Race Across the World’s no-fly rule brought down by global conflicts
Celebrity contestants in latest series twice forced to take flights before the finale, meaning half of all eight shows have had to ditch land travel policy
Whichever celebrity pairing reaches the final checkpoint first in Thursday’s finale of Race Across the World will have done so having battled through the most disrupted series in the show’s history.
The hit BBC show, which draws in millions of viewers each year, challenges pairs of contestants to traverse thousands of miles across the globe using only overland public transport and without mobile phones or bank cards.
The added twist: teams are given just a shoestring budget to cover all their travel and living costs, equivalent to the usual cost of directly flying between the first and last checkpoints.
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But across the eight series, the “no fly” policy was abandoned in half of the races contested. New data has revealed how global conflicts and travel restrictions are making travel across borders more difficult.
When the show began in 2019, the premise seemed simple. In a world where air travel had never been so accessible, the show asked whether people were forgetting how to travel through countries and aimed to promote overland travel.
But as Race Across the World has expanded, teams have been forced to fly portions of the race in four of the previous eight editions when global conflicts were a prevailing factor.
According to the Global Peace Index, the world is facing “a violent conflict crisis” with 59 active state-based conflicts, the highest number recorded since the Second World War. Ninety-eight countries were at least partially involved in a conflict, up from 59 in 2008.
The third and most recent celebrity series has been especially disrupted. In the five legs of this edition’s race between Mexico and Colombia so far, all teams were forced to take two flights to avoid political turmoil.
One flight carried teams over Nicaragua after it denied the BBC filming permission, while the second shuttled teams to Medellin in Colombia after reports of armed attacks on the land route to the nation’s second largest city.
Two pairs — the radio presenter Anita Rani and her father, Bal; and the TV presenter Roman Kemp with his sister, Harleymoon — were also forced to stop travel in Honduras for more than 24 hours after people blockaded roads in protest against the government’s plans to enforce compulsory car insurance.
Roman and Harleymoon Kemp were forced to stop in Honduras because of protests
BBC
In the main series, the no-fly policy has been abandoned in three of the past five races. In season two, in 2020, teams were flown over Ecuador while it suffered civil unrest. The race resumed in neighbouring Peru.
Covid travel restrictions meant travelling through China was impossible in season four, so teams flew from South Korea to Vietnam. A lack of viable transport across the Himalayas meant teams were flown from western China to Nepal in season five this year.
Analysis of previous races reveals the number of countries the show has featured per series has fallen significantly since 2019. In the first series, when teams raced between London and Singapore, the winning couple, the retired PE teachers Elaine and Tony Teasdale, passed through 17 countries.
In comparison, the mother-and-son duo Caroline and Tom Bridge traversed only three countries — China, Nepal and India — on their way to victory in series five this year. In the celebrity edition, pairs in the first edition in 2023 traversed 16 countries from Morocco to Norway, compared with just eight in the current celebrity edition.
Such trends could affect the way races are organised. While Race Across the World has received generally favourable reviews for its high drama and cinematography, some fans are concerned about the diminishing options for future routes.
A Race Across the World spokesperson said: “The safety and wellbeing of our contributors is always of paramount importance and while we always make every effort to maintain and preserve the authenticity of the race, sometimes, for reasons outside of production’s control, we have to adapt and respond to access issues, or unexpected safety concerns.”
