After seeing Wes got sent home last week, I was pretty excited to see what would go down this week and the rest of the season as this Challenge is made up mostly of rookies or people who haven’t played the game in quite a while. And, for once, my Challenge wish came true! Frank somehow got an alliance together between his season, San Diego, Vegas, Cancun and New Orleans. Not only that, his alliance actually figured out a way to game this episode’s challenge so that they all didn’t lose! I was shocked, this kind of things almost never happens. Clearly, the wheels will fall off and things will get heated when more and more teams get knocked out, but it’s fun to watch now. Anyway, hit the jump if you want to check out the live blog!* They have access to a beach club.

* Sarah has a thing for Alton.

* Knight’s trying to get back with Jemmye, she doesn’t seem so convinced.

* Danny and Melinda both have significant others back home. This should be interesting.

* Frank says he’s going to run this show. He’s got an alliance set up between San Diego, Vegas, Cancun and New Orleans.

* Marie’s talking big again with her team. Trey doesn’t want to shake Frank’s hand, not sure what that means.

* The challenge is called Oil Change. A pit is filled with olive oil and you wrestle inside. You’ve got to push the other person out of the ring. When you win you get a puzzle piece, your team has to collect four pieces to win. Whoever puts their puzzle together last is definitely going into the Arena. Winner of the match selects the next people to go in.

* Jasmine vs Ashley. After a bit of a scrap Ashley knocks Jasmine back on her head, hitting the line. San Diego gets their first puzzle piece and Ashley chooses Zach to go against Dustin, trying to keep her team up on pieces.

* Zach and Dustin. Dustin goes low, it’s not as quick as you’d think. Zach’s giving Dustin body blows. This is pretty gnarly. They go the full 10 minutes so neither team gets a piece.

* Camila and Frank get into a weird argument on the side.

* Nany vs. McKenzie. McKenzie wins and gets a piece.

* Knight vs. JD. Another draw.

* Sam vs. Jemmye. Jemmye’s foot touches, so she’s out and San Diego gets a point.

* Frank vs. CJ. These guys are aligned, will put up a fight and then have someone go out. CJ gets the point. They decide here to keep the rounds between their alliance and work it out so all four of them wind up winning. We’re then treated to a montage of faux matches.

* Sarah figures what they’re doing.

* Frank and Derek. Frank’s supposed to win, Derek wants to actually wrestle, but Frank still gets the point so San Diego is the Power Couple.

* After all the alliance couples are done Vegas is the last one to complete their puzzle, so this one between Dustin and Robb is legit.  Dustin gets this one. The alliance got what they wanted.

* Cara Maria vs. Marie. Marie got the point! First one for St. Thomas.

* Fresh Meat, Austin and Brooklyn are now working together to get themselves in and leave St. Thomas out of it.  Another goofy montage follows.

* Trey vs. Chet. Chet just taps out on accident.

* Marie vs. Camila. Camila wins. Fresh Meat gets their first point.

* Devyn vs. Melinda. This one’s an actual fight because both Brooklyn and Austin need just one more piece. Devyn got it!

* Danny vs. Trey. They both need just one piece. Cut to commercial! Turns out to be a draw.

* Now it’s Melinda vs. Laura. After a pretty tough one, Laura forces Melinda’s hand to touch the line. Austin’s going in to the Arena.

* “This is rookie justice. This is the rookie revolution.” – Frank. Hehe. Kind of love this.

* Easy wants Cara Maria to talk to San Diego, because Camila and Frank got into a fight at the challenge and he doesn’t want it to get them sent in again.

* San Diego asks Fresh Meat who they should throw in. Brandon says that Trey was all up with Wes. Frank LOVES being in control.

* Frank wants to talk to St. Thomas too about joining up with the alliance, so they do. Trey’s making a big point of showing that he’s not wanting to kiss ass. Frank calls Trey Wes Jr., I think he’s pretty close to dead on right there. Really not sure why Trey’s making such a big deal about not joining an alliance. Is it just stupid pride? It’s definitely stupid because, as Marie said (and I hate agreeing with her), they don’t need any more reasons for the other teams to be gunning for them. She’s there to make bank and will do what she needs to to do so.

* What San Diego should have done is ask Austin who they want to go up against and get them in on the alliance. It’s easier to deal with just two people, plus you can more easily get rid of them later on.This is a pretty volatile team anyway, so they might wind up snapping and going home on their own.

* Sending in time. Frank gets up and explains San Diego decides to throw in who they’ve chosen and we cut to a commercial. Annnd, we’re back. He just straight up says Fresh Meat.

* The choices for Arenas are Physical, Mental, Endurance and Strategy.  Since Physical was done last time it won’t be back in the mix until all four have been done (missed that explanation last week for some reason). Frank chooses Endurance.

* Out at a club. Laura and Trey are kind of getting on each other. Zach’s with Jonna.

* And then you have Knight drunkenly trying to get a second chance from Jemmye. Jemmye’s not going for it. For some reason, Melinda inserts herself in to this argument. She doesn’t want to see them like her and Danny wound up. Melinda thinks Knight’s being sincere, he says he’d put a ring on her finger. Not sure why she’s really involved here.

* Back at the house, Knight’s talking to Danny, who’s probably stressed about the Arena. Knight tells him that Jemmye calls him so he’s getting mixed signals. Danny tells him to man up because he’s just there for the money.

* The Fresh Meat team is talking the next day about who’s going in this time. Camila says they’ve been mostly watching their own backs. She doesn’t want to go in, but it’s her fault for getting into it with Frank, isn’t it?

* Cara Maria tells the camera she doesn’t want to go into an endurance challenge with Easy. Makes sense really. Brandon doesn’t want to go in because he doesn’t want to. Cara Maria doesn’t, Easy says he just went in. Basically, they don’t come to a decision.

* At the Arena Fresh Meat says they didn’t come to a decision, so it’s up to San Diego to decide. This is amazing. Cut to a commercial before telling us…of course. San Diego throws in Camila and Easy. Frank says he’d rather see Austin come back because that would be two teams with only two players.

* Balls Out. 25 balls on wires hanging over a court separated in the middle by a wall. They slide the balls towards the other end. After five minutes, whoever has the least number of balls on their side wins.

* Easy and Camila are pissed. This could be bad for San Diego if they don’t get sent home.

* Pretty hard to get a gauge on who’s winning, but it looks like Fresh Meat has fewer balls. Get to the countdown and then right into another commercial.

* Easy and Camila won 10-15. Maybe this will bring Fresh Meat together a bit.

* Peace out Danny and Melinda. Aww,they had nice things to say about each other before going home.

* Back at the house Trey tells Laura that he’d go home if she wan’t there. He doesn’t like everyone thinking he sucks and doesn’t agree with them. Apparently no one talks to him. Yes, you totally brought it on yourself.

 

Like I said, I was all over this episode, even though I don’t particularly like Frank all that much. It’s funny, the way things have played out this season because I’m actually more curious to find out what happens to the St. Thomas kids than I would have been normally. In a regular Challenge they would have already been thrown in, but this is definitely not your average bear of a Challenge. Anyway, I’m curious to see if the game is played any differently with one team completely out of it or if the alliance will start to break down. The relationship stuff doesn’t interest me nearly as much, but they seem to be focusing a lot on Knight/Jemmye, so it seems like something’s going to go down there. Again, I don’t really care what, but they wouldn’t focus on it if it wasn’t going to play some part in the game. I guess we’ll have to wait and see!