When we last left Michael and Kevin Wu, The Amazing Race's Team Houston, they had made it to Kaneshie market in Accra, Ghana in third place after Michael exhibited some very impressive racing skills when selling sunglasses and setting up a television antenna.

As episode three begins, Team Houston is only about 11 minutes behind the first place team, and they get a long opening interview about their strategy. That’s a bad sign.

Kevin explains that can’t physically match up with many of the other teams but the can “play smart” and then he mentions that his dad is 59 years old. Apparently, Kevin has decided to tempt the reality show gods. Only phrases like “We know we’ll win this leg” and “We’re not here to make friends” could taunt them more. Perhaps to appease those angered reality show gods Kevin says that they’re in the race to experience different countries together more than to win a million dollars.

For the first challenge, teams are sent to a boxing academy in Accra’s Jamestown district. Team Houston gets into a taxi race with Team Princeton A Cappella Singers who sing to their cab driver to drive faster because that’s how a cappella singers literally roll, through Ghana.

At the academy, one member of each team is put through boxing exercises, first wrapping their hands, then hitting a speed bag and jumping rope. Bless the Amazing editors’ evil little hearts because they try to make shots of the racers, including Kevin, wrapping their hands and jumping rope riveting and suspenseful, but there’s no disguising this roadblock of boring.

Finally the boxing challenge, where no one had to box, ends and the teams make their way by taxi to a rural area outside Accra, where they use wheelbarrows to take shovels, concrete mix, and bricks to a primary school.

At this point, the Amazing editors begin their juxtaposition of several of the nice teams, especially Team Houston, with the team from Nevada. Nick continuously berates and insults his girlfriend Vicki, until it becomes very uncomfortable to watch. Three episodes into the season, it looks like we’ve found the cringe-worthy bickering team.

After the building material is delivered to the school, the teams have to attend geography class. Surrounded by some adorable local primary school children, the teams sit at desks and identify Ghana on a chalkboard map of Africa. Let’s make this clear: The challenge is to find the country they are in on a map. Kevin appears to locate it on the first try, but the Amazing editors must take great delight in showing Team Nevada pick incorrectly again and again until even the polite kids begin to laugh at them.

Once teams are done entertaining the kids with America's geography ignorance, they’re given the clue to the detour of the episode, Bicycle Parts or Language Arts. Language Arts is the tougher task which most teams pick first and then abandon. The task is essentially a word search game designed with picture symbols, but before they can do the search, they have to use a code key to translate phrases in English into symbols.

Team Houston and all the other team who attempt the challenge, with the exception of Team A Cappella, never complete it because they don't notice the code key, hanging on one side of a building. They lose much time staring bewilderedly at the immense word search puzzle hanging on the other side of the same building.

Michael and Kevin give up and head for Bicycle Parts, where they have to roll a bicycle rim with a stick across a soccer field and back. By this time the team is at the rear of the pack. Kevin finishes fairly easily but the heat finally gets to Michael. Kevin continues to encourage his dad, but Michael slows, finally makes it across the field, and then nearly collapses. A doctor or medic is called in to check Michael. Kevin comforts his dad as Michael begins to cry.

If the first half hour of this episode was snooze worthy, the final minutes are what make this show Emmy worthy and make our home team so very likable.

Michael and Kevin know they’re the last team on the field and there’s almost no possibility they can catch up, yet exhausted and dehydrated Michael gets up, determined to roll the bike rim back across. He says he “wants to show my son we’re a team. I think this race is really about that. You should finish what you start.”

And they do.

They make it to the mat last. Michael blames himself and tells Phil and the cameras that he just wanted to travel to as many places as he could with his son. Only then does Phil deliver the news: this was a non-elimination leg. They’ll have to complete a speed bump task on the next leg, but there’re still in it!

Kevin ends the episode once again saying how proud he is of his father. We might have to give Team Houston, a.k.a. Team Jumba, one more name.

Team Awwww, stop making us cry.