The Amazing Race

The Amazing Race: Fall 2014

 

Amazing Race Team

By Nicole Dotzenrod
Posted 10/07/2014


On Friday, October 3, thirty teams of three met in Wilder Hall to prepare for the Amazing Race, an exhilarating scavenger-hunt challenge spanning the UMass campus. Once teams were signed-in and briefed on the rules by UMass Police Officer Tom O’Donnell, we were given our first clue and the race began.

Huddled over our clue, myself and my teammates Katelynn and Jasmine attempted to locate hidden colors in each sentence, write the color on a line with one letter circled, and use the circled letters to figure out a secret phrase. For example, in sentence one, “Bob decided to jump in, knowing that this is his only choice,” the word pink is hidden in “jump in knowing.” By the time we decoded the secret phrase “good luck,” we looked around to see that many teams had already left Wilder for the next location. The race was on.

Our next clue was a sentence written backwards: Proceed to the center of campus and look all around, find the place where cars abound. At the top is where we park, hurry now if you’re not left in the dark! Immediately we headed in the direction of the parking garage with other teams at our heels. At the garage, we faced two challenges. The first: to eat a mini-pie with no hands. I took one for the team and tried my best to devour the pumpkin pie as quickly as possible (I’ll be passing on the pumpkin pie this Thanksgiving). Next, we had to light a biodegradable paper lantern and send it into the sky. It was easy to forget the competitiveness of the race, taking pause to watch dozens of lanterns take off into the night sky.

After “reading between the lines” of our next clue, we were sent to Student Legal Services, where one team member had to stack nuts on top of one another with a wooden stick, and then hook a key onto a paper using only their mouth. Katelynn and I anxiously waited outside of the room before Jasmine ran out with our next clue, a photo of students, the symbol for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, and a building. We were headed to the Student Union.

Once at the Student Union, we had to measure out the exact portion of a shot in a solo cup. Our next clue: a food, dish, or sauce in Indian cuisine seasoned with a mixture of pungent spices + an uneducated person from a small town or country + a box made of wire or metal bars in which people keep animals or birds. Curry Hicks Cage.

At Curry Hicks, Katelynn was blindfolded. Our task was to guide her through a series of cones and caution tape using only our words. If she touched either, we had to start over. Katelynn made it to the end of the gym, and we were given another riddle: Witches, goblins and ghouls, oh my, don’t let another team pass you by. You’ll have to find us quick and save some breath, at the house that’s made to scare you to death. It’s actually not a house in the least, it’s set up on a lawn and I think we have a scary beast. Hurry quickly to the building that’s Good, and end this race as a winner, you could!

We hurried to the Goodell lawn, where we had to survive a loop in the haunted tent set up there. When we made it out alive our next riddle read as follows: Riddle me this, riddle me that, I have wheels big and fat. I make stops near and far, riding me is easier than driving a car. I’m big and white and drive through the night, but it’s not easy finding space on Saturday night. Now you think you know what I am? Find the place where I park and repair, you’re most definitely a riddle extraordinaire!

Once at the bus garage, one team member had to throw a small, squishy policeman toy into a pumpkin bucket attached strings held by the two other teammates. This earned us our next clue, a list of facts about a man who a building on campus was named after: The George N. Parks Minuteman Marching Band Building.

After playing Kan-Jam and throwing a clothespin from a balcony into a bucket, we were given the clue that set Team 6 back in the race, a holdup we would not recover from. The journalism/communication major, the English/communication major, and the sociology major were given a math problem to complete. The answer was the coordinates to our next location. (Surprisingly) we solved the problem correctly, but it proved more difficult than we thought. When we finally made it to the Mullins Center, we had fallen behind significantly.

After throwing a soccer ball back and forth while running up and down a hill (twice, because I dropped it), the German word for “recreation” led us to our next location. Split amongst the team, we had to ride the bike machine 1.5 miles, do 10 push-ups and 10 sit-ups, double-leg jump up three wooden stairs, and bike another 1.5 miles. With tired, increasingly hungry bodies, we sat down to decode our next clue, literally. Our clue was written in Morse code. By Googling “Morse code translator,” we discovered our next location was the Integrative Learning Center.

After we successfully rolled a Ping-Pong ball down the long ramp-hallway in the ILC, a list of facts about an undisclosed Massachusetts town (Dennis Leary was born here, the native people call the region Quinsigamond, etc.) led us to Worcester Dining Common. Here, we raced to roll a sushi. The next riddle read: If you’re looking for a place to rent and want to make sure you don’t end up in a tent, stop by our office in the center and we’ll show you how to live as a renter. Back to the Student Union we raced, where we sang our karaoke rendition of “Hollaback Girl” by Gwen Stefani.

Lastly, the final clue, a QR code, led us to Totman Gym, where sadly they were packing up the event. 10:20 p.m. had come and gone, and the race was over. Exhausted, we walked back to Wilder Hall, where we were welcomed with pizza and assorted wings: the perfect end to the night.

While Team 6 put forth a valiant effort we fell short - still, we’re looking forward to trying our luck again next semester! Thank you CMASS and the UMPD for putting on a great event, and congratulations to the winning team!

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