Is Phil pronouncing gnome as “no-em”? It’s kind of annoying
Nothing Phil does could possibly be annoying.
Just sayin’.
Important note to Gretchen:
Your team has been nicknamed team Weeble because Weebles wobble but they don’t fall down and your team has failed to come in last due to the clumsiness of other teams more times than any reasonable person would have predicted. This means it is not the end of the world if your team comes in last. On the other hand, it means that there is no good reason to panic and scream (especially if you have reason to believe that you are not the team in last place!).
Persons on this board have been fussing about Gretchen for a long time, and I wasn’t sure what frustrated them so. Tonight I figured it out.
Totally unrelated: I loved it that the last team to arrive was the team that got the Travelocity prize- which included the stay at the classy hotel (which should make loss of toiletries less of a problem).
And um, by the way, it seems to me that you are getting close enough to the end of the race that loss of your possessions is less devastating a loss than it would be earlier in the race.
Definitely. Oh yeah. fanning self He looked gooooood tonight!
I’m a fan, but I still thought it was pretty funny when Rob’s scheming backfired. Nice to know it doesn’t work for him every time.
Tonght’s funniest line:
Rob: “What’s a gnome”?
It’s a city in Alaska, dumbass.
For God’s Sake, I’m tired of Kvetchen’s miserable griping, and I’m gonna have to listen to it for at least another week! But tactically, it was brilliant to have her do the physically grueling task. This is probably the only time Kvetchen and Neardeath will go into any challenge with a significant lead over their younger, hardier rivals, and this saves Neardeath’s meagre reserves for the next two or three legs.
I love that Rob’s “Did you get on the earlier flight” shtick blew up in his face. He’s probably watching this episode and kicking himself.
But what did I love even more? Ron’s “dangit” 10 minutes on top of a castle while Rob and Amber make their way to the pitstop. The pullback from him fruitlessly looking for a key to Romber was priceless!
BTW-- did anyone notice that the ‘mugging by Phil’ rules have changed yet again? Not only do they lose all their gear and all their cash, but Ron and Kelly have to start the next leg with no money. I assume this is to avoid the move the models made in Season 5 where they were able to beg in a decent hotel. In the 4 Seasons, Ron and Kelly could easily make more cash than the other teams will start with!
How could Rob and Amber and Team POW have NOT found out about that earlier flight to Istanbul. Were those travel agents lying to them? They definitively said the two teams were on the earliest possible flight. I don’t get it!
That being said, the weigh-in task was a good example of what makes Rob and Amber such good racers. They divided the task equitably. Amber took charge of the scale. Rob organized folks to be weighed in a neat line and popped them on and off the scale efficiently. Boom! Task over. No arguing. No whining. Just good racing.
And that being said, I just wanted to stuff a sock in Gretchen’s whiney mouth!!! JUST SHUT UP!!!
And even though I, too, suspected that this would be a non-elimination leg, I was a nervous wreck through the whole show. (I am a Romber fan!)
But wasn’t the Columns task simple? Who knew?
Actually I’d heard that this was an existing rule all season but they didn’t mention when Kvetchen and what’s his name–the wussy old geezer came in last.
Anyway, good episode, and man o man is Kelly a megabitch.
Did anyone else notice the start times? Team Bald’s fastforward brought them to the mat 2 minutes before Romber and POW/megabitch (heh) and 9 minutes before Kvetchen and Neardeath (heh heh). Wow they were running pretty tight until the planes tonight.
I noticed that, too! That must have been some really close finish. Didn’t look all that close on the episode last week. I wonder what the arrival times were in tonight’s episode.
I figured that finding the numbers would be no problem for a team with some navigation skills (note, this leaves out the top two teams from this leg).
What I didn’t figure on was that you would not be provided the order that the numbers came in the combination: Ron and Kelly were fortunate to get it on their 4th try. There was what, 20 or so more combinations to go?
I love Rob, but I LOVED the way the flight thing backfired - now that’s good TV!
Wow, an actual upset in the established order of the last 4 episodes. Astounding!
From the Leaderboard:
Uchenna/Ilia: Way to out-Rob Rob! I have liked this team from the beginning. And, uh, is it just me, or did they manage not to get lost this ep? In fact, they might have been the only team this week without a serious navigation error.
Neardeath / Kvetchen: Lotta love there, N. Make your wife who fell down the mineshaft risk a second concussion on a castle wall. Reminds me of an old Chas. Addams cartoon, where the guy is a ticket counter with his wife, whispering to the agent, “A round-trip and a one-way to Ausable Chasm…”
Romber: Sucks to be behind the teams you called “stupid”, doesn’t it? Didn’t even win the Travelocity prize, didja? Musta crapped out that horseshoe in India, Rob.
Ron/Kelly: I agree that losing your stuff this late in the race is less of a liability, and that the four-star hotel stay will, shall we say, ease the blow. Hmm, the two teams that stayed at the less fancy hotel before the plane finished last this time, and now R&K get a serious upgrade. Could we be looking at a Romb-ah-limination next week?
Uchenna and Joyce ran a solid, solid, leg. Way to maintain first place. Forgive me for thinking that helping Gretchen & Meredith wasn’t that alturistic a move on your part – by helping them finish second, you almost knocked out another team by keeping a physically weaker team around. Had this been an elimination round that might have worked out in your favor.
Romber: HA HA.
Since Ron & Kelly won’t show up at the Pit Stop for the next 12 hours, will the other teams assume they’d been eliminated?
Aw heck, it seems like Meredith & Gretchen have busted the greatest TAR myth – that you actually NEED BACKPACKS to complete the race! Hell, the backpacks probably slow everyone down! I wouldn’t be surprised to see future teams start the race with nothing but a spare pair of undies and a headband lamp…
I too noticed Phil’s line about starting the next leg with no money…but I wonder if it’s legal for them to spend the night begging for money, buy some new gear, and give away the change? I’d at least try it…although without her makeup and hair dryer, I expect Kelly to fold very quickly on the next leg.
Still hate Rob, but I loved his “blondes leading the blondes” line, right in front of Amber and Kelly. 
Futher Important Note to Gretchen: Generally speaking, the inhabitants of Istanbul are not likely to understand Spanish words like “grande” and “rapido.”
And I could have sworn I heard Phil tell the old farts that they had to start the next leg with no money. They didn’t beg money from the others until after the next leg had begun.
Oh, forgot to ask: Was anyone able to tell which side of the Bosphorus Strait the pit stop was on? (In other words, did they finally make it to Europe?)
the first time they took the money from Team Weeble also. It will be interesting next week to see who gives them money, if they need it. They haven’t helped the two teams at all, and Romber probably won’t give them any.
Good editing, they cut to Joyce & Uchenna amd team Weeble taking off, next scene is Rob saying how stupid they are. Smooth move. I loved how the smiles turned to such serious looks when they found out 2 teams had already boarded the boat. The look on Ambuh was priceless.
Gotta hand it to Gretchen though, climbing that ladder was difficult, but she made it. Annoyed the hell out of us all night long, but she made it. And even more good news…her backpack is safe!!!
The pit stop was at the Rumeli Hisari, which is on the European side of the Bosphorus. In fact, since the “Rumeli” part refers to “Roman”, which is the term that Mehmet II (who built it) would have used to refer to all of Europe, it really means “European Fortress”. On the other side of the Bosphorus is the “Anadolu Hisari” or Anatolian Fortress (in Asia Minor).
They “made it to Europe” as soon as they touched down at Istanbul’s airport, then took the ferry back to Asia Minor (Uskudar), then to Kiz Kulesi which is in the middle of the Bosphorus, then back to Uskudar, then back to Istanbul (i.e. Europe).