You could almost hear the collective groan at the announcement of a celebrity version of the best reality competition on television, Race Across the World, in late 2019. But when four famous faces and their relatives set off on a trek from Marrakech to Tromsø (one global pandemic, two excellent standard series and a week delay following the Moroccan earthquake later), it soon dawned that the show was barely any different.
I’ve never been so happy to be wrong.
Over six weeks we’ve watched the celebrities – McFly drummer Harry Judd, All Saints singer Melanie Blatt, weatherman and TV presenter Alex Beresford and racing driver Billy Monger – and their family members struggle with budgeting, brain-numbingly long bus journeys and indecipherable train timetables just as much as the non-famous contestants do. Even with no prize money on the line (the winning normos pocket £20,000), last night’s finale was a true nail-biter.
It began with a killer blow to race leaders Monger and his sister Bonny, though, who made the tough decision to drop out of the race following a family emergency back in the UK. The reaction from those still in the running was touching, particularly from Beresford’s dad Noel, who couldn’t hold back his tears. Perhaps if he had realised then that the Mongers’ departure had bumped him and his son up to first position he wouldn’t have been so upset.
The remaining teams had to make their way from Berlin to their final destination in Norway, heading either straight north through Scandinavia (expensive but quicker), or through the Baltic nations of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia (cheaper but around the houses).
Everyone chose to travel to different major cities (Judd and his mother Emma to Oslo, the Beresford boys to Stockholm, and Blatt and her mother Helene to Tallinn), which would have made for great TV if they’d had the time and money to stop off and see the sights. Instead, most of the finale was filmed inside the fluorescently lit sweatboxes that pass for long-distance buses.
Never mind. Race Across the World has always been less about the travel than it has the relationships between the racers, and the enforced downtime aboard the buses forced the pairs to reflect on their time together. “This whole journey has been exploration of sights and sounds and … exploration of my soul,” said Harry’s mother, Emma (the series’ true star). “It’s made me feel peaceful.”
As ever at this point in the competition, budgets were dwindling. “This could be the legacy of some expensive taxis,” suggested Blatt after, with just 15 per cent of the budget left, she was forced to give up her “dream” of travelling through Norway. Anyone who’s heard me bang on about Race Across the World before will know that the reliance on taxis is one of my biggest bugbears, and it’s time producers finally put their foot down.
By the point at which the programme reached its dramatic final moments, it was impossible to know who was truly in the lead thanks to the traditionally sly editing. Or at least it was until Alex and Noel, who had struggled to find their way out of Lapland, ended up on the same bus to Tromsø as the Judds.
Anyone rooting for Emma and Harry to win (me included) would have been disheartened to watch the Beresfords run past the mother-son duo when the competition turned into a literal foot race.
It was Alex and Noel, then, who won the race, despite never once coming first in any previous leg. Worthy winners? Of course – one of the best elements of the programme is the fact that its always anyone’s game. There are never really any losers in Race Across the World. Even the celebrity version.