the challenges? More to the point: Is Steve secretly owning this season? On the soccer field, Steve knocked down the soccer targets one after the other.

The Brothers McCoy showed up at the soccer stadium full of all-American bravado; neither of them had ever played soccer before. ”Ah, cleats. Sweet!” exclaimed Jet. ”What I’ve seen on TV is all I know,” said Cord. Somehow, they managed to totally rock the soccer competition. (There’s a possibly apocryphal story about the POW soccer movie Victory that, during filming, Sylvester Stallone challenged best-soccer-player-ever Pelé to a round of penalty kicks, reasoning that soccer was not actually a real sport. Suffice it to say that Stallone did not have the McCoys’ natural talent.)

Louie and Michael arrived at Haifischbar (Shark Bar) for the mandatory drinking competition: a two-liter glass boot of beer. Michael mostly ceded drinking duties to Louie: ”It was so good to see him chugging that beer.” They were quickly off to the final stop of the night: Beatles-Platz, a monument honoring the Beatles, and The Indra, the bar where the Fab Four first hit it big playing American pop songs. (Fun fact: The Beatles had such a big following in Germany that they actually re-recorded some of their most popular songs in German. Don’t tell me you haven’t heard ”Komme Gib Mir Deine Hand”?)

NEXT: Jeff and Jordan can’t take the sauerkraut

At the back of the pack, in the land of beautiful people, Barbie Caite was getting mad at Ken Brent. ”I’m sick and tired of getting lost!” she screamed. Somehow, they weren’t even the worst off; Jordan and Jeff’s cabbie was the only bad driver in German history. He took them halfway down the Autobahn before he realized he was misreading his digital navigator. Jordan told Jeff they should’ve just gone to the soccer challenge, but Jeff pointed out, rather adroitly, ”This guy would’ve typed it in his GPS and we would’ve ended up in Switzerland.”

The Savage Detectives arrived in Beatles-Platz. Their taxi driver warned them it was right by the Red Light District: ”Pubs, discos, and sex shops.” Inside of the Indra, Beatles look-alikes were onstage. Phil welcomed the First Place team. Said the Detectives, ”I’m no longer a sheep, brother! I’m a wolf! AROOO!” DRUUNK! From zero to hero, indeed.

Back at the Shark bar, Steve kept his winning streak going by downing the Boot in what looked like two chugs. ”This is my dad’s favorite challenge in the world,” said Allie. Steve won over the bartender with his parting words: ”Thank you for the beer. Love you.”

At this point, the episode became a race between people who would lose by a little, and people who would lose by a lot. In the ”Lose by a little” category, Joe and Heidi had no luck with the soccer (”My knee is killing me,” Joe said five times), and decided to switch to the sauerkraut. Heidi, who clearly believes in Magical Thinking, promised that they’d be sauerkraut champions: ”We tailgate. We bring the sauerkraut.”

Dan and Jordan made short work of the soccer targets. I kind of enjoy the brother’s team dynamic: they seem like good friends, but there’s also a definite air of competitiveness in their interaction. (Dan: ”Jord, let’s stop wasting balls and time!”) Carol and Brandy made short work of the sauerkraut (Brandy ended up licking the plate, earning a congratulatory nod from the waiter.) Everybody was having trouble with the boot. Joe looked like he was about to vomit: ”I like drinking beer, but I dunno if I like this.” The cowboys admitted something a little bit surprising: ”I never drank a beer in my whole life.” What’s not to love about Jet and Cord? Nothing. Nothing is not to love.

Meanwhile, in the ”Lose by a Lot” category, Jordan and Jeff returned from their misadventure in the German countryside. They were rallying. They knew they had to devour the sauerkraut. When the waiter brought out the plate, Jordan made a face that I would charitably describe as ”undiplomatic.” She plugged her ears when the band started playing the polka. They managed to eat about 1/8 of the plate. ”See you later, sauerkraut!” said Jeff. They beat a hasty retreat and tried to find the soccer stadium. Jeff, always the optimist, said, ”Hopefully, somebody fell off a bridge with cement shoes.”

Speaking of the soccer stadium! Caite was excited when she heard about the soccer challenge. Soccer, it seems, was her number one sport: ”I’m really good at it.” Brent nodded in agreement and decided that the best tactic was, as usual, to let Caite do everything while he hung back and showed the world his best Blue Steel. Unfortunately, Caite hurt herself from all the kicking. She was screaming in pain. Brent helpfully advised her, ”Don’t hurt yourself. Just kick the ball.”

NEXT: Phil has some happy news

Joe and Heidi arrived at the nightmarish Beatles bar in third place. Just behind them, the Cowboys made friends with the Shark bar denizens, who were cheering them on as they gagged through the beer. Gesturing at the almost-empty boot, Cord said, ”You’re down to a tennis shoe,” which is pretty funny. ”I never ever in my life want another beer,” he said, on his way to a fourth-place finish. Tough night for the Cowboys! I have to point out that Carol had the definite burp of the night, with a proud belch that echoed across the Rhineland. I should also point out that Dan and Jordan had my favorite exchange of the night:

”Are we in the red light district?”

”Hell yeah we are! And I’m drunk!”

Big shocker: Caite is not a beer drinker. She had a tiny sip from the boot and made a face I would generously describe as war-instigating. At last, Brent had his chance to do something useful for the team. He tried to chug the beer. The result was not pretty. ”I’m gonna throw up,” he said. ”I’m really gonna throw up.” Viewers, Brent doesn’t lie! While he regurgitated all over the historic streets of Hamburg, his galpal waited patiently. When he got back in, she comforted him: ”Just chug it.” The Germans cheered him on.

The model couple sped away to Beatles plaza. Jordan and Jeff arrived, and after their worst day yet, Jeff finally found something he was good at. He polished the beer off in about two seconds, and proved himself the fan favorite of the Shark Bar regulars. Despite a big lead, Team Dating Models barely got to the finish line ahead of Team Newly Dating. This might have just been in the editing, but I can actually believe that the high maintenance beauties had trouble walking in a straight line down the street. If the last two teams actually were that close together, then Team J & J was undone by Jeff’s wandering eye: ”That’s a strip joint,” he marveled, ”These are all strip joints!”

Phil laid a happy twist on the sad couple: ”This is a non-elimination leg.” So Jordan and Jeff will live to get lost another day. How did you feel about this, viewers? Do you think they’ll be able to redeem themselves? Personally, I’m betting that they last longer than Caite and Brent: the fact that Caite made coming in seventh for the third time sound like a good thing (”Lucky number 7! Three time’s the charm!”) doesn’t fill me with confidence.

How did you feel about the trip to Hamburg, Race fans? Despite a little stumble, Jet and Cord still feel like the frontrunners to me; even when it became clear that they were starting to fall behind, they didn’t seem the least bit anxious, and that steadiness will almost certainly serve them well. Conversely, even though I’m a big fan of the Savage Detectives, it feels to me like their success last night was due to more than a few lucky breaks. Then again, there’s the ongoing mystery of Steve and Allie: whoever they are, they’re doing good things.

Lastly, does next week’s episode look bananas, or does it look BANANAS?!?!

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