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Two PHL teams join Amazing Race Asia 5, make it to next round
Back in 2010, for Amazing Race Season 4, two Filipinos, both named Richard and both raised in the US, won the reality TV competition.
This year, for Amazing Race Season 5, will another Philippine team snag the title?
In 2010, friends Richard Herrera, a model, and Richard Hardin, a basketball player, bested nine other teams, including another Philippine team composed of Fil-Australians Lani and Jess, who placed fourth overall.
The two Richards were the first Filipinos ever to win the Amazing Race Asia title.
For Amazing Race Asia Season 5, which had a global premiere on Thursday night, two Philippine teams are again trying their luck to win the race that spans across different countries in Asia.
The two Philippine teams will be competing against nine other two-person teams for the grand prize of US$100,000.
One of the Philippine teams is composed of beauty queens Maggie Wilson and Parul Shah while the other team includes the husband-and-wife team of Eric Tai of the Philippine rugby team Volcanoes and Rona Samson, an entrepreneur.
During the press briefing on Wednesday, Rona, who had a miscarriage last year, said they were motivated to join the race as they want to have a baby.
They couldn't conceive naturally and need to undergo an expensive IVF (in vitro fertilization) treatment.
On the other hand, Maggie said their team's motivation was Parul's father, who is sick and needs to undergo treatment. Parul is their family's breadwinner at the moment.
For both teams, joining the Amazing Race was one of their most exciting and most challenging experiences ever.
For British-Filipino Maggie, Ms. Binibining Pilipinas World 2007, the toughest part of the race was being away from her family, especially as she has a four-year-old child.
She said she found it difficult, "being away for so long" especially as "we're not allowed to communicate with the family."
Indian-Filipino Parul, Ms. Binibining Pilipinas Tourism 2014, was also worried about her family, especially her father.
"What if something happens to him while I'm doing the race?" she wondered.
For Rona, the toughest aspect of the race was trying to live up to expectations. She joined the race to prove that big people can accomplish great things.
Her profile on the Amazing Race Asia page said, "I want to change the views of people that big people are just lazy. I also want to serve as an inspiration to others that you can live the life you want to regardless of your shape, size, color or gender."
On the other hand, Eric, a Tongan from New Zealand who played for the Philippine national rugby team, said he found it difficult to do away with gadgets like mobile phones, which they were not allowed to use during the race.
Eric, also called by the nickname "Eruption," also said "one of the toughest was the food."
As they were always running from one place to another throughout the race, they always had to have baon, "whether it be energy drink, chocolate, or kanin."
"We ate whatever was available to give us energy for the challenge, 'cause you don't know what you're gonna do, whether you're gonna jump off something of swim off somewhere or run for so long," he said.
"You always have to have your fuel, otherwise you'll regret it," he added.
His wife, on the other hand, said they coped by "doing balot," meaning they wrapped up leftover food from PitStops or designated places for rest at certain stages of the race.
She said as she was wrapping up leftover food, she told other racers, "Don't judge me!" Despite the many challenges that they faced throughout the race, Rona said the best thing about it was that she became closer to her husband and to God.
"We're different in a lot of aspects. Our common bond is religion. That's what brought us together," Rona said, adding that they went through so many trials during the race but "we had that relationship with each other and the Lord."
Eric said the gruelling race can really put relationships to the test. "We got through a lot of trials...Hindi maiiwasan ang pag-aaway."
What's important is to learn to control emotions and "just go, go go and do the challenge," he said.
Mentally-challenging
The teams shared that the race around Asia was more mentally-challenging than physically-exhausting.
Maggie said she and Parul were determined to do their best throughout the race. "Whatever challenges that will be thrown at us, we will go ahead and do it," Maggie said.
Eric said Amazing Race was "more mental than physical."
"You have to be focused," he said. "If there's an argument, you won't finish it," he said.
Rona said they prepared the the race by practicing how they should carry their heavy backpacks "along stairs, running around the neighborhood."
Being an athlete, Eric underscored the importance of preparing well for the challenges.
"Research on the countries that you might visit," he said. Eric also said if there's one word that they need to learn in different languages, it's "Fast, fast. Bilis, bilis."
Premiere episode
In the premiere episode of Amazing Race Asia on Thursday night, the two Philippine teams struggled through the tasks that they had to complete to receive clues that will lead them to their next destination.
In the first task during the first leg held in Indonesia, the husband-and-wife team of Eric Tai and Rona Samson almost got eliminated.
The 11 competing teams were ordered to look for a specific compass, among 1,000 compasses, that points to 210 degrees. There were only 10 such compasses.
The team that didn't find the compass, Lisa and Nicole from Vietnam, was eliminated. In that round, the team of Eric and Rona almost didn't make it as they were the last to find the 10th correct compass.
Eric and Rona actually made up for their initial mistake of almost failing to finish the compass task early as they managed to catch up with the other teams in the succeeding tasks. At the end of the first leg of the race, they were the fourth team to make it to the Pit Stop.
Meanwhile, beauty queens Maggie Wilson and Parul Shah also managed to move on to the next leg of the race even though they struggled at the task called "Fix or Freight" where the teams were given a choice on which task they wanted to accomplish.
"Fix" meant fixing a bike the traditional way using a string. "Freight" on the other hand, meant hauling sand using only one sandbag to fill up four tall cylindrical containers.
Maggie and Parul chose "Fix" which actually turned out to be complicated and time-consuming. But they managed to place seventh overall in the first leg.
Meanwhile, the last team to arrive at the Pit Stop was eliminated and this was the brother and sister team of Rei and Keiji Umehara from Singapore.
Amazing Race Asia Season 5, hosted by Allan Wu, is shown every Thursday night at 9:00 p.m.
It is aired on AXN Channel: Cable Link Channel 38, Cignal Digital TV Channel 61, Global Destiny Cable Channel 61, Dream Channel 20, GSat Channel 51, and SKYCable Channel 49. — BAP/VVP, GMA News
