How to Host an Amazing Race Party

The Amazing Race is a 5-time winner of the Outstanding Reality-Competition Emmy award. The television show features teams of two people who travel the world together searching for clues while completing Detours and Roadblocks along the way. Follow these steps to throw an Amazing Race party that allows your guests to sample and appreciate the many customs and cultures the Amazing Race contestants experience during each season.

Difficulty:

Moderately Easy

Instructions

1. Design invitations that include landmark images from different countries, passport stamps, and photos of luggage, planes and trains.

2. Ask your guests to wear clothing that's indicative of their cultural background, or to wear the colors of their ancestors' flags.

3. Decorate your house with a travel theme. Visit your local travel agency and ask for travel posters, maps and flags of different countries to hang on your walls. Scatter inexpensive toy planes, trains and taxis on tables, and play a selection of international music before The Amazing Race episode begins.

4. Prepare food whose origins are found in countries around the world. Consider serving such ethnic foods as crepes, hummus and flatbread, moo shu pork and bratwurst, and for dessert, a tray of Italian cookies.

5. Divide your party guests into teams of two, and send them on a race around your town for a list of clues you've planted in select locations. For Roadblocks (which only one member of the team can perform) and Detours (which the teams must complete together) ask your guests to perform tasks they might find difficult, such as eating a plate of anchovies or counting the number of benches in a park. Offer a small prize for the team that makes it back to your house first.

6. Create an Amazing Race trivia contest, and have each team of two compete against the other teams for small travel-themed prizes, such as tote bags, travel wallets or miniature globes.

7. Hand out silver-plated luggage tags, guide books to your city or multicultural music CDs as party favors for your guests.

Tips & Warnings

• As The Amazing Race airs on television at night; you might choose to run the race competition before your party actually begins, so the teams can compete during daylight hours.