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Welcome to season 16 of the Emmy Award-winning The Amazing Race. This is my second season of recaps, in which we will continue to live vicariously through lucky 11 teams selected for race. We will find out together if this will be a Sweet 16 or pale in comparison to the stellar installment last year with the Globetrotters, the villainous poker girls, a "Street Lawyer" and the not-so-ambiguously gay duo of brothers.

Let's toss it to Phil to start this season off properly. "The world is waiting for you. Good luck. Travel safe. GO!!!"

Shying away from subtlety, the teams are shuttled to the starting line in Los Angeles aboard charters buses fully wrapped with "Amazing Race" emblazoned on every side. It's time to meet the teams and try not get too attached to one of them. A quick programming note: The premiere is only an hour, so this will likely be a lean episode with little padding (Take notes American Idol, Dancing with the Stars, etc. and your lack of Emmys).

The first team off the bus is Brent and Caite, who are models hailing from South Carolina. More importantly, Caite is the type of Web sensation that lets Comedy Central justify future seasons of Tosh.0. Caite is none other than everyone's favorite geographically-challenged Miss Teen South Carolina. You know, the one who stammered and rambled nonsensically through a question about the geographical ignorance of American students, thus proving American students are geographically ignorant, such as...such as...such as. To his credit, the boyfriend defends her and thinks she doesn't deserve the ridicule and with a clinched jaw as he says it, it seems like he will go medieval on anyone who makes fun of her. One team in and the potential entertainment for us/embarrassment for racers is already high.

Next we have Jet and Cord, professional cowboy brothers from Oklahoma. These brothers apparently have ten world rodeo titles between them; so they know high-stress competition pretty well. In a departure from what we see on this race 100% of the time, they are staying true to themselves right out of the chute by actually racing in blue jeans (we must assume Wranglers), boots, cowboy hats and button-down shirts. The wardrobe doesn't scream "race" but it may work for them.

Then we have Steve and Allie, so it's clearly time for the obligatory father-child team where dad feels like he missed out on his kid's formative years. Allie's probably not too upset since Pops racer was a third base coach for the Phillies, including the year they won the World Series, and likely she didn't exactly spend her childhood in need.

Next, we have our second brother team with Dan and Jordan from Rhode Island. Last season, I had a near-aneurysm trying to distinguish who was who with the brothers and this team will continue my plight. The twist this time is that one is straight (Dan) and one is gay (Jordan). I think that's correct.

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