Race Across the World (series five) – Meet the teams taking on the ultimate race across China, Nepal and India

RACE ACROSS THE WORLD (SERIES FIVE)

Gaz and Yin

Q: Why did you want to take part in the series?

Yin: I think it came from me. I saw the advert, and in that moment thought, you know what? I really want to do that. The last year has been quite a personal journey for me. Gaz and I, although we used to be married, have been separated for about three years. When we split up, I found another partner, but he passed away suddenly in September. The last year has been tough, but one of the things that Chris gave me was a real sense of adventure, and he really liked travelling. We talked a lot about travelling, and so when this came along, I thought, why not? Something inside me made me fill out the application form.

I said to Gaz when he got home because I was living with Gaz at the time, as he was looking after me during my grieving period, ‘Do you fancy going on Race Across the World with me?’. He was like ‘Yeah, whatever’. He probably just said it more to amuse me, because he obviously knew what I was going through at that moment. But before we knew it, he’d filled out the application and the journey had begun!

Gaz: Personally, for me, I did some travel in my early 20s, but when all my friends went to university to get degrees, I just went out and got a job. I’d seen little bits of Race on Gogglebox. When we were together, we never went on holidays off the beaten track. I’d taken 9/10months out of my life to go travelling when I was younger, and Yin had never had that.

Q: Why did you decide to do this together?

Gaz: I wouldn’t probably do this with anyone other than Yin. I know that sounds weird, because we’re not together, we’re not husband and wife, but we’re still best mates. And I think even now, ‘Could I do this with my brother? No’. ‘Could I do this with any other mates? No’. And Yin was pretty much the same.

Yin: I definitely see it as a gift from Chris. I know he’s gone, but I do think that he has had a meddling hand in this. He would be laughing hysterically but also cheering us on, wishing he were there, seeing all the different things and getting the new experiences. This whole process so far has also been a vehicle for us to talk about when we were married, but in a really nice way.

Q: Have you got a strategy going into the race?

Yin: Our main strategy is to stay to the end and do the whole experience.

Gaz: We’ve set ourselves mini goals, in the sense that we know someone gets eliminated in one of the legs, so if we can get through that bit, that’s a win. And then if we can get to the end, that’s another win. And if we’re in sight of winning it, that would be great. But in regards to strategies, it’s hard as we’ve never done it before. There is a will to win. And as much as we do think there’s a strategy, I think anything can happen!

Yin: I think Lady Luck plays a part in whether your strategy works or not.

Gaz: I think I’m very good at spending money, and Yin’s very good at saving money, so from that point of view, there is a slight strategy as we’ll be quite cautious in what Yin will let me spend.

Q: Have you picked up any tips from the previous series?

Gaz: Don’t lose your passport!

Q: What do you think are your strengths and weaknesses?

Yin: Gaz is really great as the initiator of an idea, and I’m the kind of person who takes a step back and looks at the plan and sees if it’s going to work. So I think we complement each other. Having known each other for well over 30 years, we know intrinsically where our strengths and weaknesses lie.

Gaz: I would rush in at 100 miles an hour and get it wrong every time, whereas Yin would rein me back.

Yin: I can sometimes be too cautious, and Gaz will push me to stop that dilly-dallying, which is his strength.

RACE ACROSS THE WORLD (SERIES FIVE)

Elizabeth and Letitia

Q: Why did you want to take part in the series?

Letitia: I think I signed up for this mostly for the challenge. I think I just wanted to push myself to finish something, to accomplish something big. I think on this race, it’s a good opportunity to grow as a person. I always strive to push myself to grow and see where my strengths lie, or just to know myself. Also, doing this with my sister will be fun. I don’t know if I could do it with anyone else.

Elizabeth: The reasons why I wanted to do it are similar in terms of wanting to push myself. I feel like I haven’t been challenged in a very long time. I’ve been quite mundane with my life and just going with the flow of things. But I’m also getting back into travelling because I haven’t travelled for a while; it’s mainly been for a purpose, maybe to visit someone or for a wedding. I’m looking forward to just going with the flow of travelling, backpacking and pushing myself. As I’ve got older, I’ve felt more reluctant to put myself in different positions, so this is me throwing myself out there.

Q: Have you both got a strategy going into the race?

Elizabeth: I think we’re really relying on the kindness of strangers. I think what I would love for our trip is to get the balance of both of us, because we’re pretty different. We work well together, and a lot of our differences, I think, could work well in terms of moving us forward. I think I’m quite analytical. Letitia can be more direct sometimes. I think working together and trying not to spend too much money.

Letitia: I also think to have fun, have an experience, and see as much as possible. We will focus on the race, but I’d like there to be enjoyment too.

Q: Have you picked up any tips from previous series?

Elizabeth: Be really careful with your belongings and do not leave things. That’s something I’m a bit worried about. I think it’s good to save, but on the last two legs, it’s when money just needs to be spent on the essentials – spending it to go as fast as possible.

Q: And how have you prepared for the trip?

Letitia: I’ve just done a 100 km walk on the South Downs, and we walked for 27 hours. That was a big challenge, but I feel like this will top it. It helped me to prepare for this because it was like an endurance test. And in the Race, you have to endure a lot. So I think mentally it’s prepared me to keep going. I’ve also started to fast a bit because I can sometimes be very hangry.

Q: Would you say that you’re both quite adventurous?

Elizabeth: I think we’re both adventurous in terms of trying new places, new food, and new transport. Maybe not in terms of activities.

Letitia: I’ll give everything a go. I would like my feet to be on the ground at all times. I just mentally have to prepare myself, so it just takes me a bit longer. But I’ll give it a go.

Elizabeth: I would say I am more adventurous than Letitia in terms of putting myself out there physically. Even maybe social situations as well.

Q: And how competitive are you both? Are you in it to win it?

Elizabeth: I think we can win it. We’re not normally competitive people. I think normally when I’m in something, when I’ve started something, I definitely want to see it through. I’m not aggressive with competitiveness.

Letitia: I feel like since we’ve been here, we’re like, we can actually make it. We’ve come so far already. It’s amazing.

RACE ACROSS THE WORLD (SERIES FIVE)

Fin and Sioned

Q: Why did you want to take part in the series?

Sioned: I wanted to travel anyway, so it’s a great start, but alongside that, I wanted to discover more about myself and Fin, strengthening that bond in a very real and authentic way. We’ve not really been together, just the two of us, before, so this is something where we will have to rely on and depend on each other, and we don’t have another choice. I think there is a lot about self-discovery and seeing more of the world in the process.

Fin: It’s a way to see if we can be together, basically, if it can work forever. A challenge to see if it will make or break us.

Q: Have you got a strategy going into the race?

Sioned: We’ve spoken about this – not really! It is more of a go with the flow thing for us.

Fin: We do want to win, but we’re more just seeing how it goes, seeing what we see and experiencing new things.

Sioned: It’s hard to have a strategy when you don’t know what’s ahead. It’s hard to plan. We will deal with what comes our way when it comes our way.

Q: What are you imagining your biggest challenges might be during the trip?

Fin: Before, I would have said communication, but now I’m thinking about food.

Sioned: I was going to say mine is trying hard not to take my stress out on you, because I know that I can get angry at you, even though it’s not your fault. I think Fin will struggle with budgeting, he does like to splurge!

Q: What roles do you think you’ll take on the race?

Fin: I think it’ll be Sioned with the passports and the money, and me probably doing the haggling, trying to get the best deals.

Sioned: Normally, it’s me who speaks to strangers more, but Fin has really grown in confidence, so I think he might take over that role now.

Q: Would you say you cope well during a crisis? Are you calm under pressure?

Fin: I definitely am, but Sioned, definitely no.

Sioned: It depends on the crisis. If I see a way out… maybe! I’ll have a five-minute meltdown, and then I’ll be fine and say, let’s go!

Q: What does the rest of your family make of you doing this together?

Sioned: So my mum actually mentioned it and thought it was a good idea for me to do it. She initially said I should do it with my brother, but I didn’t think that was a good idea, so I went for it with Fin. So my family are actually very supportive. They love the show themselves and they’re very sad to see me go, but they know it’s an insane opportunity and want me to really go for it.

Fin: I think my mum’s quite proud. My brother is very jealous because he’d also love to do this.

RACE ACROSS THE WORLD (SERIES FIVE)

Brian and Melvyn

Q: Why did you want to take part in the series?

Melvyn: I saw the first series and thought I could do that. It was as simple as that, then I thought, who would I want to do it with? And that was Brian. We want to create some new memories.

Brian: I watched the first series and thought this will be fun, exciting, and an adventure with an opportunity for us both to meet up, because we don’t meet up that regularly at home, and spend a bit of quality time with each other, as we used to do when we were kids. It was an excuse to get together and relive some of our old adventures as teenagers and young children.

Q: Have you got a strategy?

Brian: I suppose when we were looking at it, we thought we would plan this and plan that, and plan the other, but our strategies have basically gone out the window, because we can’t plan for anything any longer. We didn’t know we would be going to China. I wanted to go to the Amazon, but I think it’s a long way to get there from China! The strategy is that we don’t want to be kicked out first, because my children wouldn’t let me live it down.

Melvyn: The other worry from our families at home is that we shouldn’t embarrass them. So we’re going to go all out to embarrass them.

Brian: We get on, but we’ll have a few arguments and a few discussions on the way. I’ve never spent eight or nine weeks with Melvyn.

Melvyn: We’ve never spent that amount of time together. We used to spend two or three weeks together, fishing and that kind of stuff. Not only have we not spent this much time together as adults, but we’ve never spent this much time away from our partners either. I’ve been married 44 years, Brian’s been married 38 years, so that’s a big wrench for us.

Q: Are you in it to win it?

Brian: We are winners by nature. We’re very competitive. We’ll be disappointed if we don’t come first.

Melvyn: We’ll be disappointed if we don’t win it, but we’ll be even more disappointed if we don’t make it to the end.

Q: What do you think your strengths and weaknesses will be?

Melvyn: Communication. We know how to communicate, even though my Mandarin is slightly suspect.

Brian: We’re amiable. Neither of us has an issue going up to speak to people. We’re not shy. We’re very open. So that’s a strength. Our weaknesses are that we can’t speak any languages whatsoever.

Melvyn: We’re both very controlling, we think. We organise our lives. We like to be in control of what we do. We both need to be in control of where we’re going and what we’re doing. So that might cause a bit of a problem.

We have promised each other that if we make a bad decision, we will go with it. We won’t get on at one another because we’ll have discussed it anyway. We go with it, and then we get out of it. We’re here to enjoy and do our best, and we’re going to feed off the experience and learn from it.

RACE ACROSS THE WORLD (SERIES FIVE)

Caroline and Tom

Q: Why did you want to take part in the series?

Caroline: I saw the South American series and absolutely knew that that was the programme I wanted to do with Thomas. I’ve never applied for anything like this before, I’ve never done anything like this, I’ve never done anything out of my comfort zone or ever arranged any travel, and I just knew it was made for me and the perfect person was Thomas. Thomas felt the same. We were made for it, or the programme was made for us.

Tom: Exactly the same as mum, I love travelling – I never thought I’d travel with my mum, but the fact that I get to travel and see the world, and do it with her, is just perfect.

Q: Have you got a strategy?

Caroline: We know we will struggle with the budget because Thomas needs to eat a lot – a huge amount! So to make up for that, we were thinking, perhaps we could ask for favours with people, or work extra hard, or offer to do something in return for an apple at the side of the road. We are determined to race, and Thomas wants to immerse himself and have experiences. I agree with him, so our strategy is to always keep an eye on the race, but we will make the best of every opportunity while we can. It’ll make it more exciting as we’ll have to race harder, as we’re not putting the race at the forefront.

Tom: We still don’t know exactly where we’re going, or how things work in the country. I think our strategy will depend on how we do in the first leg, and it will adapt as we go along.

Q: How do you feel about travelling without mobile phones or credit cards?

Tom: It’s definitely going to be a challenge, but I’m just really excited for it. It’s been so much nicer not having your phone to rely on if a bit of conversation goes quiet or something. I think it really just forces us to spend a bit more time talking, which has been lovely. And I think it’ll be something where, hopefully, I’ll realise I don’t want to rely on my phone so much when I go home. I’ve recently noticed that my screentime is five to six hours daily. And I hardly remember any of those five or six hours. It’s pointless. It’s there to waste a bit of time.

Caroline: Nowadays, you would never go anywhere without a phone and a card. You’d be silly to. But here, we have put ourselves in that situation! I also think I’m a lot happier without my phone. Again, I find that I use it too much, and it seems to be a waste of time rather than an actual necessity. So it will do me the world of good to be a bit more resourceful. So I’m looking forward to it.

Tom: It also gives you a massive sense of freedom because we can’t text people at home and see how things are going. And in a really selfish way, I think this trip is about doing it for yourself. We just have to focus on ourselves. Yeah, it’s a really freeing feeling being disconnected for a bit.

Q: What’s the most unusual thing you’ve brought with you?

Tom: One of my best mates gave me a compass before we left. And I don’t know how useful it will be, but it’s a cool compass. It’s like an old antique one. I brought it with me, hoping that I might use it at some point. And even if I don’t, it’s just nice to have.

Caroline: My husband was asked specifically not to buy me anything, and I was meant to be coming out with no jewellery, but he still went out and bought me a beautiful little gold elephant, because I am desperate to meet an elephant and see one for real. It’s for luck.