Racing once again

Sorry, but I must again make this plug for a favorite television show.

Television is full of terrible things that call themselves “Reality TV” but “The Amazing Race” is widely recognized as a program of exceptional quality.

The premise is simple: a race around the world for a million dollars. There is no voting: the outcome is determined by luck and ability. The last team to finish a race segment is eliminated.

The sixth running of the Race will begin airing in the United States Tuesday, November 16 on CBS. It has also been televised in other countries around the world.

In addition to the inevitable adventures of traveling quickly through strange places, teams are required to perform tasks related to the country they are in, from eating some local “delicacy” to performing a perilous feat or messy errand.

As the teams compete under very stressful conditions, they are not always charitable and occasionally they have ethical slips. (In past years, a few teams promoted an “alternative lifestyle” but there was none of that last time and there seems to be nothing of the sort this time either.)

Last season, the race had contestants hang gliding in Patagonia, navigating through the Russian snow, climbing through the Egyptian pyramids, climbing cliffs in the Phillipines, rolling down hills in New Zealand, and much, much more.

Who knows where they will go this year?