FACES OF PRIDE
Photographer: Poby, Credit: Amazon Prime Video
TEAM ONYX FIRST ENTIRELY AFRICAN AMERICAN ADVENTURE RACING TEAM BY CONNIE WARDMAN Mark your calendars for August 14! It’s not only the worldwide debut of the “World’s Toughest Race: Eco-Challenge Fiji” on Amazon Prime Video, it’s also the debut of Team Onyx, the first entirely African American adventure racing team representing the U.S. while competing on an international stage. The five-person team includes both gay and straight competitors from the east and west coasts and from middle America. If you’ve been depressed over the lack of sports due to Covid-19, this 10-episode series definitely will be a welcome respite from sports reruns. Filmed in the fall of 2019 prior to onset of the pandemic, the "World’s Toughest Race: Eco-Challenge Fiji" is hosted and co-produced by celebrity survival expert Bear Grylls, famous through his survival series, “Man vs. Wild” and “Running Wild with Bear Grylls.”
Sixty-six teams will race non-stop, 24-hours-a-day for 11 days across some of the most beautiful but rugged, unforgiving terrain Fiji has to offer. They’ll race 417 miles through dense jungles, steep mountains, winding rivers, treacherous oceans and dangerous swamps. And while the teams are racing against each other for prize money of $100,000, $50,000 and $25,000 for first, second and third finishers, their biggest competitor is actually Mother Nature!
ABOVE L-R: CHRISS SMITH, SAM SCIPIO, CLIFTON LYLES, MIKAYLA LYLES, COREE AUSSEM-WOLTERING
26 COMPETE JULY - AUGUST 2020
