Prince George sibling duo Grace Dove and Joe Syme have made it through to the seventh episode of The Amazing Race Canada, a popular summer series on CTV where the six teams remaining will head to Eastern Ontario.
The Amazing Race Canada is hosted by skeleton bobsled Olympic gold medalist Jon Montgomery and based on the popular U.S. version.
The show challenges teams of two as they race across the country — and sometimes beyond — completing physical and mental challenges in pursuit of a grand prize of $250,000 courtesy of FUZE Iced Tea, a trip around the world and two 2025 Chevrolet Blazer EV SS vehicles.
Dove is an Indigenous Canadian Screen Award nominated actor who appeared in The Revenant as Leonardo DiCaprio’s wife; Alaska Daily, a television series with Hilary Swank and in How It Ends with Forest Whitaker, as well as the movie and television series Bones of Crows. Dove lives in Vancouver now but was born and raised in Prince George.
Dove’s brother Joe Syme is a diamond driller from Prince George.
Appearing on the show started with the idea of auditioning because both Dove and Syme are longtime fans of The Amazing Race Canada, Dove said.
“I had the idea last year and we talked about it but it’s quite a big deal to take time off work and trying to imagine doing it so we talked about it and then I brought it up again this year,” Dove said.
“I said ‘we should do this’ and right away Joe just jumped on board. He was just so into it. I think that his excitement got me excited and then we just said let’s do it so we took time off work and made it happen.”
Dove knew there would be so many people auditioning to get on The Amazing Race Canada.
There were interviews and many conversations and Dove said they had to convince the casting crew they really wanted to win.
“It was quite the process and lots of producers were involved and then I remember I was on set for something and I got a call from them and they said we were chosen and I looped in Joe and we were just so excited,” Dove said.
“It was really important for us to do it this year because sadly we lost our oldest brother, Thomas, last summer. So he passed away and so Joe and I ran the race for him. We really wanted to just celebrate his life and also honour him and honour our lives and do it in his name.”
Losing Thomas was the difference between considering auditioning for The Amazing Race Canada last year and doing it this year.
“I think it just put a lot of things into perspective about how little time we really have with our loved ones and so we just wanted to spend that time together,” Dove said.
From the time they got word they were on the show to the actual start date they had just a few months to prepare.
“It was enough time to arrange time off work and plan our outfits – which I was in charge of, of course,” Dove laughed.
Viewers might have noticed a particular scarf that the siblings wear during many of the episodes.
“It’s a Kookum scarf,” Dove explained.
“So Kookum means 'grandmother' in Cree and so it was a young Indigenous woman that I bought them from and it’s a nice piece of our culture that brings us together in a really nice matching style that people love.”
When watching The Amazing Race Canada teams always seem to be on the run.
“There’s actually more running involved than they show on TV,” Dove said.
“I’ve been lifting weights for the last couple of years and really getting into fitness in that way and my brother is a marathon runner so it’s no problem for him. I am not a big fan of cardio so I started training cardio maybe a month before and it was not enough. It. Was. Not. Enough. Joe was carrying both of our backpacks and encouraging me the whole way. It was rough.”
During the second leg of the race when players traveled to Lake Louise Dove noticed she was struggling physically more than she thought she would.
“I remember in that episode being so exhausted and really questioning my training,” Grace recalled.
“I was like ‘why am I this beat?’ Well, I didn’t take into consideration that I was training at sea level. So I train in Vancouver and then we went to Lake Louise and we’re in the mountains at a higher elevation and I was absolutely beat because of that. So there wasn’t much I could do about that except train in the mountains.”
But it never even occurred to her to do that, she added.
During episode 4, for the first time in the television series’ history, contestants visited the Arctic Ocean during a pit stop and also stopped in the communities of Inuvik and Tuktoyaktuk in the Northwest Territories. During the show, racers ate traditional Indigenous food, tested their strength, endurance and pushed their physical limits as they played northern Indigenous games, took on a dog-sledding challenge, learned the language or made traditional toys and had to successfully complete a Canadian satellite dish puzzle featuring Indigenous artwork.
“That is the furthest North I’ve ever been — Tuktoyaktuk on the edge of the Arctic Ocean — and I know The Amazing Race Canada has been trying to go there for years but you can imagine with such little infrastructure the planning it takes to get a production up there. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience to be able to go there, to be so welcomed by the community, to eat their traditional foods, to play their traditional games. I remember we were literally flying over the Arctic Ocean and the sun was setting, we were almost done that day and it took my breath away and I had a nice little cry because it meant so much to me. There are very few moments I got to be still on the show and that was one of them and I was very grateful to have that opportunity.”
During the first few episodes, Dove said, they were struggling a bit but things have changed now.
“I think you can really see us getting our feet under us,” Dove said.
“There’s so much to understand about The Race. There’s long travel days, getting to know the other teams, the strategy. There’s just so much going on. I think it was really overwhelming at first but especially when we touched base in Vancouver and then we got to Prince George and I think from what I can see we’re really starting to get our communication down. My brother and I hadn’t spent time together since we were children. So I think you really start to see our relationship come together and our communication starts getting dialed in.”
The strategy was to just play the game, Dove added.
“My brother and I had many conversations around just being authentic to ourselves, being honest and playing with honour,” Dove explained their approach.
During episode 4 there was a first hint of deception that took place when a team claiming to be Syme stole the ride share meant for the siblings, setting them back significantly as they waited for another ride.
“We just kept saying that, ‘let’s just play with honour’ but not everyone goes down that route and you can see there are many different strategies and I was just so focused on our own game that I didn’t even know that might happen to us,” Dove said about the deception.
“Now looking back I just feel a little naive and would I have done things differently? Possibly.”
Contestants never know where they are going until they start that leg of the race so when The Amazing Race Canada came to Prince George all the contestants find out just like always.
“When you’re running you genuinely don’t know where you’re going next,” Dove said.
“So when we found out we were going to Prince George that was the first we’d ever heard it, which is so incredible because we were almost out in the first leg. So the show would’ve still come to Prince George whether we were in it or not. We’re so glad we were still in it and able to race around our own hometown. Our parents are here, our family is here and we couldn’t even tell them. We were running around and we went to the pool, for example, where I spent many, many, many afternoons after school and The Race does it in such a good way. They go to these different areas and they show so much respect to the First Nations communities whose land we’re on and they do it in such a good way and they get the community involved and just the whole thing is done so well.”
Dove said as they went around Prince George everyone was so excited to see the racers and knew immediately it was The Amazing Race Canada on location.
In the meantime they have successfully continued on through episode 5 and 6 and are now heading to Eastern Ontario for more adventures during episode 7.
There’s one thing Dove wants readers to know.
“It’s a lot harder than it looks on TV,” she laughed.
“I’ve been watching the show with my family and I’m pausing it, telling them ‘this is so much harder than it looks!’ And I think that’s the funny part. Joe and I were watching the show before we raced and we just thought ‘we got this, oh, it’s going to be so easy’ but when you’re in it you want to win, the suspense, the traveling, it all takes a lot so hats off to all the racers in previous seasons. It’s not easy and kudos to everyone who competes. It’s very difficult.”
She couldn’t forget to mention her dear brother Joe.
“He is a man of mystery,” Grace said about her marathon-running sibling.
“I couldn’t have done it without him. He is such a beast. He is just sturdy, very honest and strong and he really carried me in so many ways. He’s a great big brother.”
Episode 7 of The Amazing Race Canada airs on CTV on Tuesday, Aug. 26. Check it out to see how the brother sister duo from Prince George manage this next adventure in Ontario.
