Interview ‘The Amazing Race Canada’ Ameen & Surria

Ameen and Surria took on Season 12 of The Amazing Race Canada as a mother and son duo who were already used to working side by side through their family business, Cedar Valley. After Ameen convinced his mom to take a chance on the race, the two brought their competitive energy and complementary strengths all the way to the final five, even winning the leg right before their elimination. In this exit interview, Ameen and Surria look back on the incredibly close final seconds of their race, the challenges they loved and the ones they never want to do again, and how Surria’s injury changed the way they approached the competition. They also share what the experience showed them about their relationship, their advice for future racers, and why giving 110% until you reach the mat is what going the extra mile means to them.

TEM (The Extra Mile): Re-watching last night’s episode,   especially the final 10 seconds.. How do you guys feel?

Ameen: That was a crazy, crazy episode. It was, we were on the edge of our seat the entire time. Just brought back all the emotions, all the anxiety, all the adrenaline. And, yeah, we knew how it all ended, but watching that come together on screen was just…

Surria: Yeah. Unfortunately, reliving it again was tough, and it was interesting because we have been so excited every week, we have watch parties, you know, people come over every episode, and after episode seven, winning that one, was so awesome to watch, but then we knew what was coming next week, so I couldn’t even enjoy winning like seven, because I knew what was coming, but yeah, it’s a lot of mixed emotions, for sure.

TEM: What got you guys into the Amazing Race, like, whose idea kind of was it, like, did you have to give a little push to the other, or how did that happen?

Ameen: Yeah, I mean, my mom didn’t really know what the show was, I wasn’t a super fan by any means, but I had seen the show before, and I figured, you know, this is an amazing opportunity for us, it’s a once in a lifetime opportunity, let’s go ahead and try it, and just see what happens, you know, we like to put ourselves up to different challenges, and see what we can… I kind of accomplished, so it was something that we definitely wanted to try, and I had to convince my mom a little bit. A lot, not a little bit. I knew it would be a blast, so yeah, we definitely wanted to go all in.

TEM: And, you know, working, obviously you guys have worked together, and now working together in a competition, do you find, like, how do you find, like, your competitive edge? D0 you find one of you guys a little more competitive, or how did that kind of come about working together?

Surria: We’re both pretty competitive, and that is one of the reasons why we wanted to be on the show, is that we thought we could do this, no matter my age or whatever, you know, position that we’re in.

Ameen: Yeah, I would say I’m more competitive. I’m just, I’m very intense. Like, I don’t know if it came through on camera, but, like, my, once I have, like, an objective and a goal, it’s like, that is the only goal, and there’s nothing I hate more than losing. Like, I just want to win in everything that I do. So, like, if we got, like. Like, here’s, you know, congratulations, here’s your clue, like, my mom wants to hug the person giving it to us, I’m like, no, let’s go, we can’t wait to send it, and I’m just, like, very intense in the moment, so I think I’m a little bit more competitive, but both of us together as team, we’re definitely ultra-competitive, and we were only there for one reason, and that was to win, but had a lot of fun along the way.

TEM: Of course, and was there anything that you both kind of learned about one another that maybe you didn’t know, or something that was amplified, just being in this competition together?

Surria: I think more amplified, because we definitely know each other well, working together for so many years, so just reinforce the strength of our relationship, and the respect we have for each other, because I know what his strengths are, he knows what my strengths are, and so we really work well together and complement each other in a lot of those challenges.

Ameen: Yeah, it’s kind of like a testament of how good our working relationship is, and our personal relationship, but the fact that, like, we can just, you know, set a common goal and go out there and try and achieve it. and not get frustrated with each other and just work so well together and have those skill sets that, like my mom said, complement each other. This is kind of our life every day. We work together every day and we’re always trying to build and achieve something new that we haven’t done before. So it was just a testament to how well we work together.

TEM: And was there any type of challenge that you guys didn’t get to do that you prepped for?

Surria: Yeah, archery. And absolutely. Practiced the night before we went out. Didn’t get to do any of that.

Ameen: I was hoping for some, like, some stuff with like driving cars and like racing. I mean, we were driving a lot. I mean, more so on racing or like shooting things. I think that would have been fun. Or a hockey challenge. I waiting for a hockey challenge.  I think they did that in season 11, so it was tough to bring back.

TEM: What was your guys’ like favorite challenge and least favorite challenge throughout the season?

Ameen:  Good question. For me, my personal favorite was the… And see in episode seven was catching the fish, the walleye and the pickerel, like that was just one of the most fun challenges, I thought it was something really cool to do, I had a blast in there.

Surria: Yeah, mine would be the disco, the disco challenge.

TEM : What was like one challenge you’re like, nope, never again?

Surria:  Sitski. Hands down.

Ameen:  I love those summer games. actually made all my friends do the summer games. And last week, we set it up an hour before the watch party and I made them do all those games and try and get it done. And they’re like, this isn’t as easy as it looks, it’s a lot harder than we thought. So those ones were definitely tough for me.

TEM:  Yeah, no, definitely. I think that’s one of those things that seems a lot easier, but then when you’re actually in it, all the pressure.

Ameen:  The cameras in your face and the $20,000 $50,000 on the line, it’s not as easy to throw a Frisbee as you would think.

TEM:  So what advice would you guys have for any people?

Ameen: If you are looking to apply, make sure you do all your research, watch all the previous episodes, all the previous seasons, see what was done on the show. Find if there’s any trends, find if there’s challenges that repeat. Are there more physical challenges, more memory challenges? So what exactly do you need to do? That’ll help you prepare in some sort. It’s very hard to actually prepare for the race, because you never know what you’re going to do, or who’s going to do what. So really, like, memorize that, those previous challenges, see how long it takes, see what you’re doing, and then kind of make sure you’re picking your partners when you have that balanced skill set. You you both can’t be good at, you know, we both don’t need to be great at math. One needs to be good at math, one needs to be good at, you know, drama. So, you know, having that balance between your team, I think it’s very important.

TEM: We’re all about going the extra mile. So what do you, how do you guys go the extra mile?

Surria; For us, we’re we’re always… always… always… For always… Looking at going above and beyond and doing our absolute best and giving it our all. And to be honest, we, you know, we did give it our all on that last episode. We tried our best to make it to that mat in fourth place, but it didn’t work out. You know, I don’t know what more we could have done. I mean, I’ve got blood coming through my pants on my knees and it was rainy. We were just like drenched. And with my injury, it was just like we tried our best to get there as hard as we could. And honestly, we never, we, we don’t like slacking and we never give up. You can’t go in with that mentality that, oh, I’m just going to take a penalty. Oh, I’m just going to give up. No, you’ve got to like go hard all the time

Ameen: and give it 110% in every challenge. Like there is, there is, you a lot of physical challenges and, and I was typically doing the majority of the physical work because my mom was injured and I’m trying to relieve her of that. And so like there was times where I was tired and a lot of stuff you don’t see on, on actual TV, but there’s a lot of times where I’m tired. I’m want to take a breath and I’ll like stop for a second. But no, I can’t stop right now. have to just push through all this and I’ll, you know, relax in the car when I’m driving somewhere or whatever. So it was really making sure that we just gave it our all 100% of the time. Until you finally check in with John on that mat, you know, you’re giving it your all. And even racing that last 10 seconds to the mat, we actually decided we’re just going to leave all of our stuff in the car. Because we were like, if we stop to get our stuff, we’re definitely going to lose. Yeah. So it’s like, leave all of our stuff in the car, we’ll run the race, the rest of the race without any clothes, any supplies, as long as we can just get to that mat. So, you know, it’s just making sure that you think of all those little things to try and, you know, finish in the proper place.

Catch a new episode of The Amazing Race Canada Season 12 on Tuesdays at 9 p.m. ET/PT on CTV and streams next day on Crave