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Anyway, the challenge is another one we’ve seen before, but I can’t be bothered looking up exactly when we saw it. The duelists will compete by racing along a balance beam, collecting a bag of numbered tiles and putting the tiles in order in a frame. When they’ve finished their bag, they go back, collect the next bag and do the same thing. There are 100 tiles in total, each with a number from 1 to 100. Let the duel begin!

Laura? makes quick work of the balance beam, with John and then Brad behind. She is done first with the puzzle portion too, while Brad appears to have some difficulty putting the numbers 1 to 10 in order. Laura? has her second bag in hand before Brad is done.

However, Brad almost catches up thanks to a bunch of unforced errors by John. First he drops his bag, and has to start again, then he falls off the beam. Laura has her third bag while John and Brad are finishing their second, and to no one’s surprise finishes first. Things do look pretty close between John and Brad, with them both in the 90s at the same time, and John pulls out a second-place effort. “Brad is out,” declares Probst, who has seemingly stripped the castaway formerly known as Culpepper of honored last-name status. Four tribe immunity losses and one second-place finish at Redemption Island just isn’t good enough. Feel the burn of Probst’s disdain!

Probst asks Brad how Survivor compares against playing in the NFL, because they are both completely the same, but Brad would much rather talk about how he came into the game as a shield for Monica though he became an anchor, and now “you’re free, wind’s blowing, sail, sail hard, it’s all good.” So long, Brad. I’m going to have to find someone new to pick on now. Also notable - Aras’s plan from last episode actually worked.

Laura?, as winner of the challenge, has to decide who to give the Hidden Immunity Idol clue to. She picks Vytas, and Vytas follows Probst right down to the fire to toss it in. Brad didn’t even have to tell him to do it. Can’t people actually think of a better way to play it? This is even less interesting than seeing Russell Hantz find idols with nothing but a few hints from the production stuff.

I realise that precedent has been set about how these clues are going to be played this season, but seriously, this is the third clue for Tadhana and the clue is going to say “these are the precise directions to the idol, dimwit”. Tadhana knows they are heading into a merge soon and will be the minority. What would be the issue with Vytas saying “I’m going to get the idol and use it to protect us at the merge”? Even if no one trusts Vytas 100%, they probably still trust him enough to not target him immediately. The only person I see being upset would be Caleb, because the idol would take away his power as the swing vote. Instead, everyone on Galang knows that no one on Tadhana has a hidden immunity idol, and if it comes down to tribe against tribe, they don’t have to think too hard about who they target.

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