Sat, May 10 2008 - 3rd Edition of Toronto's Amazing Race! (View Original Event Details)
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Twelve teams of two successfully finished the 3rd edition of Toronto's Amazing Race on a beautiful Saturday. This race was particularly competitive as we had the first winners of the Amazing Race (Andrea & Chris) and one-half of the winners (Darrel) for the second Amazing Race.
The theme of this race was Architectural Toronto and I promised that the racers would not be visiting the CN Tower or the ROM's Chrystal. One may be wondering, "Then what's left to see architecturally in Toronto?" Plenty, it turns out.
From our usual spot at Union Station, racers took off for old City Hall because I'm rather fond of the fact that the architect E.J. Lennox decorated the building with his name and face, and poked fun of the politicians of his day by making caricatures of their faces and using them as grotesques. Then they trotted off to the Elgin & Winter Theatre, which is the only double-decker theatre left in the world (if you haven't seen the inside, I highly recommend taking the tour during Open Doors). Next racers ran off to the Summerhill LCBO, which is THE WORLD'S LARGEST LCBO (since, LCBOs only exist in Ontario, it's really the just the largest LCBO, but it sounds more impressive to say THE WORLD'S LARGEST), where they had to go find what real absenthe is like (no, they didn't get to drink it, I just made them read a little article about it). Then they booked it to Day Ave, where the smallest house in Toronto stands.
There they found Jason and had to complete a drawing challenge. Jason didn't like the first attempt from a couple of teams and he made them redraw it. I was most impressed with Andre and Lan's drawing of the house. We all agreed it was very nice.
From there, they traveled south to the Gladstone and hunted for the photographer who captures the gentrification process found in Toronto. A few teams even took the time to take a picture with her. The sixth checkpoint was Scadding Cabin, located at the Exhibition Place. I chose Scadding Cabin because it was the oldest house in Toronto. Darrel and Nick were in such a hurry to get there, that they ran from the Gladstone all the way to the cabin.
At the cabin, Marco and Shannon were waiting for them for the racers' next challenge - build a house out of graham crackers and frosting, although some racers thought I meant for them to have a snack. People were surprisingly creative with building their houses. Jason and Chetan took particular care in building their house (Shannon claimed that they took 20 minutes), while other teams were quite secretive. As a part of the challenge, teams had to transport their house to the finish in a shoebox.
Yes, each team had their own shoe box. And all those shoe boxes belonged to me. These shoe boxes are from the shoes that I had bought since coming to live in Toronto three years ago. I didn't know what to do with the shoe boxes and I thought it was a waste to throw them away, so I kept them in my closet (I have a lot of closet space). Finally, I put them to good use. I still have more shoe boxes in my closest. No, I do not think I have enough shoes.
Then racers went to OCAD, a funky artsy building in the middle of staid downtown, before finally coming to the finish line at the Duke of Richmond. Pretty much at the point, all the graham cracker houses were finished, except for Chris and Andrea's, which was still left standing.
The top six finishers were:
1) Darrel & Nick 2:58
2) Andrea & Chris 3:06
3) Chetan & Jason 3:10
4) Pierre & Dave 3:15
5) Sara & Shelagh 3:21
6) Robbin & Stacey 3:44
Pierre and Dave were ringers in this race. They posed as people who just wanted to walk the entire race, but instead they ran their hearts out. Dave said that he wanted to walk it, but as soon as he saw people running, his competitive nature came out and he ran too. Pierre stated that he had no choice but to run after his partner.
We found out that Angeline & Geopo found out about the event and the club through Metro. Apparently this event got written up as a notice in that paper. Cool!
Special kudos goes to Justin who drove in Toronto from Kingston just for my event. He and his partner, Kate, also won a special award from me (a book of Where things are) for their frantic antics at the Elgin & Winter Theatre. After I had sent off all the racers from Union Station, I walked over to the theatre because I was wondering why Justin & Kate hadn't called in yet. I stood across the street and watched in fascination as Kate and Justin ran back and forth in front of the theatre vainly searching for the answer to a question written on their clue.
As always, I gratefully thank the people who helped me out. This event cannot take place with their help: Jason for manning the Day House checkpoint, Shannon and Marco for helping me assemble the clue packets and for manning the Scadding Cabin Checkpoint. I also would like to thank my friend, Steffan, who was the unofficial architecture consultant for this event.
Have some photos from this event that you'd like to share in our photo album? Please forward them to Erik Sonstenes at photos@torontooutdoorclub.com. Please note that we prefer to receive the photos in approximately 640x480 or 750x500 pixels - do NOT send original high-res photos. If you have a LOT of photos, please submit up to twenty of your favorites (only) for a day event, or up to forty of your favourites for a multi-day event. Thank you.