Murtz On The Scene: Exclusive Interview With The Amazing Race All-Stars‘ John Erck & Jessica Hoel

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The last time John Erck & Jessica Hoel competed on The Amazing Race, they were eliminated while still holding onto an express pass. Race fans always knew that the pair would be back for another shot at the $1 million prize and they were certainly the team with the most compelling backstory heading into The Amazing Race All-Stars. Unfortunately, the pair still couldn’t pull off the win in the second Race experience as they were eliminated at the Piazza del Popolo in Rome after an exciting race to the finish with the Globetrotters. I caught up with John and Jessica to discuss what happened.

Murtz Jaffer: John, you seemed like a totally different person this season. Was it more important to you to win or to change your image from the last time you raced?

John Erck: I think that we just wanted to be ourselves more or less and last time we felt like all of our segments on the show really featured our competitive side. I wouldn’t say that we are different people or anything. I just feel like a different side of who we are got presented to the public this time around. Our main objective was to just kind of have fun. It wasn’t about winning the million dollars or to change our image or anything like that. It was more just Jessica and I wanting the chance to travel around the world together because we had so much fun the first time.

MJ: Jessica, are you glad that you didn’t even have an express pass to worry about this season?

Jessica Hoel: I mean I guess it would have been kind of fun to use one, or to use the one that we had the last time. It was actually kind of nice not having express pass because when you have one, it becomes your story. It’s all about the express pass and you have to really think about like when to use it. Without having it, I mean you didn’t have it as a crutch so you didn’t think about ‘okay what if I don’t do this challenge or when could I use it?’ or any of that or ‘oh teams are going to U-Turn us because we have it.’ I liked not having it.

MJ: And I am sure you also didn’t want to misuse it like you did the last time you were on The Amazing Race?

JH: Yeah definitely… because I was actually thinking about this. If we had the express pass I was thinking we probably would have used it in Malaysia when we couldn’t catch that fish and if we had, we would have misused it again because Margie and Luke hadn’t even showed up yet. So yeah I think it was just better not to have it in general because it’s just way too many things to think about when to use the express pass.

MJ: John, Did the fact that Jen and Caroline had to complete a speedbump give you a false sense of security? The odds were that they would probably be behind you, so were you surprised when Phil said you were eliminated?

JE: No we weren’t thinking about the country singers at all during that leg of the race. I don’t remember even knowing that they had to do a speed bump. We were just running our own race and when we struggled to figure out what the clue meant and to figure out that riddle (especially after we had driven around for two hours), we were almost 100 percent certain we were in last place.

When we showed up to the Spanish steps finally and saw two of the other teams there, we were shocked and it gave us a sense of hope. We didn’t have any thoughts about like the country singers or keeping track of where they were. I just immediately started doing the challenge.

During the roadblock, a conversation broke out and somebody had suggested that they were pretty sure the country singers were still out on the race course because they were the last ones to do the detour and also had the speed bump to deal with. That was the first time that the idea had even crossed my mind. Jess and I wouldn’t have known because we did the gladiator side of the detour and everyone else did the chariots so we didn’t see anybody all day because we were gone by the time Leo and Jamal did the gladiator challenge.

So it really wasn’t like how you characterize the question at all. Almost the exact opposite. Once we heard that the country singers were still out on the course, it was basically something that we just wanted to be true. And so that’s when Jamal or Flight Time or somebody else suggested that the Afghanimals share their answer with us, in return for us promising not to U Turn them. That made a lot of sense to us at the time so we said ‘yeah, let’s do it.’ Turns out that we all really were in last place and none of us knew. Since we showed up last we were the ones that got eliminated.

MJ: Jessica, it seemed like you were stuck with a terrible cab driver. How far behind did he put you when you were trying to find the steps?

JH: I timed it. It was like two hours before the time we left the gladiator challenge and got to the steps so it was a long time. At the same time I mean we were so far ahead of the other teams which was good. That was the only time we caught up to those two other teams. It’s really unfortunate because I think we finished pretty far ahead of Leo and Jamal and Flight Time and Big Easy. We got pretty far behind but again… yeah… bad cab driver but at the same time we had no idea where to tell him go directly to. If we would have just said Spanish Town he would have been able to get us there so yeah, it’s unfortunate.

MJ: John, the Afghanimals gave you and the Globetrotters the answer to the puzzle. Why do you think they did this and was it specifically just so that they could garner good karma and not be victimized by next week’s Double U-Turn?

JE: [Laughs]. I don’t even really remember the question of ‘will you promise not to U turn us?’ That wasn’t a big part of the experience. I just remembered being happy that Jamal was sharing the answer. After watching it back on TV, however, he very clearly said ‘l’ll give the answer if guys promise to not U Turn us’ so it seems like that was the motivating force behind their decision. He saw it as an opportunity to get two teams to agree not to U Turn him moving forward. It also made a ton of sense to us at the time and so we were happy to comply.

MJ: Jessica, your acting during the Gladiator Swordfight detour was hysterical. John, one of my favourite parts of the episode was when you kept convulsing even after he had killed you. Were you both meant to be gladiators in another life?

JH: [Laughs] I didn’t see that! Were you convulsing?

JE: [Laughs] They said that you weren’t passing this challenge unless your performance was theatrical so we knew it was going to be exactly what it was.

JH: Yeah I mean we were being over the top because we were like ‘okay if we smile they might say oh don’t smile.’ You don’t know what you are supposed to do so we were like cool.

JE: The clue said that If you weren’t theatrical you wouldn’t pass it so we said ‘okay well we better just do it like that.’

JH: And the guy we were fighting was so into it that we had to match him!

MJ: I was watching the episode with Meghan & Cheyne (Season 15 winners) and when John started convulsing we all like dying!

JH: [Laughs] I got to watch that back!

MJ: John, there were four teams from your original season (season 22) on All-Stars. Did this surprise you and was it an advantage or a disadvantage?

JE: Yeah I was definitely surprised to have that many teams come back from one season and we were excited about it, we like and had fun running with all the teams that returned from our season everything. We were both surprised and excited about it.

MJ: Jessica, this season, it seemed like you didn’t really make any mistakes. The twinnies got hung up on the first leg. Mark & Mallory went back to get Mark’s backpack. In your case, it was really just a bad cab driver. Is it better or worse to go out that way? Better because you know it wasn’t your fault. Worse because it was someone else’s.

JH: Yeah I mean both kind of sting a little bit because you are like ‘oh gosh what if we would have gotten a good taxi driver?’ I think we were really playing it really strong and weren’t making any mistakes. It was really great but at the same time I don’t know, it just looks better to go out that way (from something that wasn’t our fault) from the fan perspective and not getting harassed so much for going out as if it was our own mistake. In that perspective I think it’s better to go out the way that we did and I think going out this way… it’s kind of like it just wasn’t meant to be. It was out of our control.

MJ: John, that final footrace to the finish line was probably the most exciting moment of the season thus far. How close was it and did you know it would be tough to beat the Globetrotters in a footrace?

JE: Ah so there is so many kind of pieces to that because I didn’t know that we were running for last place. The sequence of events is kind of remarkable. As I was up at the top getting my answer approved, Jess started taking off before me. That made sense to me because the order that you landed on the mat was the same order that you left in the next day. A fan who had been watching everyone come had been really keeping track of the teams and told Jess that if were in seventh, it meant that we were last. That’s how Jess knew that we were in last before I did. After she found out, Jess kind of took off down the street and I was just trying to catch up. I wasn’t running as fast as I possibly could because I didn’t know it was a sprint for the finish. About half way down is when I kind of realized ‘well geez, if she is going that fast then maybe we are in last place’. After I realized it, I started sprinting as fast as I could and dropped my backpack but at the point it wasn’t enough to close the gap and that was that.

MJ: Jessica, What’s next for you? I hear you guys are getting married soon?

JH: We are getting married in the Fall. I am doing a lot of wedding planning right now!

MJ: John, Will we see you at the finale in Vegas?

JE: Oh Jess and I are still talking about the details to that if we can make it happen we would love to.

MJ: Sounds great thank you so much guys.

JH: Alright bye.

Murtz Jaffer is the world's foremost reality television expert and was the host of Reality Obsessed which aired on the TVTropolis and Global Reality Channels in Canada. He has professional writing experience at the Toronto Sun, National Post, TV Guide Canada, TOROMagazine.com and was a former producer at Entertainment Tonight Canada. He was also the editor at Weekendtrips.com.