Weapons Remain Unsheathed But One Team Still Pays a Painful Price on THE AMAZING RACE CANADA

By BILL HARRIS Special to The Lede   The five remaining teams in Season 9 of THE AMAZING RACE CANADA had to keep their eyes on the prize – and on the pie! – in a new episode that debuted tonight on CTV, CTV.ca, and the CTV app. In addition to some “tourtière torture” as the action moved to Québec’s Saguenay region, the teams also faced a specific timing issue on a go-kart course, as well as a rock-climbing excursion in which everyone was keen on cracking the code. More alliances were formed, and it was an incredibly polite episode, with no teams choosing to utilize the deadly Double Pass option. But kindness does not save souls in the cutthroat world of THE AMAZING RACE CANADA, and another team was sent home. SPOILER ALERT: Details of what happened follow. Having avoided elimination a couple of times previously, Jermaine and Justin were in first place for a brief spell early in the episode. They arrived at the Double Pass, chose not to delay any of their competitors – “it’s what felt right,” Justin said – and headed off in search of the tourtière obstacle course. But they got horribly lost on the way, and by the time they arrived, they were back in last place. Jermaine diligently fought through his setbacks carrying the tourtière, and Justin later hung tough to bravely complete the rock-climbing task, but it wasn’t enough. Here’s what Jermaine Aranha and Justin Baird, close friends and drag sisters from Toronto who were motivated to be inspirational representatives of the 2SLGBTQ+ community, had to say about their many ups and downs on THE AMAZING RACE CANADA:   Q: At certain times it seemed as if you were having fun, but at other times not so much. How has the reaction been from people you know as the episodes have rolled out?  JUSTIN: “Watching it, you just realize how much everything has to be whittled down to fit into the 45 or 42 minutes it takes for the episode to air. But what’s great is that our friends and our families get to see us be funny, be silly, go through all the emotions. They love it. They’ve enjoyed it. People have said how entertaining we are, and we know this – hence, why we got on the show! So we’re extremely proud of what we accomplished.” JERMAINE: “I’ve done some absolutely amazing things in my life. And I mean, truly amazing things. And running THE AMAZING RACE CANADA, no pun intended, is the most amazing thing I have ever done. The race, it kind of speaks to the reality that is life. There are challenges that we have to overcome. While we overcome those challenges, we usually come out on the other side a better person. I do believe that we are better people because we were able to run the race. There are so many standout moments that listing them would take all day, literally. But I think the one moment that did it for me was when Deven and Amanda, and Justin and myself, arrived in fourth place on the mat together. I think it spoke to so many different things. It spoke to what people of colour can achieve when they work together. It spoke to us as Canadians, the diversity. And we were the entertaining team of the cast, there is no disputing that. We made people feel so many things. We made them angry. We made them cry. We made them laugh. And at the end of it all, we inspired people as well.”   Q: Do you regret not slowing down any of your rivals at the Double Pass? JERMAINE: “The race is so unpredictable, and while you’re out there, you don’t know where anyone else is. The truth is, we arrived at that board first, but we had no way of knowing that. We thought we had arrived second. We thought Tyler and Kayleen were ahead of us. And when we got to the board, we literally were stunned when it was empty. So we were like, well, if they’re not playing dirty, we’re definitely not going to play dirty. It made absolutely no sense to use that board, because it would have literally put an unnecessary target on our back.” JUSTIN: “There was a narrative that we were running a race of integrity. We did not want to play dirty, we didn’t want to play underhanded, whenever we were faced with any of these situations, when it came to pass boards or anything else. The race of integrity that we were running was that, you know what, whoever wants to get into the fray, let them get into the fray. We’re going to be who we are, we’re going to rise above, and we’re going to continue on, regardless of what’s placed in front of us. So we really had no intention to screw up anyone, especially if nobody was screwing with us.” JERMAINE: “So what you’re saying is, we weren’t Ben and Anwar.” (Both Justin and Jermaine laugh very hard!)   Q: If you could go back and do anything differently, what would it be? JERMAINE: “This is what I will say to that, as a person who believes wholeheartedly in fate and destiny. I believe that everything in this life happens when it is supposed to, the exact way that it’s supposed to. Yes, we may have been eliminated. Yes, we may not have won the race. But there’s absolutely nothing that I would change, because fate and destiny said that this is the race that we were supposed to run. And that’s exactly what we did. Fate and destiny said winning THE AMAZING RACE CANADA was a ‘no’ for you. But that ‘no’ is preparing you for a great ‘yes’ in your future. I absolutely wouldn’t change anything. I wouldn’t change my partner, I wouldn’t change the tasks that each of us did, I wouldn’t change when we got eliminated. Fate and destiny brought us to this moment for a reason. And I do believe that fate and destiny has something so much greater in store for us.” JUSTIN: “I agree. Amen.”   With only four teams – Tyler and Kayleen, Ty and Kat, Ben and Anwar, and Deven and Amanda – still in the running, THE AMAZING RACE CANADA continues next Tuesday, Sept. 5, at 9 p.m. ET on CTV, CTV.ca, and the CTV app. billharristv@gmail.com @billharris_tv