LAST EDITED ON 04-10-10 AT 11:09 PM (EST)

Mirror Image

That was a pretty weird episode. It featured quite possibly the greatest comeback ever in Amazing Race history, as Jet/Cord climbed back to 1st place even after doing an extra task. Also, consider the fact that they had taxi problems at the very beginning. Doing the chingay task saved them big time.

Steve & Allie, on the other hand, just couldn't seem to catch a break this week. They quickly fell to the back of the pack, and were eventually beaten by Dan/Jordan who didn't even have a taxi throughout most of the leg.

Also, as someone pointed out in the East Coast Spoiler thread this week, this week's rankings was a complete mirror image of last week's.

Week 8 Results
1st place - Jet/Cord (2x)
2nd place - Carol/Brandy (1.9x)
3rd place - Louie/Michael (.8x)
4th place - Brent/Caite (.7x)
5th place - Dan/Jordan (.6x)
6th place - Steve/Allie (0x)

Double Yikes

The recession continued this week in the TAR Casino Game this week. It was kind of a "Perfect Storm" situation this time. The Payout Table favored the top two spots really heavily... And, of course, those teams turned out to be Jet/Cord (a Speed Bump'd team) and Carol/Brandy (an unpopular wager). The overwhelmingly popular choices were Dan/Jordan, Steve/Allie, and Louie/Michael, who all scored negative this week.

Because we had a very unpredictable leg, it made the Bonus Game extremely difficult. No one got their bonus wager correct.

We can't even get solace in the (+1) question, as the answer to the (+1) Question was surprisingly "No". Brent/Caite talked about wanted to U-turn Carol/Brandy, but never went as far to say they want the team gone. It ended up being mostly a wash for everybody, as jbenz was the only person to get it right.

Overall, we had another 4 players bust out of the game, either due to Steve/Allie or the bonus game. These players are esquire, Deshawnator22, popeave, and vince3. Thanks for playing, each of you. Free cocktails for everyone!

A couple big moves this week. The Greatest Gainer Award goes to MzTee and louislam, who both climbed 15 ranks. louislam jumped up to #12 while MzTee leaped to #4. Amazing!

The Perfect Bet Award goes to VisionQuest, who doubled up this week. Nicely done.

Leaderboard
1. (+3) CTgirl - 426
2. (+3) Yogi - 409
3. (+2) KwietOne - 312
4. (+1) MzTee - 171
5. (+1) kidflash212 - 158
6. (+1) Jims02 - 153
7. (+2) michel - 137
8. (+4) MaxZ - 127
9. (+1) qwertypie - 109
10. Element King - 109
11. Belle Book - 94
12. (+2) louislam - 82
13. (+3) vennui - 77
14. (+3) flipxcyd - 72
15. (+1) Wallflower66 - 61
16. beau_30 - 59
17. ARNutz - 52
18. Corvis - 51
19. (+3) Silver03 - 50
20. (+3) Snidget - 45
21. (+1) chiubakka - 42
22. (+3) tribephyl - 39
23. Road Kill - 38
24. (+1) Ontheroadagain - 24
25. (+3) Nessie - 18
26. (+3) kduck - 16
27. (+2) AddieRacer - 14
28. (+1) Molaholic - 6
29. (+3) jbenz - 3
30. (+3) VisionQuest - 2
31. (+2) esquire - 0
32. (+2) Deshawnator22 - 0
33. popeave - 0
34. vince3 - 0

It turns out that misses an entry really helped out CTgirl, who is still #1. However, Yogi really cut into her lead with a clever Jet/Cord bet. The scores are extremely top-heavy right now, so we'll see if anyone can make a comeback.

Week 8 Payout Table
1st place - 2x
2nd place - 1.7x
3rd place - Break Even
4th place - .3x
5th place - 0x

Max Individual Bet - 60 points

(+1) Question (Over/Under)
The previews show Carol & Brandy visibly upset over something, calling someone idiots. Do Carol & Brandy use either of the words "stupid" or "dumb" over 5 times or under 5 times during the next episode?

Also, if they say it exactly 5 times, that counts as the Under.

The (+1)s can be used all the way through the second-to-last week. Once we reach the finale, they will be discarded.

Bonus Game - Clock Game

We did this a couple years ago and I liked it, so we'll do it again.

This week, players may wager some points of the amount of time that the 1st place team beat the team that finished 5th in the previous leg. In other words, how much faster did Jet/Cord complete the previous leg than Dan/Jordan?

We are going to measure it based on the departure times for the next episode. So, if Jet/Cord leave at 4:23 AM and Dan/Jordan leave at 7:30 AM, then the correct answer would be "3 hours, 7 minutes."

Ah, but how close does your wager have to be? That's really up to you.

For this game, you must choose how much risk you're comfortable with. Every wager must be accompanied by which Payout Table you're playing off of. The smaller margin of error, the higher the payout will be if you're right. Use the following codewords to label your wager.

"Cautious" (45 mins)
Off by 45 mins or less - 2x
More than 45 mins - 0x

"Risky" (30 mins)
Off by 30 mins or less - 4x
More than 30 mins - 0x

"Dangerous" (15 mins)
Off by 15 mins or less - 6x
More than 15 mins - 0x

"Insane" (5 mins)
Off by 5 mins or less - 10x
More than 5 mins - 0x

"Suicidal" (0 mins)
Guessed exact time difference - 20x
Off by 1 min or more - 0x

Max Bet (all tables) - 15 points
Number of Guesses You Can Make - 1

A sample wager might look like...

Bonus Game "Insane"
20 points - 3 hours, 12 mins

So if you're off by 5 minutes or less (3:07 to 3:17), you'd win. If you weren't, you might wish you'd played more conservatively. It doesn't matter if your guess fell within the range of another payout table. It's all based on the one that you choose. Just don't forget to say which payout table you're playing.

If they don't reveal the times at the beginning of the episode where we have no answer, then all bets will be refunded.

Because of the sensitive nature of the payouts (10x, 20x), I am requiring all Bonus wagers to be submitted by 11:59 PM on Saturday night (April 10). You can make your regular picks on Sunday, as usual, in a separate post. Just make sure you don't edit the previous one on Sunday!

If I see any bonus picks posted/edited on Sunday, I'm throwing them out and just scoring your regular picks.

TAR16 Teams Remaining
Brent/Caite
Carol/Brandy
Dan/Jordan
Jet/Cord
Louie/Michael

Good luck!