The Amazing Race eliminated Jazmine Lewis and Danielle Littleton during Friday night's broadcast of the CBS reality competition's 27th season.

ADVERTISEMENT

The best friends became the fourth team eliminated from the around-the-world competition after they arrived at the Race's fifth Pit Stop at Masuwe Private Game Reserve in Zimbabwe in last place.

In an exclusive interview with Reality TV World on Monday, Jazmine and Danielle talked about their The Amazing Race experience and what went wrong.

Below is the first half. Check back with us soon for the concluding portion.

Reality TV World:  How far behind Cindy Chac and Rick Chac did you finally arrive at the Pit Stop when you got eliminated? What was the time gap between you and the team ahead of you?

Danielle Littleton: I remember this like it was yesterday because we were walking up with our fruit baskets and I looked up and I saw that Rick was, not like right in front of us, but maybe like a minute in front of us. And I saw him struggling.

So, I knew if we had a perfect walk with it then we probably could've caught them, but I would say they probably checked in maybe like a minute to maybe a minute-and-a-half before us. It wasn't far off at all.

Reality TV World:  So once you stepped on the Pit Stop mat, were you certain you were in last place or did you have hope another team could still be behind you?

Jazmine Lewis: At that point, we knew we were in last because at the previous walking with the lions, we had to wait. So we saw that Rick and Cindy were the last to do that, and then after, you had to go to the Pit Stop and walk with the fruit. And so we knew that since we were after them, we had an idea we were in last.

Reality TV World:  Speaking of your mistake at the Lion Encounter, it seemed like you just failed to read the clue thoroughly to know your next clue would be waiting inside of a skull. Is that all that happened or was there more to it than what viewers saw?

Danielle Littleton: If you want the short story, yes, that's exactly what happened. And if you want the long story, there was so much happening. I mean, I know they showed that our taxi cab driver took us to the Pit Stop first and then we were asking people, "Is this the Lion Encounter?"

And, you know, one of the ladies was like, "yeah," and she just put the wrap on our heads. So we were like, "Okay, we're here!" And so we went there first, found out that we were in the wrong spot and went to the Lion Encounter after that.

The Cheerleaders [Tiffany Chantell and Krista Debono] had already passed us, so right there, some kind of franticness hit us. And then we went back to the Pit Stop -- because we forgot to let go of our taxi cab driver -- and then we went back to the Lion Encounter place.

Finally, we got there and were like, "Finally we can go through the Lion Encounter, get our clue and move on to the Pit Stop." And we forgot to read the clue all the way through. So there was a lot of back and forth between the Pit Stop and the Lion Encounter. And it was all that, kind of, running back and forth that made us forget to take a second and really read the clue all the way.

Reality TV World:  When you had to go through the Lion Encounter for a second time to find the clue, how much time did you waste? How long did that take you?

Danielle Littleton: The longest part was us waiting until "Chac Attack" [Cindy and Rick] and Paparazzi [Logan Fazio and Chris Gordon] were done because they were on the trail and there are only two trails. And so, that was the longest part.

Once we got back on the trail with the lions, we knew what we were supposed to be looking for, we found a skull right away and took off and headed to the Pit Stop. So it wasn't a lot of time. The longest part was waiting and it seemed like even longer than before because we were in last place and we were waiting.

Reality TV World:  So assuming you saw the Lion Encounter as your demise in the leg, I think it's possible to argue maybe your decision not to U-Turn anybody in the prior leg is kind of what did you in. How do you feel about that perspective?

Jazmine Lewis: Yeah, we had talked about it before, about U-Turning the team that was behind us, which would have been the cheerleaders. But when we got to the U-Turn mat, we saw [host Phil Keoghan there] and so we were like, "Well, we're not going to U-Turn because the Pit Stop is right here" -- without putting two and two together, thinking that it was going to be a continuation leg.

And so, we really started off really strong after the start of that fifth leg. And so, we just decided not to U-Turn. But then afterwards, of course, we were like, "We could've done this. We could've U-Turned. We could've saved our place." But we didn't.

Danielle Littleton: Yeah, they have a clip of us on CBS saying we can play the "What If Game" all day, but I stand by the fact that it was our own mistake. We did not read the clue, and the only reason why we got kicked out of the Race is because we didn't read the clue.

Even without the U-Turn, if we read our clue, we would've gotten fifth or sixth place and still had been racing. So, we didn't read our clue and that's really what did us in.

Reality TV World:  So it sounds like if you knew you'd continue racing right away, you definitely would have U-Turned Tiffany and Krista knowing they were behind you. But would you have considered U-Turning Justin Scheman and Diana Bishop? It seemed like most of the teams were conspiring to do that based on Tanner Kloven and Josh Ahern's request.

Jazmine Lewis: We had heard about the plan and were like, "Okay, so whoever gets to the U-Turn mat first, that's who you're going to U-Turn." But we were so far behind everyone, it would just be a waste to U-Turn Justin and Diana because they had already crossed the Pit Stop at that point.

Reality TV World:  Do you have any idea then why Tiffany and Krista U-Turned Justin and Diana? That seemed a little strange to me. (Laughs)

Danielle Littleton: Yeah (laughs). We were kind of shocked because I remember we were at the cliff and Jazzy told me that she was talking to Krista -- while I was jumping off the cliff screaming my head off -- about how they had U-Turned the Green Team.

And we were kind of just like, "Why would you do that?" Like we knew we were in last place already. We knew that it was between the Cheerleaders and us. And they said that they wanted to keep their promise to the rest of the cast because it was a whole entire cast vs. Green Team kind of plan. So, it was that.

We were going to do it if we were in front of the Green Team and if we got to the U-Turn mat before them. So we kind of knew that we were in last place and that the Green Team was long gone because painting the giraffe took so long.

Jazmine Lewis: Yeah.

Danielle Littleton: So I think they wanted to keep -- I think they had good intentions. They wanted to keep good on their promise that they made to the whole entire cast, but it was not the smartest move.

Jazmine Lewis: And maybe they did it as an influence to get the Express Pass [proving] they kept their word by U-Turning them. [Tanner and Josh] could then be like, "Oh, they kept their word. Why don't we give the Express Pass to them?"

Reality TV World:  Did you or anyone else view Tanner and Josh as a bigger threat than Justin and Diana? I was surprised more teams didn't think to turn against Tanner and Josh. I know they had the extra Express Pass to hand out, but only one team can get it.

Danielle Littleton: I knew from the very beginning when we were in the semifinals. We saw the Green Team and I knew from the beginning that they were going to be the team to beat. And that's before we even really got cast on the show. They just seemed like their relationship was really good, they're driven, they knew their stuff.

And so, with Team Texas, yeah they might have a physical strength, but we've seen in a lot of Races in the past that physical strength doesn't always get you there. I mean, we're physically strong but we got eliminated. So, that's not always it. We just knew they had a good relationship, they're really smart and they were the biggest threat because of his knowledge of the Race too.

Check back with Reality TV World soon for the concluding portion of Jazmine and Danielle's exclusive The Amazing Race interview.


About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski

FOLLOW REALITY TV WORLD ON GOOGLE NEWS