January 6, 2025 • 44 mins
Part 1 of the final!
-Swim. Swim. Swim. Oh and more swimming
-Puzzling!
-Jordan domination
-Michele and Jenny off to a good start
-And more!
Twitter: @ChallengeFanPod
Instagram: @challenge_fanatics_podcast
-Swim. Swim. Swim. Oh and more swimming
-Puzzling!
-Jordan domination
-Michele and Jenny off to a good start
-And more!
Twitter: @ChallengeFanPod
Instagram: @challenge_fanatics_podcast
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
What's going on everybody, and welcome back to another episode
of the Challenge and Addicts podcast, where we are here
to break down everything Challenge related. We are here to
break down the Challenge forty Battle of the eras Episode eighteen,
The End of an Era, Part one. My name is
(00:21):
Josh Green. You can find us on all social media
platforms at Challenge Fan Pod. Please rate reviews, subscribe the
whole nine wherever it is you listen to your podcasts.
We're down to eight in here to talk about the
Elusive eight, a legendary group competing in this final. My
(00:45):
co host Austin People said, Austin, how you doing? We're
doing great, baby. It's the final, the Final. We are here.
Its final time. As so many ridiculous uh you know
confessionals were in this episode. I just want to say, overall,
(01:09):
before we break down a lot of these checkpoints from
day one, I I don't know, because I was seeing
some stuff out there that people didn't love the final
and everything because there's too much swimming. I actually like
what we had here in part one overall.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
So yeah, I did too.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
I loved it.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
I thought it was this is like what a final
is like.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
It sucks.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Yeah, it's Jordan's you know, this is what Jordan's good at.
But it was it's a final, it's fun.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
What do you what can you do? Uh?
Speaker 2 (01:47):
And I compare it compared to the flagship when when Tyson,
you know, Tyson won and it was it was that
bs uh you know bsno one, Yeah, right at the.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
End, Look, I uh, you know, we'll we'll break into
it more. But I don't think that it was like
this incredibly different. It was different because there was more swimming,
but like swimming's been in finals for a while.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Yeah, granted, this is probably the most swimming that we've
seen in a final.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
In a long time.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Yeah, that's fair, But I don't know, I mean, I
get it. It's because everybody's upset because Jordan's gonna win.
I think that's pretty pretty evident.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
Yeah, but I think everybody else is more used to
the same format over these seasons. Like even whether it's
a cold final or a warm final, they start in
the water and then they never go back to it,
or they end they start and end in the water
and that's it. Instead.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
I mean, it definitely favors people that like to swim, Like, yeah,
no question.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
But that's been a part of the show, right, Yeah,
water challenges on like every season of the show. Like
that's not something that's completely foreign. Yeah, it was just
a season or at least this part of the final
is a part that very much favored those in the water.
(03:28):
So I didn't really mind seeing them have like actual
food in the beginning of this episode here, you know,
when everyone's talking about their journeys on this season and
in different finals, we see them having carbs, like they're
eating spaghetti and meatballs. I honestly, I think I'm getting
(03:51):
sick of the discussion about like the gross food eating
and like what they can and can't eat. It's not survivor.
Like if you want to give them regular meal before
a final, like, I don't care. It's yeah, I'm kind
of with you. It's not going to change the impact
of how this thing goes. So that's how I looked
(04:12):
at that part of it to start this off. But
we get on this boat, the SS Sinister and TJ
to no one's surprise, is up and at it beautiful
sunrise coming up here at six am, and everybody you
(04:36):
know they're tired, right, they have no blankets, but they
did have mattress pads at least on this.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Hey, that was one of the best sleeping arrangements on
a final we've seen in a while.
Speaker 1 (04:46):
That's what I'm saying. Thank you, Austin. We do agree,
and we agree on a lot of things about this show,
but I I could not agree with you more. We'll
see if there's any point that I agree with you
more on, but this is one. I'm watching the episode
and I am screaming at my TV, like Jordan and
Tory slept with snakes on War the World's too, Like
(05:11):
if they wanted, you know, they did the rotations during
that final, and if you wanted to sleep, you had
to sleep around snakes. I would much rather have no
blanket and just a mattress pad. And you know, Johnny's
between all the finals he's been in, there's definitely been
worse sleeping conditions. So I was just shocked. And you know,
(05:35):
obviously this part favorite Michelle for sure, of the four women.
I mean, she's done, you know, seventy eight days on
Survivor without being voted out, so she's used to sleeping
in the sand, no problem. So a mattress pad without
a blanket, forget it. Like that's that's a luxury for
her on these shows. So we get the breakdown from
(06:00):
from your friend of mine TJ. Labin. First place for
the men is four hundred grand, first place for the
women four hundred. Then we get seventy five for second
for each man and woman, and third place man and
woman each get twenty five. Basically, we then find out
(06:24):
there's two kinds of shocking things that at least the
competitors are finding shocking. The first one being that the
sinister is the starting and the ending part of each
checkpoint on this final which I will give them a
little bit of leeway there. I was surprised that each
(06:46):
checkpoint was starting and finishing at the book, I was
not accessing that much swimming, I'll give them that.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Yeah, it's a lot of swimming. I mean, at the
end of the day, love it or hate it, it's
like a lot. That's a lot of swimming.
Speaker 1 (06:59):
Yeah, yeah, for sure, a lot of swimming going on
here on day one. And then the second surprise, and
the one that I've seen many of fans not thrilled
about for a number of different reasons, the Karma vote
gets revealed to the final eight. You know, We've had
(07:22):
different segments throughout the season of people wondering if there's
a redemption house, if there was some sort of twist,
and there is with the Karma vote having all the
eliminated players voting on those left in the game, so
they gave points to all finally contestants, and Banana's nose
(07:46):
right away. He's screwed because TJ says the person in
last will have a severe disadvantage and the person in
first will get an advantage. So immediately, I think Bananas
and Jenny, as they said in their confessionals, they're in trouble.
But this is the best news Michelle, Derek, and Kyland
(08:09):
could have got. Did you forget about the karmera points?
You know, like it was rarely mentioned in these episodes.
So how do you feel that it's such an impact
in the final?
Speaker 2 (08:23):
I mean, I think because the elimination, we always knew
it was going to be a thing.
Speaker 1 (08:26):
Yeah, so I think we knew it was coming. But man,
I don't know. I mean, I I.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
Really hope it doesn't impact the game that much. I
think that'd be really stupid. I was hoping for like
a you know, a time penalty. We knew, but instead
they're like, all right, at the end, we'll reveal, so
you know, they have the opportunity to do what happened
with Ashley and Hunter of the one season. So I
don't really like that aspect of it.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
Yeah. Uh, that's a very good comparison and I didn't
even think about that. But yes, they now, of course
this opens the floodgates. They always get upset when fans
have their conspiracy theories about the show and all of that,
but they just open themselves up to any conspiracy theories,
(09:22):
any upset fans out there, because you can't even if
Jordan dominates, which he you know, of course, if you
watch the episode, you see he goes on to do
in day one again like we don't know. Is it
fifty to fifty? Like our fifty percent of the final
going to come down to Karna points? Is it only
(09:45):
a quarter of the results, Like that's the whole thing.
And I get that they want that like dramatic moment,
but man, does it suck at least in my opinion,
I am not happy that they're not till the end.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
Yeah, no, I agree. I wish they kind of told
us early on.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
But yeah, so we're going to find out at the
end of the final they're going to add the cardinal points.
They're going to add the tokens from the checkpoints. Now,
I will say the tokens aspect, I don't want to
(10:26):
say it makes it well, I will say it. It
does make it easier. Now, I don't know if they
said you have to finish the checkpoint to get a token,
because it doesn't look like they have like blown the
whistle and said like, all right, you're in last place,
like just get back on the boat. I doubt they
(10:47):
would do that, because that's a major advantage to anyone
getting last place over the people who have to swim
back to the boat. Yeah, so let's hope they don't
they don't do that. But this first checkpoint is called
sam Blast, and the finally have to jump into the water,
(11:10):
swim to the shore, solve a puzzle, swim back to
the sinister and get their token. Derek has, like we
spoke about in our last episode, and I know some
people out there, regardless of who it was, weren't thrilled
that one of the guys was going to be getting
a penalty. Derek's got a three minute penalty to start
(11:32):
this final, Yeah, which I totally forgot about. Yeah. The
poor guy goes into the last elimination of the season,
beats Corey in a great win to get his way
into elimination. He wins on a guy's day down the
stretch in a very important daily against probably the best
(11:57):
competition he's had in his Challenge career, and then just
because he gets fourth out of fourth in a daily,
I don't know. I really thought that they should have
said to the guys like, hey, you're in the final,
but whoever gets first place, you know, gets ten grand
or something. Yeah, instead of a three minute penalty in
(12:20):
the final, Like that's annoying, it's helping me. It sucks.
But that being said, Derek Chavez continues to be underestimated,
but man does he catch up on this three minute penalty.
(12:41):
He catches bananas and k island in the water, and
even Jordan notices him. He has no quit in him.
He never says die. And it's a shame because I
would love to see and I think we know at
(13:01):
this point how this final Gode would go for for
Derek if if Jordan wasn't here, because he really puts
on an amazing performance.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
Yeah, I mean it would be It would literally be
Derek and Johnny fighting for fighting for first.
Speaker 1 (13:19):
And not even. And I want to put this out
there because I know Derek is probably since we already
have four people on each side, I think we're starting
to have a good idea, at least on the guy side,
of where everyone's going to finish. Derek wouldn't just get
second because of the karma vote. Like, the karma vote
(13:41):
is going to help him a lot. He had a
lot of friends this season. He did not make like
any enemies at all, so that part's going to help
him a ton. But he was so good in this
first day, so I just want to make sure we
cut that and gave him the credit he deserves because
(14:02):
he he really. Yeah. Look, even if you're on Jordan's tale,
the guy, like you said in the beginning, he crushes
every swimming part and all these checkpoints and he didn't
mess up on any of the checkpoints on day one,
and then he runs triathlons for fun. Yeah he can't.
(14:25):
You can't catch a guy who's, you know, doing triathlons
for fun. Yeah, you just can't. But we on the
girl's side very close on every checkpoint today on day
one and Michelle and Jenny. You know, I was impressed
(14:45):
with with Jenny West here on day one. I thought
her asthma, as it's been like the forty first contestant
on the show this season. I really thought her asthma
was going to be a problem. And h she starts
off real well, I was really questioning her asthma. What
(15:06):
do you mean? I was like, all right, oh, no.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
Obviously he has it.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
But I mean I was like, where's the asthma? Definitely
there's got to be something that's helpful in the water
because she was keeping up with Michelle, and Michelle has
always been a good swimmer, and she was also beating
Michelle in the water too, So very interesting from Jenny.
(15:31):
Not interesting. I mean, listen, the woman's a very strong competitor.
We've known this about Jenny for a while. But I
think I do want to say, and while I love
Rachel Robinson and I think she still has a chance
in this, I think Tory and Rachel thought it was
(15:51):
going to be between them two and Jenny and Michelle
were just going to be, you know, an afterthought. And
regards the makeup of a final, you cannot think like that,
you just because you know why, they'll have dumb shit
like the overnight task that we'll talk about later. The
(16:12):
finals have really intense things and then things you can
never prepare for, like counting thousands of coins and singing
a song. Oh yeah, you want to talk about brutal Yeah, yeah,
and we we will get there. But man, was that
(16:34):
just stuff like that made me enjoy it. So we
we get to find out from TJ that the Sinister
is going to be moving to different spots in the
water and until they get to their next location. Uh,
they're the competitors are only allowed to stand in their
(16:55):
red tape circle. They're not allowed to move outside of it.
They're not allowed to lay down. We did not get
any confirmation what happens if their hands slipped off or
anything like that.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
It seemed like a safety thing. I don't really know
what that was.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Yeah, I think it was more yes, a safety thing,
but also a we don't want them to rest, so
we're gonna make it safe and annoying with no rest
because you can tell. I mean, with all the swimming,
even after the first checkpoint, first thing I would want
(17:32):
to do is lay down and rest and they're all
just I mean, Bananas is like hanging with one arm Michelle,
you know, her whole body's hurting. And with the freak
out that we have from Jenny at the end of
this episode, she was probably a quarter of the way
to that freakout by then. So yeah, like any final,
(17:55):
everybody's losing their mind. But I think you think this
boat added an element to that, Like with how creepy
it was and you know, being on the water and
all that, I feel like that might have added to
the suspense of the final. I don't know, Yeah, yeah,
I think so.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
I mean that it was a pretty gross boat and
you're waiting for things to pop out.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
Yeah, but I thought.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
You know, the one thing that we haven't talked about,
which I thought was pretty cool was the fact that
because they were on a boat and that was their
home base, they were able to move locations for various challenges.
So like after the first challenge, they were able to
move to the second location in the third location, I
thought that was pretty cool.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
Yeah, and it opened it up for the different the
different things to be done once they got to shore,
like for the first checkpoint when they were and I
forgot to mention this. But in the first checkpoint, they
were only allowed to take one piece at a time
for their puzzle, and they had to make five laps
(18:58):
and I'm sure a lot of fans watching are like
five miles. Like these people train that all the time
in the sand. Running that much, that's a pain in
the ass. Like that's brutal. Running that in shoes or
(19:19):
without shoes. That sucks. It's more effort to get your
knees up to make sure your feet don't sink too
much in the sand. That was brutal on the first one. Yeah,
absolutely brutal. And then with this second check point, when
they get there, they have to swim to another boat,
(19:42):
which I thought was fun, you know, not always going
to shore to do a task. They have to swim
under another boat and memorize a memory board and you know,
put all sixteen in the correct spots. Now, I really
(20:03):
really thought, I said, you know what if Kyland gets
here in about third and he's not behind by that much,
it's like this is Kylon's checkpoint easy, you know, like
he's able to go under and two maybe three trips,
memorize the whole board and you know, win because that's
(20:24):
what he's been doing on the challenge, like this type
of memory task. This is tailor made Kyland. He's not
doing well here. I mean the swim for him, real struggle.
He said he wasn't.
Speaker 3 (20:41):
Ready for this along with a swim, he wasn't ready
for any swim.
Speaker 1 (20:44):
Yeah. I think I think Kyland, even if there was
one swim off of the sinister and that was it
for the entire final, I think Kyland would have been like,
all right, the swim's done. I'm able to move on. Yeah. Now, look,
it's always people are going to say like, oh, what
(21:05):
if there wasn't all this swimming, And I would like
to see Kyland in a final like that, But every
final is going to have some sort of swimming in it. Yeah,
it's not going to be to this extent. But to
say that he can just not worry about swimming would
be ignoring a part of it.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
And this was the face puzzle, right, yeah, yeah, so
another thing I want to call out.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
Oh no, the face puzzle was checkpoint one. But yeah,
what about it?
Speaker 2 (21:32):
Yeah, I was gonna tell you something about that that
I forgot about.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:34):
No, to put in perspective, how far away the sinister
was that platform, right, was five hundred meters the sinister.
The sinister was at the very least double that.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
A mile is.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
About nineteen hundred nineteen hundred meters, so they had to swim.
They had to swim at minimum somewhere around three miles
I think total yesterday, so like a mile on the
first leg, probably close to a mile on the second leg,
and then you know, close to a mile on the thing.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
I mean, it was just crazy. You know, there's only
two people in the challenge world that could have competed
with Jordan on this final with how it was formatted,
and one of them was on forty and the other
one was off doing two different reality shows. The first
person was ct he's like a fish in the water,
(22:33):
and the other one's Wes.
Speaker 2 (22:34):
Who's also gonna say Wes yeah, fish yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
I mean that would have been a fucking clinic to
see those three do this. Yeah, because no disrespect to
the other three guys. Derek Island bananas all in their
own right.
Speaker 2 (22:52):
Hat bananas, bananas, and Derek aren't even that bad.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
No, no they're not. It's just that it's so hard
to keep up with Jordan, and I still stand on it.
I think the only two guys that could have kept
up with Jordan are C Team Wes yep and It's
bananas is better than those two at other things, but
with swimming, those two are head and shoulders above above Johnny.
(23:22):
But yeah, I mean, look, it's starting. We're at this point.
They even make a comment on it. After the memory
board they're like, oh, can we can we give something
to Jordan that he's not good at?
Speaker 2 (23:36):
You know, well Johnny at the boat the other bow
check point where he's like, all right, what's Jordan good at?
Speaker 1 (23:42):
Puzzle?
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Memory water? All right, let's do that. Yeah, yeah, So yeah,
I think Johnny Kyland like they were not happy with
production with the choice of the final, and they were like,
I mean people see it more as like just complaining
about it, and I think the average viewer, but like
(24:03):
they're very much visibly complaining to production about their choice
of a final, which I understand, but like, you know,
also you know it is what it is.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
We hear Kylon later in the episode and he's like,
I can't believe I'm gonna lose this because of all
this swimming, and I just bro it's like whatever season
that was with BESI when he wouldn't eat you know it, Like,
I know there's differences in that, and there were different reasons.
(24:37):
But you have all these guys and girls in the
Challenge Universe who haven't won a season yet, and there's
a lot of them have that one Achilles heel, and
you can say whatever you want, but like, I don't
even think it would have mattered, because if it was
all on Land, Bananas is doing a lot better in
(25:00):
this final two, yeah, and Kyland would have to worry
about him and all those carnival games that they do
during finals, Bananas would be getting an advantage in those,
just because he's good at all that that fucking random shit,
you know, Like we mentioned Michelle and Jenny really still
(25:22):
doing a great job. At checkpoint two, Tory and Rachel,
you know, they're they're getting pissed off because they keep
getting in the back of the pack. But we get
to checkpoint three and it is called a thousand steps.
(25:44):
They have to go find this clue to solve a
mystery for the final checkpoint of the day, which I
tried pausing my TV. I couldn't really read the sign.
But if I'm ascertaining it correctly, it seemed like it
(26:04):
was some phrase for a skull puzzle? Am I accurate
on that?
Speaker 2 (26:10):
It's yeah, was this the platform?
Speaker 1 (26:12):
One? No, that was they were going the platform was
when they swam out and saw the skull check point one, No, no,
one was the the.
Speaker 2 (26:25):
Yeah, so three, this is the one I was talking
about with like the print in perspective, this is the
platform one?
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Yes, yes, you're right, I'm sorry. Three. Three was when
they swam out to the platform and had to look
out to see their their puzzle and if they got
it wrong, they had to come back and yeah, the
one thousand meters like you had said, Yeah, for a perspective.
(26:51):
But then four was when they had to do the
thousand steps to then get to their clue, to get
to the different clues to solve the mystery for the
final checkpoint of the day. And again another one here
for for Michelle and Jenny. This whole episode, I'm waiting
(27:16):
for Rachel and Toy to just burst.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
Through, I know, and it never happened. Yeah, how about that.
Speaker 1 (27:25):
Because it seems like as this episode's going right, we
start off with checkpoint one and two with a ton
of swimming, but then three and four is definitely less swimming.
We're seeing them do the steps. We're seeing them, you know,
have to run more. So I'm thinking, all right, Rachel's
about to catch up and this this is over. You know, Brandon,
(27:49):
I do think we're getting some foreshadowing soon, but it's
it's not at the point that I thought. I thought
we were going to get it right away. Yeah, but
that's listen, a credit to Michelle and Jenny. I mean,
you see Jordan finishing the checkpoint. Michelle and Jenny are
battling it out and they're not that far behind Jordan. Yes,
(28:11):
so they were going back and forth all day on
day one, and you know, Derek, Derek's hanging in there.
You know. It's again, it's tough to talk about the
guy's side because I know they're editing it and I
(28:32):
know they want to try and make it look close.
But Jordan's just miles and miles ahead of these guys.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
He is, I know, I know, I don't even think
the Karravote is going to impact the guys. It might
impact the girls, it might impact second third place big time.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
Even though Rachel was an angel, Rachel has a lot
of friends.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
Yeah, well, I was gonna say Rachel probably has.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
The best votes.
Speaker 2 (29:02):
If I had to guess, I could see Johnny and
Derek flip flopping at the end.
Speaker 1 (29:09):
Oh yeah, yeah, a second and third type thing. Nobody
had an issue with Derek all season.
Speaker 2 (29:15):
Yeah, that's about it, though, I'm the only the big
one potentially is like Jenny and uh Michelle flip flopper
one and two. That could happen. But I think dude,
using the Karma vote to flip flop one and two,
I think is ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
I think that would be really rough. I swear to God,
if that happens.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
That's gonna be that's gonna be really tough like that
because that, yeah, I'm their fortieth season, like like there's
a grueling final, this person just one and you're gonna
flip flop because you know of a vote by the
cast members, like you know the other thing too. Here's
my other problem with the Karma vote. This is a
cutthroat show. You're not supposed to like be nice to people.
(30:04):
This show is not about being nice to people, and
like this kind of forces you to do that. I
think it's kind of dumb, Like this show's not built
on that. Do it on Survivor or Big Brother, don't
do it on the Challenge where this one of the foundations.
There's three aspects of the show. It's going out to
the bars and drinking, which like isn't much of a
thing anymore. It's competing, and then it's fighting. Those are
(30:27):
the three. Those are the three aspects of this show
that make it so good. So you kind of take
away the fighting aspect. It's just kind of are you punt?
You're punishing people for the drama aspect, and it's kind
of I just don't have a I just have an
issue with it.
Speaker 1 (30:42):
You know what it is too and it pains me
to say it, but I I The reason that I
feel like the players probably aren't as upset about these
carmel points is that they probably talk about it like
it was nothing. But I guarantee you when they went
(31:03):
for the reunion and as people were getting eliminated, they
were talking about like, oh, what did you give this person?
What did you give that? And it's not even about
this season, Austin. It goes into the future seasons and
the All Star seasons of like, oh, this person had
my back when I was competing in the final, they
(31:25):
gave me a good score for Karma points, like the
challenge now is so much more based on the future.
And let me make sure I don't screw someone over
who's gonna get a call in the same season as me, yea,
which annoys me. But that part I can't control what
I think they could have done a better job with
(31:46):
if they really wanted. I know they wanted to do
the Eras theme, like it made sense with all the
divisions of the teams, and you know, the Eras Tour
was gigantic, So I get all the marketing, the naming
of it, right, I've got no problem with that, But
what they should have done, Hey, if you're the first person.
Speaker 4 (32:08):
In karmel points for the final, first place guy, first
place girl, a nice advantage to start the fine last
place girl disadvantage.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Leave it at that, and then that's what I thought, Yeah,
cooking from there. Yeah, because in that way, we know
as it's going, okay, this person's in first, this person's
in second. Now we like we said, we know Jordan,
barring a medical emergency or a he gets attacked by
(32:42):
a shark.
Speaker 2 (32:43):
Yeah, he's putting together one of the most dominant final
performances we've ever seen.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
But yeah, yeah, this guy, I mean, if there was
any a doubt.
Speaker 3 (32:56):
Yeah, let's also like he's killing it in the swim
but like, let's also not forget he's destroying the puzzle
parts as well, so like and like, it's not it's
it's not even close. I mean, he has already a
big lead with the swimming, he is destroying the puzzles,
so it's just it's not remotely close.
Speaker 1 (33:13):
And I'm sure Kyland was hoping, you know, he's like,
there's got to be puzzles in math somewhere around here,
you know, yep, And he was hoping Jordan would got
tripped off. He really, it's tough to find a weakness
in Jordan's game. The only one is Paul Russell as
as that is to say, but it's.
Speaker 2 (33:33):
True, that is it, and and uh what it?
Speaker 1 (33:36):
Uh?
Speaker 3 (33:36):
Kyland said Jordan has one of the best win percentages, right, Yeah,
you never.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
Mentioned land And I think Landon's two for two.
Speaker 3 (33:44):
We know nobody remembers Landed Landon if he kept going,
because he stopped early.
Speaker 2 (33:49):
I think he was two for two. If Landon kept going,
he probably would have been one of the best challengers
of all time. I think pound for pound he is,
but because he didn't do a lot of challenges, he's
not gonna considered, which I understand.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
They had him on on Challenge Mania and he said
that he even if he went on All Stars or
the Flagship and like got paid what on average other
people are getting paid and he won, he would be
making less than what he's making in his career. So
(34:22):
whatever was his career again, I don't know, but whatever
he's doing, like shout out to him because.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
Yeah, but like you know, I I think I think
it's less about the money more about the challenge, right
because I mean they're getting what fifty seventy five thousand
dollars probably on average most of these challenges, like.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
The bare minimums, some of them get way more than that.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Yeah, so average okay, maybe average one hundred thousand like that,
doesn't you know, I wouldn't be shocked if most of
these people are making more money than that in their
everyday job.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
So yeah, but yeah, yeah, it would it would be
I've thought about it. It would be kind of cool if,
like he report, least somebody on Era one. Granted all
five of the Era five or Era one guys were
really good. Yeah, but it would be cool to see
how he stacks up against everybody. This is a good
(35:15):
blast in the past. There we uh, we see Kyland
having Before we get to the last checkpoint of the episode,
Kyland is having a brutal cramp in the water. You know,
I've had some rough cramps, but not in the water,
So I can't I can't imagine poor guy. I mean,
(35:36):
he's in last, He's gotten a terrible cramp, and now
he's just hoping he can he can finish the final,
let alone, you know, if he can catch up.
Speaker 2 (35:47):
Yeah, he's having a rough go of it. The water
is not his thing.
Speaker 1 (35:50):
No, No, Now, I will say I don't think this
was by any means the best thing for Kyland. I
think we had a lot of there was a storyline
this season where in a vision where people could actually
see Kyland winning because him and Jordan kept going back
(36:11):
and forth in dailies throughout the season. So I don't
think anyone would have been surprised. What I will say
is this does set him up perfectly to continue to
get called back because now he has that motivation. Oh yeah, yeah,
the final but getting last, you know. Yeah, So we
(36:36):
get to the overnight checkpoint. And I'm sorry. I know
a lot of people thought this was stupid as hell,
and it was stupid to be clear, But again, like
you said earlier, Austin, with the three things that make
the challenge under the fighting and drama, how much of
that is over stupid things? And like how many how
(36:59):
many times have we seen a cup of noodle get
thrown at someone? Yeah, the most, like fighting over pasta
being one of the most iconic fights in the show's history.
So listen, this was stupid, but I was here for it. Okay,
you can't train for something like this. It's just who
(37:20):
wants it more and who has the mental fortitude to
hang in there and not go crazy and not lose
it because Jenny's going crazy? What did you think of this?
Like insane insanity contraption they had going here with.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
The dude, I like think that was I think this
is the hardest thing of the day, to be honest
with you, I can't.
Speaker 3 (37:42):
Imagine, like, you're counting these coins, and first of all,
I think they're counting currency.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
They're not counting the coins.
Speaker 3 (37:49):
That is nuts, So the counting currency, and then you
know they're exhausted. They swam miles and then they did
a bunch of your running and everything. They ran up,
they go upstairs, and then you're singing this frickin' song
for thirty minutes.
Speaker 2 (38:07):
Some of the people were closing their eyes, which I
probably would have done, and then you go back down.
You're doing that for hours, Like I think that is
just mental just mental fortitude to continue forward with that.
And then I can't you know, It's like, I can't
blame Jenny. But also, girl, you gotta like you gotta
be quiet, like everybody's going through the same stuff, like
(38:28):
do it in your head or something like. And then
you hear Jordan like shut up.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
We know that Jordan and Johnny do that to their
closest friends. They'll yell at them and tell them to
shut up. So the fact that Johnny is even yelling
at her to stop, like, you can clearly tell this
girl is breaking. She is not having it, and it's
(38:56):
starting to rub everybody. And everyone had been talking talking
about how Jenny was out in front. Jenny's doing real well,
I would be shocked and call it a hot take
or whatever. I don't think it's that hot of a take.
But I think this is Rachel's checkpoint, and I think
(39:20):
this is where it turns and she starts locking in
on day two.
Speaker 2 (39:25):
Yeah, I would like to see one of Banana's angels win.
Speaker 1 (39:32):
Yeah, they've been fighting. From an underdog perspective, I'd love
to see Michelle win. I just don't know if this
if she's got it against this group.
Speaker 2 (39:42):
He's in it, She's in it, so you never know.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
And I just want to say, like, regardless of how
this finishes for her, like she talked about, right, she
fought from the bottom of the whole season three elimination wins,
really had a fun season, has been a main narrator,
and you're right, she is still in it, Like, she
is very much in the thick of it. The karma
points are going to be a big thing for her,
(40:07):
Like that's a big positive for her. She had a
lot of strong allies leave this game, and I mean,
aside from Amanda and Laurel, those are probably the only
two people giving her negative or you know, not good
karma points. Like I think everyone else is fine with her.
So I'm just thrilled to see her hanging in there.
(40:32):
It's great.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
Yeah, she's right there.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
But this is going to be a fun next episode,
we're going to see part two in the finish of
the Challenge forty Battle of the Eras. I'm sure not,
I'm sure. I definitely know we have a reunion because
the cast went out to film in Amsterdam several weeks ago,
So we do have a reunion for this season. We'll
(40:58):
see how that goes. But this is gonna be an
exciting finish, you know. I hope it goes. We have
some intrigue. I'm looking to see what else we we
have checkpoints wise, I hope there's there's something stupid for
me to laugh at, because I I laughed so hard
(41:19):
with that overnight checkpoint. I really did, and I can't
wait for it to finish. I can't wait for everyone
to be yelling at each other counting them fucking coins. Yeah,
it's gonna be great. So we'll be back next week
to break down the finale a Battle of the Eras.
(41:41):
Then we'll get a reunion at some point and later
this month. As we talked about last week, when the
cast broke Challenge All Stars five rivals, the fans have
been clamoring for rivals. It's back. Rivals is an interesting
word for some of these pairs. Some of these pairs
(42:01):
are definitely rivals. Some of these people I don't know
if they've talked in the last five or ten years.
And they may not even hate each other. They may
just feel indifferently. It's an interesting cast. I'm sure we'll
watch it, all that good stuff, but we gotta wrap
(42:22):
up forty and we will be here to break it
all down. May have a few more special nuggets coming
your way. Won't reveal that yet as nothing's been confirmed,
but you know, subscribe to your podcast speed so you're
you're able to see what's coming down the pipeline as
(42:42):
we wrap up Challenge forty Battle of the Eras Austin,
thank you so much for hopping on the mic. It's
always a pleasure. Where where can the listeners check you out?
What are you doing for the Bears game? You know
all the good stuff?
Speaker 2 (43:01):
Well, I will I choose not to be not to
upset my Sundays. I will be in Mexico tomorrow, so
I will not be watching the Bears.
Speaker 1 (43:16):
All right. Well, if you're.
Speaker 2 (43:18):
They've ruined me enough this year, it's enough.
Speaker 1 (43:22):
And just a programming note. Due to Austin's vacation, I
may have a guest song with me to recap part
two of the finale, or we wait wait till he
gets home. We will figure that off out off air,
but we're excited either way, looking forward to seeing who
is the winner of this hallmark season of the Challenge.
(43:45):
Who's going to be crowned winners on the Sinister, looking
forward to it as we think it'll be Jordan, and
then who the heck knows for the girls. It's still
up in the air, but I'm excited. We know you are.
Hope you all enjoy your weekend and hope you all
have a great week
What's going on everybody, and welcome back to another episode
of the Challenge and Addicts podcast, where we are here
to break down everything Challenge related. We are here to
break down the Challenge forty Battle of the eras Episode eighteen,
The End of an Era, Part one. My name is
(00:21):
Josh Green. You can find us on all social media
platforms at Challenge Fan Pod. Please rate reviews, subscribe the
whole nine wherever it is you listen to your podcasts.
We're down to eight in here to talk about the
Elusive eight, a legendary group competing in this final. My
(00:45):
co host Austin People said, Austin, how you doing? We're
doing great, baby. It's the final, the Final. We are here.
Its final time. As so many ridiculous uh you know
confessionals were in this episode. I just want to say, overall,
(01:09):
before we break down a lot of these checkpoints from
day one, I I don't know, because I was seeing
some stuff out there that people didn't love the final
and everything because there's too much swimming. I actually like
what we had here in part one overall.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
So yeah, I did too.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
I loved it.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
I thought it was this is like what a final
is like.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
It sucks.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Yeah, it's Jordan's you know, this is what Jordan's good at.
But it was it's a final, it's fun.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
What do you what can you do? Uh?
Speaker 2 (01:47):
And I compare it compared to the flagship when when Tyson,
you know, Tyson won and it was it was that
bs uh you know bsno one, Yeah, right at the.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
End, Look, I uh, you know, we'll we'll break into
it more. But I don't think that it was like
this incredibly different. It was different because there was more swimming,
but like swimming's been in finals for a while.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Yeah, granted, this is probably the most swimming that we've
seen in a final.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
In a long time.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Yeah, that's fair, But I don't know, I mean, I
get it. It's because everybody's upset because Jordan's gonna win.
I think that's pretty pretty evident.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
Yeah, but I think everybody else is more used to
the same format over these seasons. Like even whether it's
a cold final or a warm final, they start in
the water and then they never go back to it,
or they end they start and end in the water
and that's it. Instead.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
I mean, it definitely favors people that like to swim, Like, yeah,
no question.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
But that's been a part of the show, right, Yeah,
water challenges on like every season of the show. Like
that's not something that's completely foreign. Yeah, it was just
a season or at least this part of the final
is a part that very much favored those in the water.
(03:28):
So I didn't really mind seeing them have like actual
food in the beginning of this episode here, you know,
when everyone's talking about their journeys on this season and
in different finals, we see them having carbs, like they're
eating spaghetti and meatballs. I honestly, I think I'm getting
(03:51):
sick of the discussion about like the gross food eating
and like what they can and can't eat. It's not survivor.
Like if you want to give them regular meal before
a final, like, I don't care. It's yeah, I'm kind
of with you. It's not going to change the impact
of how this thing goes. So that's how I looked
(04:12):
at that part of it to start this off. But
we get on this boat, the SS Sinister and TJ
to no one's surprise, is up and at it beautiful
sunrise coming up here at six am, and everybody you
(04:36):
know they're tired, right, they have no blankets, but they
did have mattress pads at least on this.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Hey, that was one of the best sleeping arrangements on
a final we've seen in a while.
Speaker 1 (04:46):
That's what I'm saying. Thank you, Austin. We do agree,
and we agree on a lot of things about this show,
but I I could not agree with you more. We'll
see if there's any point that I agree with you
more on, but this is one. I'm watching the episode
and I am screaming at my TV, like Jordan and
Tory slept with snakes on War the World's too, Like
(05:11):
if they wanted, you know, they did the rotations during
that final, and if you wanted to sleep, you had
to sleep around snakes. I would much rather have no
blanket and just a mattress pad. And you know, Johnny's
between all the finals he's been in, there's definitely been
worse sleeping conditions. So I was just shocked. And you know,
(05:35):
obviously this part favorite Michelle for sure, of the four women.
I mean, she's done, you know, seventy eight days on
Survivor without being voted out, so she's used to sleeping
in the sand, no problem. So a mattress pad without
a blanket, forget it. Like that's that's a luxury for
her on these shows. So we get the breakdown from
(06:00):
from your friend of mine TJ. Labin. First place for
the men is four hundred grand, first place for the
women four hundred. Then we get seventy five for second
for each man and woman, and third place man and
woman each get twenty five. Basically, we then find out
(06:24):
there's two kinds of shocking things that at least the
competitors are finding shocking. The first one being that the
sinister is the starting and the ending part of each
checkpoint on this final which I will give them a
little bit of leeway there. I was surprised that each
(06:46):
checkpoint was starting and finishing at the book, I was
not accessing that much swimming, I'll give them that.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Yeah, it's a lot of swimming. I mean, at the
end of the day, love it or hate it, it's
like a lot. That's a lot of swimming.
Speaker 1 (06:59):
Yeah, yeah, for sure, a lot of swimming going on
here on day one. And then the second surprise, and
the one that I've seen many of fans not thrilled
about for a number of different reasons, the Karma vote
gets revealed to the final eight. You know, We've had
(07:22):
different segments throughout the season of people wondering if there's
a redemption house, if there was some sort of twist,
and there is with the Karma vote having all the
eliminated players voting on those left in the game, so
they gave points to all finally contestants, and Banana's nose
(07:46):
right away. He's screwed because TJ says the person in
last will have a severe disadvantage and the person in
first will get an advantage. So immediately, I think Bananas
and Jenny, as they said in their confessionals, they're in trouble.
But this is the best news Michelle, Derek, and Kyland
(08:09):
could have got. Did you forget about the karmera points?
You know, like it was rarely mentioned in these episodes.
So how do you feel that it's such an impact
in the final?
Speaker 2 (08:23):
I mean, I think because the elimination, we always knew
it was going to be a thing.
Speaker 1 (08:26):
Yeah, so I think we knew it was coming. But man,
I don't know. I mean, I I.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
Really hope it doesn't impact the game that much. I
think that'd be really stupid. I was hoping for like
a you know, a time penalty. We knew, but instead
they're like, all right, at the end, we'll reveal, so
you know, they have the opportunity to do what happened
with Ashley and Hunter of the one season. So I
don't really like that aspect of it.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
Yeah. Uh, that's a very good comparison and I didn't
even think about that. But yes, they now, of course
this opens the floodgates. They always get upset when fans
have their conspiracy theories about the show and all of that,
but they just open themselves up to any conspiracy theories,
(09:22):
any upset fans out there, because you can't even if
Jordan dominates, which he you know, of course, if you
watch the episode, you see he goes on to do
in day one again like we don't know. Is it
fifty to fifty? Like our fifty percent of the final
going to come down to Karna points? Is it only
(09:45):
a quarter of the results, Like that's the whole thing.
And I get that they want that like dramatic moment,
but man, does it suck at least in my opinion,
I am not happy that they're not till the end.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
Yeah, no, I agree. I wish they kind of told
us early on.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
But yeah, so we're going to find out at the
end of the final they're going to add the cardinal points.
They're going to add the tokens from the checkpoints. Now,
I will say the tokens aspect, I don't want to
(10:26):
say it makes it well, I will say it. It
does make it easier. Now, I don't know if they
said you have to finish the checkpoint to get a token,
because it doesn't look like they have like blown the
whistle and said like, all right, you're in last place,
like just get back on the boat. I doubt they
(10:47):
would do that, because that's a major advantage to anyone
getting last place over the people who have to swim
back to the boat. Yeah, so let's hope they don't
they don't do that. But this first checkpoint is called
sam Blast, and the finally have to jump into the water,
(11:10):
swim to the shore, solve a puzzle, swim back to
the sinister and get their token. Derek has, like we
spoke about in our last episode, and I know some
people out there, regardless of who it was, weren't thrilled
that one of the guys was going to be getting
a penalty. Derek's got a three minute penalty to start
(11:32):
this final, Yeah, which I totally forgot about. Yeah. The
poor guy goes into the last elimination of the season,
beats Corey in a great win to get his way
into elimination. He wins on a guy's day down the
stretch in a very important daily against probably the best
(11:57):
competition he's had in his Challenge career, and then just
because he gets fourth out of fourth in a daily,
I don't know. I really thought that they should have
said to the guys like, hey, you're in the final,
but whoever gets first place, you know, gets ten grand
or something. Yeah, instead of a three minute penalty in
(12:20):
the final, Like that's annoying, it's helping me. It sucks.
But that being said, Derek Chavez continues to be underestimated,
but man does he catch up on this three minute penalty.
(12:41):
He catches bananas and k island in the water, and
even Jordan notices him. He has no quit in him.
He never says die. And it's a shame because I
would love to see and I think we know at
(13:01):
this point how this final Gode would go for for
Derek if if Jordan wasn't here, because he really puts
on an amazing performance.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
Yeah, I mean it would be It would literally be
Derek and Johnny fighting for fighting for first.
Speaker 1 (13:19):
And not even. And I want to put this out
there because I know Derek is probably since we already
have four people on each side, I think we're starting
to have a good idea, at least on the guy side,
of where everyone's going to finish. Derek wouldn't just get
second because of the karma vote. Like, the karma vote
(13:41):
is going to help him a lot. He had a
lot of friends this season. He did not make like
any enemies at all, so that part's going to help
him a ton. But he was so good in this
first day, so I just want to make sure we
cut that and gave him the credit he deserves because
(14:02):
he he really. Yeah. Look, even if you're on Jordan's tale,
the guy, like you said in the beginning, he crushes
every swimming part and all these checkpoints and he didn't
mess up on any of the checkpoints on day one,
and then he runs triathlons for fun. Yeah he can't.
(14:25):
You can't catch a guy who's, you know, doing triathlons
for fun. Yeah, you just can't. But we on the
girl's side very close on every checkpoint today on day
one and Michelle and Jenny. You know, I was impressed
(14:45):
with with Jenny West here on day one. I thought
her asthma, as it's been like the forty first contestant
on the show this season. I really thought her asthma
was going to be a problem. And h she starts
off real well, I was really questioning her asthma. What
(15:06):
do you mean? I was like, all right, oh, no.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
Obviously he has it.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
But I mean I was like, where's the asthma? Definitely
there's got to be something that's helpful in the water
because she was keeping up with Michelle, and Michelle has
always been a good swimmer, and she was also beating
Michelle in the water too, So very interesting from Jenny.
(15:31):
Not interesting. I mean, listen, the woman's a very strong competitor.
We've known this about Jenny for a while. But I
think I do want to say, and while I love
Rachel Robinson and I think she still has a chance
in this, I think Tory and Rachel thought it was
(15:51):
going to be between them two and Jenny and Michelle
were just going to be, you know, an afterthought. And
regards the makeup of a final, you cannot think like that,
you just because you know why, they'll have dumb shit
like the overnight task that we'll talk about later. The
(16:12):
finals have really intense things and then things you can
never prepare for, like counting thousands of coins and singing
a song. Oh yeah, you want to talk about brutal Yeah, yeah,
and we we will get there. But man, was that
(16:34):
just stuff like that made me enjoy it. So we
we get to find out from TJ that the Sinister
is going to be moving to different spots in the
water and until they get to their next location. Uh,
they're the competitors are only allowed to stand in their
(16:55):
red tape circle. They're not allowed to move outside of it.
They're not allowed to lay down. We did not get
any confirmation what happens if their hands slipped off or
anything like that.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
It seemed like a safety thing. I don't really know
what that was.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Yeah, I think it was more yes, a safety thing,
but also a we don't want them to rest, so
we're gonna make it safe and annoying with no rest
because you can tell. I mean, with all the swimming,
even after the first checkpoint, first thing I would want
(17:32):
to do is lay down and rest and they're all
just I mean, Bananas is like hanging with one arm Michelle,
you know, her whole body's hurting. And with the freak
out that we have from Jenny at the end of
this episode, she was probably a quarter of the way
to that freakout by then. So yeah, like any final,
(17:55):
everybody's losing their mind. But I think you think this
boat added an element to that, Like with how creepy
it was and you know, being on the water and
all that, I feel like that might have added to
the suspense of the final. I don't know, Yeah, yeah,
I think so.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
I mean that it was a pretty gross boat and
you're waiting for things to pop out.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
Yeah, but I thought.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
You know, the one thing that we haven't talked about,
which I thought was pretty cool was the fact that
because they were on a boat and that was their
home base, they were able to move locations for various challenges.
So like after the first challenge, they were able to
move to the second location in the third location, I
thought that was pretty cool.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
Yeah, and it opened it up for the different the
different things to be done once they got to shore,
like for the first checkpoint when they were and I
forgot to mention this. But in the first checkpoint, they
were only allowed to take one piece at a time
for their puzzle, and they had to make five laps
(18:58):
and I'm sure a lot of fans watching are like
five miles. Like these people train that all the time
in the sand. Running that much, that's a pain in
the ass. Like that's brutal. Running that in shoes or
(19:19):
without shoes. That sucks. It's more effort to get your
knees up to make sure your feet don't sink too
much in the sand. That was brutal on the first one. Yeah,
absolutely brutal. And then with this second check point, when
they get there, they have to swim to another boat,
(19:42):
which I thought was fun, you know, not always going
to shore to do a task. They have to swim
under another boat and memorize a memory board and you know,
put all sixteen in the correct spots. Now, I really
(20:03):
really thought, I said, you know what if Kyland gets
here in about third and he's not behind by that much,
it's like this is Kylon's checkpoint easy, you know, like
he's able to go under and two maybe three trips,
memorize the whole board and you know, win because that's
(20:24):
what he's been doing on the challenge, like this type
of memory task. This is tailor made Kyland. He's not
doing well here. I mean the swim for him, real struggle.
He said he wasn't.
Speaker 3 (20:41):
Ready for this along with a swim, he wasn't ready
for any swim.
Speaker 1 (20:44):
Yeah. I think I think Kyland, even if there was
one swim off of the sinister and that was it
for the entire final, I think Kyland would have been like,
all right, the swim's done. I'm able to move on. Yeah. Now, look,
it's always people are going to say like, oh, what
(21:05):
if there wasn't all this swimming, And I would like
to see Kyland in a final like that, But every
final is going to have some sort of swimming in it. Yeah,
it's not going to be to this extent. But to
say that he can just not worry about swimming would
be ignoring a part of it.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
And this was the face puzzle, right, yeah, yeah, so
another thing I want to call out.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
Oh no, the face puzzle was checkpoint one. But yeah,
what about it?
Speaker 2 (21:32):
Yeah, I was gonna tell you something about that that
I forgot about.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:34):
No, to put in perspective, how far away the sinister
was that platform, right, was five hundred meters the sinister.
The sinister was at the very least double that.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
A mile is.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
About nineteen hundred nineteen hundred meters, so they had to swim.
They had to swim at minimum somewhere around three miles
I think total yesterday, so like a mile on the
first leg, probably close to a mile on the second leg,
and then you know, close to a mile on the thing.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
I mean, it was just crazy. You know, there's only
two people in the challenge world that could have competed
with Jordan on this final with how it was formatted,
and one of them was on forty and the other
one was off doing two different reality shows. The first
person was ct he's like a fish in the water,
(22:33):
and the other one's Wes.
Speaker 2 (22:34):
Who's also gonna say Wes yeah, fish yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
I mean that would have been a fucking clinic to
see those three do this. Yeah, because no disrespect to
the other three guys. Derek Island bananas all in their
own right.
Speaker 2 (22:52):
Hat bananas, bananas, and Derek aren't even that bad.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
No, no they're not. It's just that it's so hard
to keep up with Jordan, and I still stand on it.
I think the only two guys that could have kept
up with Jordan are C Team Wes yep and It's
bananas is better than those two at other things, but
with swimming, those two are head and shoulders above above Johnny.
(23:22):
But yeah, I mean, look, it's starting. We're at this point.
They even make a comment on it. After the memory
board they're like, oh, can we can we give something
to Jordan that he's not good at?
Speaker 2 (23:36):
You know, well Johnny at the boat the other bow
check point where he's like, all right, what's Jordan good at?
Speaker 1 (23:42):
Puzzle?
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Memory water? All right, let's do that. Yeah, yeah, So yeah,
I think Johnny Kyland like they were not happy with
production with the choice of the final, and they were like,
I mean people see it more as like just complaining
about it, and I think the average viewer, but like
(24:03):
they're very much visibly complaining to production about their choice
of a final, which I understand, but like, you know,
also you know it is what it is.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
We hear Kylon later in the episode and he's like,
I can't believe I'm gonna lose this because of all
this swimming, and I just bro it's like whatever season
that was with BESI when he wouldn't eat you know it, Like,
I know there's differences in that, and there were different reasons.
(24:37):
But you have all these guys and girls in the
Challenge Universe who haven't won a season yet, and there's
a lot of them have that one Achilles heel, and
you can say whatever you want, but like, I don't
even think it would have mattered, because if it was
all on Land, Bananas is doing a lot better in
(25:00):
this final two, yeah, and Kyland would have to worry
about him and all those carnival games that they do
during finals, Bananas would be getting an advantage in those,
just because he's good at all that that fucking random shit,
you know, Like we mentioned Michelle and Jenny really still
(25:22):
doing a great job. At checkpoint two, Tory and Rachel,
you know, they're they're getting pissed off because they keep
getting in the back of the pack. But we get
to checkpoint three and it is called a thousand steps.
(25:44):
They have to go find this clue to solve a
mystery for the final checkpoint of the day, which I
tried pausing my TV. I couldn't really read the sign.
But if I'm ascertaining it correctly, it seemed like it
(26:04):
was some phrase for a skull puzzle? Am I accurate
on that?
Speaker 2 (26:10):
It's yeah, was this the platform?
Speaker 1 (26:12):
One? No, that was they were going the platform was
when they swam out and saw the skull check point one, No, no,
one was the the.
Speaker 2 (26:25):
Yeah, so three, this is the one I was talking
about with like the print in perspective, this is the
platform one?
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Yes, yes, you're right, I'm sorry. Three. Three was when
they swam out to the platform and had to look
out to see their their puzzle and if they got
it wrong, they had to come back and yeah, the
one thousand meters like you had said, Yeah, for a perspective.
(26:51):
But then four was when they had to do the
thousand steps to then get to their clue, to get
to the different clues to solve the mystery for the
final checkpoint of the day. And again another one here
for for Michelle and Jenny. This whole episode, I'm waiting
(27:16):
for Rachel and Toy to just burst.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
Through, I know, and it never happened. Yeah, how about that.
Speaker 1 (27:25):
Because it seems like as this episode's going right, we
start off with checkpoint one and two with a ton
of swimming, but then three and four is definitely less swimming.
We're seeing them do the steps. We're seeing them, you know,
have to run more. So I'm thinking, all right, Rachel's
about to catch up and this this is over. You know, Brandon,
(27:49):
I do think we're getting some foreshadowing soon, but it's
it's not at the point that I thought. I thought
we were going to get it right away. Yeah, but
that's listen, a credit to Michelle and Jenny. I mean,
you see Jordan finishing the checkpoint. Michelle and Jenny are
battling it out and they're not that far behind Jordan. Yes,
(28:11):
so they were going back and forth all day on
day one, and you know, Derek, Derek's hanging in there.
You know. It's again, it's tough to talk about the
guy's side because I know they're editing it and I
(28:32):
know they want to try and make it look close.
But Jordan's just miles and miles ahead of these guys.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
He is, I know, I know, I don't even think
the Karravote is going to impact the guys. It might
impact the girls, it might impact second third place big time.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
Even though Rachel was an angel, Rachel has a lot
of friends.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
Yeah, well, I was gonna say Rachel probably has.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
The best votes.
Speaker 2 (29:02):
If I had to guess, I could see Johnny and
Derek flip flopping at the end.
Speaker 1 (29:09):
Oh yeah, yeah, a second and third type thing. Nobody
had an issue with Derek all season.
Speaker 2 (29:15):
Yeah, that's about it, though, I'm the only the big
one potentially is like Jenny and uh Michelle flip flopper
one and two. That could happen. But I think dude,
using the Karma vote to flip flop one and two,
I think is ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
I think that would be really rough. I swear to God,
if that happens.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
That's gonna be that's gonna be really tough like that
because that, yeah, I'm their fortieth season, like like there's
a grueling final, this person just one and you're gonna
flip flop because you know of a vote by the
cast members, like you know the other thing too. Here's
my other problem with the Karma vote. This is a
cutthroat show. You're not supposed to like be nice to people.
(30:04):
This show is not about being nice to people, and
like this kind of forces you to do that. I
think it's kind of dumb, Like this show's not built
on that. Do it on Survivor or Big Brother, don't
do it on the Challenge where this one of the foundations.
There's three aspects of the show. It's going out to
the bars and drinking, which like isn't much of a
thing anymore. It's competing, and then it's fighting. Those are
(30:27):
the three. Those are the three aspects of this show
that make it so good. So you kind of take
away the fighting aspect. It's just kind of are you punt?
You're punishing people for the drama aspect, and it's kind
of I just don't have a I just have an
issue with it.
Speaker 1 (30:42):
You know what it is too and it pains me
to say it, but I I The reason that I
feel like the players probably aren't as upset about these
carmel points is that they probably talk about it like
it was nothing. But I guarantee you when they went
(31:03):
for the reunion and as people were getting eliminated, they
were talking about like, oh, what did you give this person?
What did you give that? And it's not even about
this season, Austin. It goes into the future seasons and
the All Star seasons of like, oh, this person had
my back when I was competing in the final, they
(31:25):
gave me a good score for Karma points, like the
challenge now is so much more based on the future.
And let me make sure I don't screw someone over
who's gonna get a call in the same season as me, yea,
which annoys me. But that part I can't control what
I think they could have done a better job with
(31:46):
if they really wanted. I know they wanted to do
the Eras theme, like it made sense with all the
divisions of the teams, and you know, the Eras Tour
was gigantic, So I get all the marketing, the naming
of it, right, I've got no problem with that, But
what they should have done, Hey, if you're the first person.
Speaker 4 (32:08):
In karmel points for the final, first place guy, first
place girl, a nice advantage to start the fine last
place girl disadvantage.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Leave it at that, and then that's what I thought, Yeah,
cooking from there. Yeah, because in that way, we know
as it's going, okay, this person's in first, this person's
in second. Now we like we said, we know Jordan,
barring a medical emergency or a he gets attacked by
(32:42):
a shark.
Speaker 2 (32:43):
Yeah, he's putting together one of the most dominant final
performances we've ever seen.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
But yeah, yeah, this guy, I mean, if there was
any a doubt.
Speaker 3 (32:56):
Yeah, let's also like he's killing it in the swim
but like, let's also not forget he's destroying the puzzle
parts as well, so like and like, it's not it's
it's not even close. I mean, he has already a
big lead with the swimming, he is destroying the puzzles,
so it's just it's not remotely close.
Speaker 1 (33:13):
And I'm sure Kyland was hoping, you know, he's like,
there's got to be puzzles in math somewhere around here,
you know, yep, And he was hoping Jordan would got
tripped off. He really, it's tough to find a weakness
in Jordan's game. The only one is Paul Russell as
as that is to say, but it's.
Speaker 2 (33:33):
True, that is it, and and uh what it?
Speaker 1 (33:36):
Uh?
Speaker 3 (33:36):
Kyland said Jordan has one of the best win percentages, right, Yeah,
you never.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
Mentioned land And I think Landon's two for two.
Speaker 3 (33:44):
We know nobody remembers Landed Landon if he kept going,
because he stopped early.
Speaker 2 (33:49):
I think he was two for two. If Landon kept going,
he probably would have been one of the best challengers
of all time. I think pound for pound he is,
but because he didn't do a lot of challenges, he's
not gonna considered, which I understand.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
They had him on on Challenge Mania and he said
that he even if he went on All Stars or
the Flagship and like got paid what on average other
people are getting paid and he won, he would be
making less than what he's making in his career. So
(34:22):
whatever was his career again, I don't know, but whatever
he's doing, like shout out to him because.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
Yeah, but like you know, I I think I think
it's less about the money more about the challenge, right
because I mean they're getting what fifty seventy five thousand
dollars probably on average most of these challenges, like.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
The bare minimums, some of them get way more than that.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Yeah, so average okay, maybe average one hundred thousand like that,
doesn't you know, I wouldn't be shocked if most of
these people are making more money than that in their
everyday job.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
So yeah, but yeah, yeah, it would it would be
I've thought about it. It would be kind of cool if,
like he report, least somebody on Era one. Granted all
five of the Era five or Era one guys were
really good. Yeah, but it would be cool to see
how he stacks up against everybody. This is a good
(35:15):
blast in the past. There we uh, we see Kyland
having Before we get to the last checkpoint of the episode,
Kyland is having a brutal cramp in the water. You know,
I've had some rough cramps, but not in the water,
So I can't I can't imagine poor guy. I mean,
(35:36):
he's in last, He's gotten a terrible cramp, and now
he's just hoping he can he can finish the final,
let alone, you know, if he can catch up.
Speaker 2 (35:47):
Yeah, he's having a rough go of it. The water
is not his thing.
Speaker 1 (35:50):
No, No, Now, I will say I don't think this
was by any means the best thing for Kyland. I
think we had a lot of there was a storyline
this season where in a vision where people could actually
see Kyland winning because him and Jordan kept going back
(36:11):
and forth in dailies throughout the season. So I don't
think anyone would have been surprised. What I will say
is this does set him up perfectly to continue to
get called back because now he has that motivation. Oh yeah, yeah,
the final but getting last, you know. Yeah, So we
(36:36):
get to the overnight checkpoint. And I'm sorry. I know
a lot of people thought this was stupid as hell,
and it was stupid to be clear, But again, like
you said earlier, Austin, with the three things that make
the challenge under the fighting and drama, how much of
that is over stupid things? And like how many how
(36:59):
many times have we seen a cup of noodle get
thrown at someone? Yeah, the most, like fighting over pasta
being one of the most iconic fights in the show's history.
So listen, this was stupid, but I was here for it. Okay,
you can't train for something like this. It's just who
(37:20):
wants it more and who has the mental fortitude to
hang in there and not go crazy and not lose
it because Jenny's going crazy? What did you think of this?
Like insane insanity contraption they had going here with.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
The dude, I like think that was I think this
is the hardest thing of the day, to be honest
with you, I can't.
Speaker 3 (37:42):
Imagine, like, you're counting these coins, and first of all,
I think they're counting currency.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
They're not counting the coins.
Speaker 3 (37:49):
That is nuts, So the counting currency, and then you
know they're exhausted. They swam miles and then they did
a bunch of your running and everything. They ran up,
they go upstairs, and then you're singing this frickin' song
for thirty minutes.
Speaker 2 (38:07):
Some of the people were closing their eyes, which I
probably would have done, and then you go back down.
You're doing that for hours, Like I think that is
just mental just mental fortitude to continue forward with that.
And then I can't you know, It's like, I can't
blame Jenny. But also, girl, you gotta like you gotta
be quiet, like everybody's going through the same stuff, like
(38:28):
do it in your head or something like. And then
you hear Jordan like shut up.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
We know that Jordan and Johnny do that to their
closest friends. They'll yell at them and tell them to
shut up. So the fact that Johnny is even yelling
at her to stop, like, you can clearly tell this
girl is breaking. She is not having it, and it's
(38:56):
starting to rub everybody. And everyone had been talking talking
about how Jenny was out in front. Jenny's doing real well,
I would be shocked and call it a hot take
or whatever. I don't think it's that hot of a take.
But I think this is Rachel's checkpoint, and I think
(39:20):
this is where it turns and she starts locking in
on day two.
Speaker 2 (39:25):
Yeah, I would like to see one of Banana's angels win.
Speaker 1 (39:32):
Yeah, they've been fighting. From an underdog perspective, I'd love
to see Michelle win. I just don't know if this
if she's got it against this group.
Speaker 2 (39:42):
He's in it, She's in it, so you never know.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
And I just want to say, like, regardless of how
this finishes for her, like she talked about, right, she
fought from the bottom of the whole season three elimination wins,
really had a fun season, has been a main narrator,
and you're right, she is still in it, Like, she
is very much in the thick of it. The karma
points are going to be a big thing for her,
(40:07):
Like that's a big positive for her. She had a
lot of strong allies leave this game, and I mean,
aside from Amanda and Laurel, those are probably the only
two people giving her negative or you know, not good
karma points. Like I think everyone else is fine with her.
So I'm just thrilled to see her hanging in there.
(40:32):
It's great.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
Yeah, she's right there.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
But this is going to be a fun next episode,
we're going to see part two in the finish of
the Challenge forty Battle of the Eras. I'm sure not,
I'm sure. I definitely know we have a reunion because
the cast went out to film in Amsterdam several weeks ago,
So we do have a reunion for this season. We'll
(40:58):
see how that goes. But this is gonna be an
exciting finish, you know. I hope it goes. We have
some intrigue. I'm looking to see what else we we
have checkpoints wise, I hope there's there's something stupid for
me to laugh at, because I I laughed so hard
(41:19):
with that overnight checkpoint. I really did, and I can't
wait for it to finish. I can't wait for everyone
to be yelling at each other counting them fucking coins. Yeah,
it's gonna be great. So we'll be back next week
to break down the finale a Battle of the Eras.
(41:41):
Then we'll get a reunion at some point and later
this month. As we talked about last week, when the
cast broke Challenge All Stars five rivals, the fans have
been clamoring for rivals. It's back. Rivals is an interesting
word for some of these pairs. Some of these pairs
(42:01):
are definitely rivals. Some of these people I don't know
if they've talked in the last five or ten years.
And they may not even hate each other. They may
just feel indifferently. It's an interesting cast. I'm sure we'll
watch it, all that good stuff, but we gotta wrap
(42:22):
up forty and we will be here to break it
all down. May have a few more special nuggets coming
your way. Won't reveal that yet as nothing's been confirmed,
but you know, subscribe to your podcast speed so you're
you're able to see what's coming down the pipeline as
(42:42):
we wrap up Challenge forty Battle of the Eras Austin,
thank you so much for hopping on the mic. It's
always a pleasure. Where where can the listeners check you out?
What are you doing for the Bears game? You know
all the good stuff?
Speaker 2 (43:01):
Well, I will I choose not to be not to
upset my Sundays. I will be in Mexico tomorrow, so
I will not be watching the Bears.
Speaker 1 (43:16):
All right. Well, if you're.
Speaker 2 (43:18):
They've ruined me enough this year, it's enough.
Speaker 1 (43:22):
And just a programming note. Due to Austin's vacation, I
may have a guest song with me to recap part
two of the finale, or we wait wait till he
gets home. We will figure that off out off air,
but we're excited either way, looking forward to seeing who
is the winner of this hallmark season of the Challenge.
(43:45):
Who's going to be crowned winners on the Sinister, looking
forward to it as we think it'll be Jordan, and
then who the heck knows for the girls. It's still
up in the air, but I'm excited. We know you are.
Hope you all enjoy your weekend and hope you all
have a great week
Popular Podcasts
NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal
Gregg Rosenthal and a rotating crew of elite NFL Media co-hosts, including Patrick Claybon, Colleen Wolfe, Steve Wyche, Nick Shook and Jourdan Rodrigue of The Athletic get you caught up daily on all the NFL news and analysis you need to be smarter and funnier than your friends.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com