The episode begins where if left off last week. Lolo chooses to face Tia in elimination — the smart move. Lindsey gives her shit about it, but Lindsey should have decided earlier, and not sent in Tia knowing she was facing Lolo.

Lolo goes for the basket, Tia squares up, takes a swipe at Lolo, gets her almost to the ground while Lolo hands the ball into the basket. Tia takes her attempt, takes a small step into the circle, then tries a high lob into the basket for an air ball. Round 2 happens, Lolo runs up, Tia moves aside and lets Lolo put it in. Victor sounds the horn to end the game, Lolo wins. After taking the first hit from Lolo, Tia did not want to get hurt, which as a pro athlete with sponsors, I can respect that.

We lose America’s sweetheart, Tia Blanco. She leaves with a smile. We were blessed with her presence.

The next day we get a scene of Wes and Lolo hanging out at a coffee shop. Wes gets a fancy iced coffee, while Lolo gets a cappuccino. Tells you a lot about them as people. Wes says he needs to talk to Lolo about feeling targeted as he knows the feeling. Coming from the person that saw 8 eliminations between Fresh Meat and the Ruins, yes, he knows what it is like to be public enemy #1. Wes gives her a great dad talk, except for the awkward fact that she is a year older.

We move on to the daily challenge where we get the same puzzle/endurance Challenge from Exes 2 that Wes/Theresa won, and where Zach verbally abused Jonna. In this version, they make it a team effort. There will be 1 person as a “lifter”, the person who lifts the 300 lbs lid up so that the “looker” could memorize the puzzle and describe to his two “relayers” who will run up the hill til they get to the two “runners” to tell them what the looker saw, then the two runners gun for the puzzle person where they give her the info of what to put where. If they get a row wrong, they have to take everything down and restart the row. Gus and Darrell are captains, we find out Darrell is playing for March of Dimes as his son was born premature at 29 weeks.

Ultimately, the Champs win due to Wes putting them into the perfect team.

CT is the lifter, as he is huge.

Wes is the looker, stating he is most articulate.

Darrell and Jordan were relayers, to keep their same speed.

Cara Maria and Camila were runners, keeping the same speed.

Ashley is the puzzle person.

The Champs are good in theory.

Kam is the lifter, duh.

Gus is the looker, okay.

CM and Lindsey were relayers, this killed them.

Lolo and Louise were runners, amazing to watch Olympians run.

Louie is the puzzle person.

Lindsey could not keep up with Champ guys, it didn’t like CM Punk could either. And while Lolo/Louise could crush Cara/Camila, those two run at the same pace, leading to total efficiency. The Champs win as this is their game, this what they’re used to.

Things get a little heated between Darrell and Lolo. When Darrell/Jordan link up with Cara/Camila they are relaying the info. In order to win, Lolo starts getting near them and saying random colors. Darrell tells her to back off, and that if she wasn’t a female, he’d knock her ass out.

For winning, Darrell is safe and must pick someone from his team for elimination. Gus automatically goes in. The Pros team decides to tie the voting up 2–2–2, so Gus has to pick. Gus decides that because Louie is his friend, he will choose CM Punk instead. Wes volunteers for elimination, making Jordan upset as he wanted to volunteer. They choose to do so, rather than get voted in by all of their teammates. CT laughs that the amount of respect he gets is crazy and that he’s still riding his glory days. When are people going to realize it’s not the same CT, even CT knows it, but for some reason they don’t.

After the nominations they go to the batting cages. CT teaches Louise how to hit a baseball. Jordan hits on Lolo and they talk about her dating life and virginity. Gus goes off with Cara and they get to talk about life, Gus’s coming out story, and it’s cute to watch them bond.

We get to the elimination where Gus’s boyfriend is there to support him. This Challenge is way more low-key and chill than any other Challenge. The elimination is Ice Bath, the elimination that Nelson/Amanda played against Jamie/KellyAnne in on Rivals 3. You get submerged in Ice Water, then have to do a puzzle for X amount of time, then go back to the Ice Water, back and forth.

Gus faces off with CM Punk first, CM Punk jokingly eats the ice. Gus thinks he has the advantage as the Winter sport athlete. This game was not about who is better at puzzles, crowd intervention mattered. Gus is lucky to have made a ton of friends on the Champs side as they directed him on how to win.

The same goes for Wes vs Jordan, the crowd chooses Wes over Jordan completely. Jordan has kind of been a dick on Champs vs Pros, the crowd, and especially CT picked their guy Wes over him. Wes claims it as the crowds win, but so far he’s 2 for 2 in elimination.

We are now down to 12 people, and this game is getting more exciting each episode. Stacked competition makes it all so much fun. This show is chill without Bananas.