Characters / The Amazing Race 34

The Amazing Race character index
United States original: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8: Family Edition | 9 | 10 | 11: All-Stars | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18: Unfinished Business | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24: All-Stars | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31: Reality Showdown | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36
Asia: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5
China Rush and China: China Rush 1 | 2 | 3 | China 1 | 2 | 3 | 4
Australia: 1 | 2 | 3: Australia v New Zealand | 4 | 5 | 6: Around the World | 7: Celebrity Edition
Canada: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6: Heroes Edition | 7 | 8 | 9

The 34th installment of The Amazing Race.

Derek Xiao and Claire Rehfuss

Reality romance from Los Angeles, CA. They met on Big Brother 23 and hooked up afterwards.

Tropes associated with them:

• Asian and Nerdy: Derek works in a conglomerate as said in Big Brother 23, and was raised to play piano as well as the other typical Asian stereotypes.
• Awesome by Analysis: Clarie's specialty, with it coming into major focus during the final stretch of Leg 6, when she realizes that Cracking Walnuts, while the simpler and less risky detour, will take all the teams the same amount of time and that the placements won't change and, while Medieval Gamer is riskier to attempt, if they finish quickly, they can make up a lot of time. She's right and she and Derek place second.
• Brains and Brawn: Both of them are fairly fit and smart, with Claire in particular solving a puzzle fairly quickly in Jordan. They also used this to their advantage for the most part with how they split Roadblocks, with Derek doing the most physically demanding ones.
• Chekhov's Skill: Claire's skill with puzzles allowed her to solve the slide puzzle in Jordan faster than most teams. Conversely, Derek's knowledge of the piano allowed them to finish the final challenge faster than any other team.
• History Repeats: One of the most popular duos in their season of Big Brother, win in the second Big Brother team in the end though unlike Cody and Jessica, they were not portrayed as villains.
• Smarter Than You Look: While Claire certainly wasn't a fool on her season of Big Brother, here she shows just how smart she is easily solving a slide puzzle with only minimal help from Derek.
• The Good Guys Win: While all teams of the Final 3 were likable, Derek and Claire winning was considered a major step up from the last pair of Big Brother winners.
• Wacky Marriage Proposal: Played with. While the two don't plan to get married yet, they come out of this closer than ever even if Derek plays with it.

Emily Bushnell and Molly Sinert

Long lost twins from Ardmore, PA and Palm Beach Gardens, FL. Despite being on a season with a fair amount of physical teams, along with not having spent too much time together, the two excelled during the race. A combination of their analytical skills and their navigational skills allowed them to breeze by other teams, and in the process, became strong contenders, even with racking up a first place finish on the Megaleg in Italy. Their skills also did not go unnoticed by the other teams, forming a pseudo-rivalry with Marcus & Michael. However, in the first Jordan leg, Emily tweaked her knee, hindering her physicality, and they struggled to keep up in time, and left Molly trying to complete the more physical tasks. They were able to catch a lucky break in the Megaleg in Spain when they opted for the faster Flamenco Detour, narrowly beating out the brothers. Finally, despite struggling in the Iceland leg, they were able to squeeze their way into the finals due to David's struggling in the water, despite being behind because of Emily's knee. In the final leg, despite leaving the Jack Daniel's Distillery first, they got lost while looking for the Roadblock putting them in 3rd. They were able to make up time and reach the final task last, they were able to finish the task after Derek & Claire, allowing them to finish the race in 2nd Place.

Tropes associated with them:

• Bittersweet Ending: They didn't win, but are happy they got to spend so much time together and truly build a relationship.
• Chekhov's Skill: Molly's work in healthcare allowed them to make up a lot of time on the challenging Head of the Class section of the Detour.
• Friendly Rivalry: With Marcus & Michael.
• Game-Breaking Injury: Emily tweaked her knee in Jordan and it made her struggle with running and walking. Despite this, they have been able to keep up with the pack and they ultimately finished 2nd.
• Handicapped Badass: In spite of Emily's injured knee, they have shown no signs of stopping and in fact placed very high in all legs afterwards, ultimately finishing in second.
• Long-Lost Relative: They were adopted into separate families and only met because one of their daughters did a DNA test, leading to the discovery. Part of the reason they joined the race was so they could make up for lost time together.
• Superior Successor: They can be considered one to Andie and Jenna, as both teams consisted of female Long Lost Relatives who had only discovered each other shortly before the race. However, unlike Andie and Jenna, Emily and Molly were able to actually work together and become one of the biggest threats, even with Emily's injured leg. Humorously, while Andie and Jenna were the second team gone, Emily and Molly would finish in second place.
• Twofer Token Minority: By sheer coincidence, both Asian-American twins were raised Jewish by their adoptive families and attended Hebrew school, which comes in handy when they must learn Arabic.

Luis Colon and Michelle Burgos

Married from Miami, FL.

• Failed a Spot Check: What did them in the final Piano Challenge. They were able to quickly identify the locations and the order, but Luis didn't account for the black keys, and only assumed that the white keys only had pictures. The time it took for them to reorientate themselves after getting the black key images doomed them to 3rd.
• In-Series Nickname: "Miami", due to where they hail from and their matching black shirts emblazoned with that location name.
• Large Ham: Both of them were loud and energetic.
• Took a Level in Badass: They began the race as a mid-level team, but quickly picked up starting in Jordan, leading two first place finishes.

Aubrey Ares and David Hernandez

Ballroom dancers from Los Angeles, CA.

• Aside Glance: Aubrey does one to the camera while bickering with David in the car in France.
• Chekhov's Skill: David is a helicopter mechanic by trade and while not completely the same, he was still able to make up a lot of time at the Motorcycle Roadblock because of it.
• Foregone Conclusion: David struggled on the Roadblock initially. Then David struggled at the Icelandic Volcanoes task. He and Aubrey decided to take the time penalty. However, by that point, all the remaining teams had completed the challenge and reached the Pit Stop, meaning all they could do was delay the inevitable.
• Reality Show Genre Blindness: Although they were alternates, there is really no excuse at this point to come on the show without being a half decent swimmer. There have been swimming tasks every season since the beginning and they have taken out many a team before.
• Super Drowning Skills: What causes their elimination, as David is a poor swimmer and struggled with both the Roadblock and Icelandic Volcanoes task so badly that he and Aubrey opt for the penalty instead.

Marcus and Michael Craig

Military brothers from Richmond Hill, GA and Alamogordo, NM.

• All or Nothing: There were times when they were visibly frustrated when they were not in 1st place at the end of a leg.
• Chekhov's Skill: Their knowledge of Hebrew helped them with pronouncing the Letter by Letter Detour in the second Jordan leg.
• Failed a Spot Check: They lost a good amount of time in the first France leg when Michael left his car keys at the top of castle and had to go back to retrieve it. Luckily, they were able to recover quickly and came in first place that leg.
• Friendly Rivalry: With Emily & Molly.
• Genius Bruiser: They are Ivy League educated and in the military.
• Loophole Abuse: At the Letter by Letter detour in Jordan, they realized both teammates didn't need to learn the letters, so they split the alphabet in half and memorized their own letters.

Quinton Peron and Mattie Lynch

Former Rams cheerleaders from Pasadena and Vista, CA

Tropes associated with them:

• Brains and Brawn: Quinton is the strong brawn while Mattie is the more logical brains.
• Chekhov's Skill: During the Leg 3 Detour, they end up picking Head of the Class since Mattie took anatomy at college. They end up finishing very quickly because of it.
  • Quinton also got through the Rugby Roadblock quickly due to their time in the NFL. Sadly, this still kept them far enough behind and not able to catch up and they were eliminated.
• Tomboyish Name: "Mattie" is commonly a diminuitive of "Matthew", but in this case it's a diminuitive of "Madison".

Glenda and Lumumba Roberts

Newlyweds from Norcross, GA. They got off to a strong start coming in second place the first two legs, but things came crashing down in the third leg. They accidentally walked halfway to the medical school and realized they had to drive there so they lost a lot of time. From then on, they consistently were close to the bottom. Even despite the presence of an equalizer in Jordan, their struggles continued. After departing last in France, they accidentally drove their car into a ditch and even though their car was pulled out quickly, they were so far behind that they never recovered.

Tropes associated with them:

• Always Second Best: In the first two legs of the race, they finished in second place behind Derek and Claire and Marcus and Michael respectively. Afterwards, they never came close to first.
• Foregone Conclusion: They never even saw another team in their last leg.
• Running Gag: They constantly talked about wanting to make a baby during the race.
• Tiny Guy, Huge Girl: While Lumumba certainly isn't short, saying at one point he's around 5'8^note approximately 173 cm, Glenda is huge and towers over not only him, but most of the other guys as well. It actually makes the dancing part of the Partner Spinnin' Detour somewhat challenging for them since he has to twirl her.

Abby Garrett and Will Freeman

Childhood sweethearts from Birmingham, AL. They started off around the middle of the pack, but quickly found their footing to pull off back to back top 4 finishes. The high life would not last long as Will contracted COVID, removing them from the race.

• Out of Focus: Probably on purpose so no one would get too invested in them.
• Non-Gameplay Elimination: They had to be removed from the race due to testing positive for COVID-19.

Linton and Sharik Atkinson

Father/daughter from Brooklyn, NY. Despite their short statures, and Linton being older than most of the other racers, they were actually holding their own quite well. However, in the second half of the Mega Leg, Sharik broke down on the sculpture Roadblock, forcing Linton to drag her along for the rest of the leg. Despite her wanting to quit, she decided to stay in the race. While they were equalized in the following leg in Jordan, Linton took way too much time searching every square inch of the perimeter of the desert for a spaceship piece, putting Linton & Sharik so far behind they were eliminated.

• Hypocrite: Sharik was very quick to judge Linton's performance at the Alien Artifact searching Roadblock despite her only doing 1 Roadblock.
• Irony: The very next leg they almost quit at the Pit Stop, they were eliminated.
• The Load: Sharik, she didn't do any of the first 3 Roadblocks, and while the statue sculpting task wasn't the easiest, she whined the whole leg after the fact and tried to quit at the Pit Stop.
• Reality Show Genre Blindness: Sharik only did 1 of the first 5 Roadblocks, which would've forced her to do harder Roadblocks later in the race after Killer Fatigue set in.

Rich Kuo and Dom Jones

Motivational speakers from Huntington Beach, CA

Tropes associated with them:

• Cloud Cuckoo Lander: Dom regarding the "merfairy hair".
• The Cobbler's Children Have No Shoes: Dom is a motivational speaker, yet struggles to stay motivated in Florence, being prone to breakdowns whenever something is somewhat challenging.
• Gender-Blender Name: Dom, although it's likely to be short for "Dominique" or similar.
• The Stoic: Rich, especially in comparison to Dom.

Tim Mann and Rex Ryan

Golf buddies from Brentwood, TN

Tropes associated with them:

• Punny Name: Team T. Rex.

Aastha Lal and Nina Duong

Engaged from Marina del Rey, CA

Tropes associated with them:

• Asian and Nerdy: They call themselves "mentally tough".
• Twofer Token Minority: It's noted they're only the 8th lesbian team on the Amazing Race, on top of their Asian status.
• We Hardly Knew Ye: They crashed out in last place after heavily struggling in the barrel rolling challenge.