Anyway, the Katie attacked the tire course first, and as she scrambled through, she told us how worried she was that she didn't have enough body to stretch from tire to tire. Couldn't she just swing the tires? Nevertheless, she made it through fine and was followed by David who managed to lose his pants in the midst of everything. Pants or no pants, he made it through also, and just when we were thinking that this challenge might be a cake walk, good ol' Beth showed up, ready to piss off her team. She managed to crawl into the tires, but at a certain point, she stalled, unable to go any farther. Eventually, her team told her to just drop in the water (way to encourage her), and with that, all of her points evaporated from the board. This, of course, led to groans, eye-rolling, and various looks of "I told you so!", especially after every other person on the team slithered through the tires with no problem. By the end of the heat, the Veterans had performed well but were nervous and anxious that Beth's fall would be the death of them. Don't worry, guys. A) The Rookies have dominated the interview segments, and B) Ibis did verify how amazingly strong her team was. Therefore, it was clear that the Rooks would be losing this week.

Sure enough, the cocksure Ibis was first up for her team, and within seconds, she found herself dangling between two tires, jeopardizing the slim lead the Rookies had. Never mind that this was the easiest heat of them all, and never mind that you had to be a total idiot to screw up this challenge this early. Ultimately, Ibis lost her grip and dropped into the ocean below, utterly failing in a most embarrassing way. Ha. As she then cried in the arms of her teammates, I couldn't help wondering why the team had benched Randy instead of her. Was there a mandatory guy/girl ratio that had to be preserved? Probably. Okay, never mind.

Who else wants to point their fingers and laugh?

It ain't easy bein' Ibis.

Luckily, the rest of the Rookies weren't nearly as inept as Ibis, and they all made it through the course without incident. Kina had some minor difficulties as she found herself twirling momentarily in one of the tires. I was surprised she didn't lash out and accuse the tire of conspiring against the team. "Listen Tire. You can say whatever you want, but I know what I know, and you can't change that!"

Eventually, Kina made it through, and everything seemed to be going just wonderfully for the team. The only person left was Alton, and being that he's Superman and all, this really shouldn't be a problem for him, right? Again -- flashback to MTV promos. Okay, so Alton found himself in a bit of a spot on this course. With so many tires gone, he couldn't quite cross the gap at one point, no matter how hard he tried. And yes, he tries to swing, but that didn't work. Why the Rookies didn't have their tallest guy, MJ, go last is beyond me. If I were Alton, I would have grabbed onto the dangling chords from where the tires used to be and used those for leverage, but alas, he decided instead to climb out onto the tire and attempt to jump. The operative word there was "attempt" because no sooner had he straddled the tire in a strange, uncomfortable way, than he was suddenly hanging from it, his fingers the only thing between him and a team loss. It was kind of like an action movie, minus the excitement.

Still, this was Superman Alton, we were talking about, and if there was anyone capable of crawling back up into the tire and finishing this course, it was him. Unfortunately, the one thing he couldn't do was slow down time, and oh yeah, guess what? There suddenly was a time limit on this challenge. Funny how things can suddenly change like that. Well, the clock ticked down to zero, Alton dropped into the water, and the Veterans won, causing Derrick to yell, "Now we can f**king celebrate!!!" YEAH!!! SOMEBODY GET THE PERIWINKLE KNIT CAP!!!

At the Gauntlet deliberations, Alton apologized to his team for falling (and what about you, Ibis? No apologies from you??), and without much fanfare, he chose Jeremy (ah ha! It was him after all!) to go into the Gauntlet. Why Jeremy? Why not? Alton later explained that it was because Jeremy has never been a standout for his team (nor the series, really), but Jeremy felt differently. "C'mon! Wake up and smell the coffee," he ranted to the camera. "This is not the right decision!" For God's sake, he has a faux-hawk!! What else must he do to prove himself??

"I like to think of myself as the brunette version of Mark Long."

Anyway, TJ spun the wheel of misfortune, and let me guess: Captain's Choice? Surprisingly, no. Instead, the wheel landed on "Capture the Flag," which officially put Jeremy's chances at beating Alton in the Gauntlet at about 3.5 million to 1. Seeing that this Gauntlet would be totally predictable, the producers thankfully spared us from the typical pomp and circumstance and simply headed right to the competition. TJ fist-bumped the two guys, and they were off. Well, almost off. First Jeremy had to say a little prayer: "Everything is always in your hands, Lord. Honor and glory be yours. Amen." Just assuming on this one, but I tend to think Jeremy's request for divine intervention in the Gauntlet probably was not at the top of God's priority list.

Posted by B-side on February 25, 2006 6:25 PM