# TAR 11 December 2015 -- We Got a Chance, Baby! **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 12, 2015, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227 "2015-12-12T02:13:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Laggard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de053/32.png) [@Laggard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Laggard)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/21 "2015-12-14T06:35:43Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > This is actually untrue. > > Most seasons of TAR feature contestants with an average age of between 31 and 36. Only one dips below 30 (Season 25 at 29.5) and that was after 10 of the previous 15 seasons averaging over 33 (including the oldest season, Season 14 at 37.1). Are you saying that they include the same number of older teams (50+) now like they used to? I can’t remember the last older team. And aren’t most teams now what I termed generic/pretty/athletic? Maybe we have different ideas as to what is old. Maybe my memory isn’t good. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Controvert](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dec6dc/32.png) [@The\_Controvert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Controvert)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/22 "2015-12-14T06:55:41Z")
If I’m ever on the Amazing Race final leg and there’s a taxi I want to hold, I’m going to rip a $100 bill in half and tell the cabbie I’m giving the other half when I return in 20 minutes. If someone else comes along without half a $100, don’t take them. It’s NOT me. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 7:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/23 "2015-12-14T07:07:08Z")
> [@Laggard](#): > > Are you saying that they include the same number of older teams (50+) now like they used to? I can’t remember the last older team. And aren’t most teams now what I termed generic/pretty/athletic? Maybe we have different ideas as to what is old. Maybe my memory isn’t good. Yes. Even going back to the beginning, TAR rarely featured more than two teams per season with 50+ members. It’s true that this season didn’t have “old” team (Denise was the oldest at 51), but it’s an exception. And as I said, the average age has remained within a few years since the earliest seasons. Jeff and Lyda of Season 26 (59 and 47) were the last “old” team. Looking over the list, the big change appears to be a shift away from players in their 30s to players in their late 20s. That’s what’s bringing the average down just a smidge versus the first five seasons. ---
**Author:** ![Laggard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de053/32.png) [@Laggard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Laggard)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 7:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/24 "2015-12-14T07:40:42Z")
Interesting, Justin. Thanks. From a subjective viewpoint though do you think there are now less non-traditional teams. The Hippies who won a few years ago being a good example of such a team. ---
**Author:** ![EllisDee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellisdee/32/4531_2.png) [@EllisDee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EllisDee)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 12:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/25 "2015-12-14T12:11:45Z")
> [@Laggard](#): > > Interesting, Justin. Thanks. From a subjective viewpoint though do you think there are now less non-traditional teams. The Hippies who won a few years ago being a good example of such a team. What’s non-traditional? This season had a little person team, for example. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/26 "2015-12-14T13:22:58Z")
> [@Laggard](#): > > Interesting, Justin. Thanks. From a subjective viewpoint though do you think there are now less non-traditional teams. The Hippies who won a few years ago being a good example of such a team. Which ones? The Dating Hippies or the Life-Long Friend Hippies? And I’m not sure either would qualify as non-traditional. They’re still just dating people and friends, which is super common on the show as a relationship. ---
**Author:** ![Algernon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a183cd/32.png) [@Algernon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Algernon)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/27 "2015-12-14T14:55:33Z")
> [@Fenris](#): > > The gimmick for the next season looks to be as awful as the “blind date” one. I don’t know. It is hard for me to believe that any concept could be as awful as the blind date season. :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Theodore\_Striker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/74df32/32.png) [@Theodore\_Striker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Theodore_Striker)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/28 "2015-12-14T15:03:47Z")
One of the few redeeming things about this season of the race was that anyone aside from Justin and Diana won. Aside from that, there were a slew of very unlikeable teams, though one of the few that were ok did win. I wish the Amazing Producers would go back to having teams without a hook or a label, and let the fans figure out who they liked. The personalities of the racers will come out over time, and given the exhaustion and stress of travel and the tasks, personalities and conflicts will surface. And for chrissakes, can we just please end the “whoever gets here first is almost surely going to leave first” tasks? There seemed to be so many of them this season, and it was kinda’ meh to watch. My wife and I are longtime race watchers, and found ourselves wondering a few weeks ago if we were just watching out of habit instead of enjoyment at this point. I blame the Boston Rob seasons. ---
**Author:** ![SUZ\_MAC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8e8cbc/32.png) [@SUZ\_MAC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SUZ_MAC)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/29 "2015-12-14T15:58:41Z")
I’ve been trying to find a site that provides a list of the next seasons Amazing Racers. I looked on CBS dot com and didn’t see anything. Unfortunately, I did not stay tuned after the finale. ---
**Author:** ![Edward\_The\_Head](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ce73a5/32.png) [@Edward\_The\_Head](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Edward_The_Head)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/30 "2015-12-14T16:19:16Z")
> [@Algernon](#): > > I don’t know. It is hard for me to believe that any concept could be as awful as the blind date season. :eek: Forgot the Family edition I see. At least the blind date only had half the teams that way. It might be interesting to see teams randomly put together, but actually randomly and not paired for whatever reason. Then again we did see that kind of happen with those two from Alabama, I think, a couple of seasons ago. > [@EllisDee](#): > > What’s non-traditional? This season had a little person team, for example. I can remember teams like Kent and Vixen, and Adam and Rebecca. The hippies do kind of stand out a bit too. I only kind of remember the team you’re talking about for this season. It would be nice to have more then just white couples end up at the end. > [@SUZ\_MAC](#): > > I’ve been trying to find a site that provides a list of the next seasons Amazing Racers. I looked on CBS dot com and didn’t see anything. Unfortunately, I did not stay tuned after the finale. They have provided a list, and I think they even did a video of the start you can find. They are, to the best of my knowledge, internet ‘stars’. I haven’t heard of any of them. Not sure that’s going to be that exciting. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Controvert](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dec6dc/32.png) [@The\_Controvert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Controvert)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/31 "2015-12-14T21:16:40Z")
> [@Theodore\_Striker](#): > > And for chrissakes, can we just please end the “whoever gets here first is almost surely going to leave first” tasks? There seemed to be so many of them this season, and it was kinda’ meh to watch. I agree with this sentiment, but what would you suggest? I am thinking perhaps they can introduce new types of tasks that involve more strategic choices. I like the _Survivor_ challenge where players can choose how much rope to unravel. If you misjudge and later discover you have insufficient rope, you have to return to the start to unravel more. But you also risk wasting time unraveling too much rope that is unused at the end. I’d also like to see an “elapsed time” counter for the teams. Let the audience know the exact effect those strategic choices had. I’d also like to see detour-type choices incorporated within the tasks. So teams arrive and the task is to get a key for a locked door. To get the key, you can either run across a greased log suspended over water and jump at a key hanging on a rope, or manipulate a ball bearing through a tilting maze puzzle. After you unlock the door, in the next room, you can either construct a castle structure with wooden blocks using only your feet, or learn a traditional folk dance and perform it to a judge’s satisfaction to complete the task and receive your next clue. Each time a team completes some part of the task, show their triumph and flash their elapsed time breakdown (for each part, and their total) as they talk. Maybe even flash the average times so we know if someone is particularly fast or slow. ---
**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/32 "2015-12-14T21:27:48Z")
> [@Laggard](#): > > Interesting, Justin. Thanks. From a subjective viewpoint though do you think there are now less non-traditional teams. The Hippies who won a few years ago being a good example of such a team. Actually, they _were_ traditional alpha-males\* who just decided that “hippie” made a good gimmick. One was student-body president and played varsity tennis in High School and they were both in…I dunno…Harvard or Yale. The darker haired of the two was kind of a psycho (something about stowing away on an airplane or something). And as “lifelong friends”, they’d only met a few years earlier on some sort of semester abroad thing. I’d read (back on the days of TWoP, I think) that they were one of like only 5 couples Phil refused to deal with on “All-Stars” \*If you mean the two jackass “Ta-TOW” hippies. There was a quite nice man/woman hippie team a few years later but I don’t remember if they won. ---
**Author:** ![Laggard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de053/32.png) [@Laggard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Laggard)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/33 "2015-12-14T21:32:24Z")
It’s likely just me but too many of the teams blend together. We too often ask ourself “who the hell is that” when another generic team appears on screen. You will never confuse the hippies for another team. I would love to see a clock showing how far teams are behind other teams. So mid leg it would show “currently 3rd -45:00”. But I guess that would ruin the drama sorta. And enough of the teams from social media or other reality shows. Am I correct that this started around the time they had Boston Rob as a racer? ---
**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/34 "2015-12-14T21:36:38Z")
> [@The\_Controvert](#): > > I’d also like to see an “elapsed time” counter for the teams. Let the audience know the exact effect those strategic choices had. This would be great, but it will never, EVER, _EVER_ happen. To create false tension, the Amazing Producers always trim the distance between the contestants. Apparently they rarely cheat though–they won’t show stuff out of order, but they’ll really cut stuff. Like on this finale, Team Whiny Bitch (and his girlfriend) were certainly at the detour at the same time as Team Newsroom, but the editing made it seem like they were minutes apart. I like your ideas a lot–including this one–but this one will never happen. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/35 "2015-12-14T22:20:33Z")
> [@Fenris](#): > > \*If you mean the two jackass “Ta-TOW” hippies. There was a quite nice man/woman hippie team a few years later but I don’t remember if they won. TK and Rachel from Season 12. And they did win (which I mentioned above). They were awesome. ---
**Author:** ![notfrommensa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f14d63/32.png) [@notfrommensa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/notfrommensa)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/36 "2015-12-14T22:31:48Z")
I wanted to know how much the taxi fiasco cost the Green Team and Paparazzi. It seems to me that the Reporters should have been far ahead, taking a taxi to Belmont than the other two teams who took a Bus from Randalls Island to Manhattan (apparently) and then take a taxi to Belmont. ---
**Author:** ![StarvingButStrong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/starvingbutstrong/32/335_2.png) [@StarvingButStrong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StarvingButStrong)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2015, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/37 "2015-12-14T22:53:12Z")
Adding options within tasks would be awesome, but I expect too complex/expensive to set up for us to giet them. Three other easier ways to make order shuffling more likely: make the tasks simply harder physically (transport 600 lbs of bricks from pt A to pt B), harder mentally (more opaque clues, solve a puzzle like make some scales balance given a heap of items of different weights), or simply fall back on random choice (the infamous hay bales/find the chocolate with the strawberry core). The first tends to favor the alpha male teams, the second tend to be less than photogenic, and the last… well, it sucks to see a great team eliminated on a purely random draw. ---
**Author:** ![Laggard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de053/32.png) [@Laggard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Laggard)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2015, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/38 "2015-12-15T00:04:47Z")
I understand why producers introduced more bunching but I don’t like it. A team gets a three hour head start only to find themselves waiting with everyone else cause the damn temple doesn’t open till 8 AM. Often it’s like each stage is a fresh start for every team. Mistakes from the previous day are erased. ---
**Author:** ![magnusblitz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b4bc9f/32.png) [@magnusblitz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magnusblitz)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2015, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/39 "2015-12-15T01:20:57Z")
I actually wouldn’t mind if it was a fresh start each week… as long as everyone knew that in advance. Sure, it makes it less important to finish strong (basically, come in first for a prize, don’t get eliminated by coming in last, but everything else is the same) but it also means a team won’t fall so behind that they never have a chance to catch up (which happened a few times this season). Also puts more onus on every other team to try hard since they could be eliminated with a slip-up in one leg. But yeah, the main problem was that so many of the tasks this season were just busy work or “experiences”. Lots of jumping off things, or guided tasks (such as walking with the lion, or the shark cage) - teams will leave in the same order they arrive. They need more tasks like “listen to these songs and identify the composers” or “memorize this drink order” instead. ---
**Author:** ![Algernon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a183cd/32.png) [@Algernon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Algernon)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2015, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227/40 "2015-12-15T14:31:38Z")
> [@magnusblitz](#): > > I actually wouldn’t mind if it was a fresh start each week… as long as everyone knew that in advance. Sure, it makes it less important to finish strong (basically, come in first for a prize, don’t get eliminated by coming in last, but everything else is the same) but it also means a team won’t fall so behind that they never have a chance to catch up (which happened a few times this season). Also puts more onus on every other team to try hard since they could be eliminated with a slip-up in one leg. Hmmm. Interesting concept. > [@magnusblitz](#): > > But yeah, the main problem was that so many of the tasks this season were just busy work or “experiences”. Lots of jumping off things, or guided tasks (such as walking with the lion, or the shark cage) - teams will leave in the same order they arrive. They need more tasks like “listen to these songs and identify the composers” or “memorize this drink order” instead. Agree wholeheartedly. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tar-11-december-2015-we-got-a-chance-baby/740227.md?page=3)