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Race Around The World was based on a Canadian television show. On it, a group of Australians between the ages of 20 and 30 were sent around the world for one hundred days and they had to send back a four minute documentary from a different country every ten days. It ran for two years, in 1997 and 1998.
In 2000, a spin-off of the program aired, named "Race Around Oz". Richard did not host this program, though.
The 1997 racers were Bentley Dean, Claudia Rowe, Kim Traill, Olivia Rousset, John Safran, Ben Davies and Scott Herford (thanks to Hope). Olivia won the Race, with Kim coming a close second, in a points situation that came down to the last story. John won the most popular vote with his quirky, controversial stories. In fact, one of his stories, in which he put his camera in a confession box, was deemed unfit for screening and he received no points for it.
In 1998, several of the first group of Racers took part in the Sydney to Hobart yacht race. They once again filed reports on their travels and these were shown on ABC TV on a show called Tall Ships in mid-98 (below). John Safran has gone on to record a song, entitled "Not The Sunscreen Song", which was a parody of Baz Luhrman's "Sunscreen Song". It was widely condemned by various social groups for it's questionable advice to young people, but the younger generation embraced it as a funny, satirical look at life, and not actual life advice.
The second batch of Racers, for the 1998 series, were Cate Anderson, David Sharkey, Sheona McKenna, Tony Wilson, Rachel Bannikoff, John Thiris, Tim Bryson and Catherine Turner. Tony won 1998's Race, with his fantastic variation of humourous stories and great characters. Sheona came in at second place. Tony also won the Popular Vote with the beautiful prize of a night's stay at the Rosebud Caravan Park (near Melbourne). Tim won the prize for the most late stories (though John must have been pretty close!).
Tony Wilson joined John Safran on an ill-fated news/comedy show on Channel Seven in 1999, and now writes for The Age in Melbourne occasionally.
