America's Toughest Judges?

While I was watching last night's episode of "America's Toughest Jobs, I realized something that hadn't struck me before. On shows that have judges, most of the judges are there for the whole season. On shows like "Top Design", "America's Next Top Model" and "Project Runway", there is usually one guest judge, but the others are there for each episode. It gives a good mix of looking at just the one project being judged to having an idea of how the participants have been performing all along.

"America's Toughest Jobs" goes against that method. There are different judges each week. They are the 'bosses' that oversee the various jobs the contestants tackle. This creates an interesting dynamic in which a previously successful competitor can find themself headed home for one bad performance. That's what happened last night.

This week's job was mining for gold in Alaska. These people must be sick of the cold now. This job required spending time standing in frigid water. It was hard and heavy work. One thing that has surrised me, and happily so, is how often the women come out on top. Sandy was singled out as the best last night.

After working a 24-hour shift, the four contestants found to be the poorest were sent to pan individually. Steven, Phil, Bryce and Ben were selected as the bottom four. The surprise here was that Phil was top last week as a truck driver. Another surprise for me was that Eric was not in the bottom four. I'm amazed he's still around. Anyway, the four in jeopardy of being sent home spent the night trying to find gold. The person who found the least, judged by weight, would go home.

Sadly, it was Phil who came in last. It's a shame to see him go, but I think this has shown everyone that they have to push hard every time. There's no riding of previous successes.
Next week, they'll be logging in Washington. Hopefully, it we be a bit warmer. I'm looking forward to seeig how the women do. They sure are proving that there really aren't many, if any, 'men's jobs'.