O.C.'s 'Amazing Race' couple talk dating, how the show starts, but not how it ends
Isabelle Du and Dennis Hour focused hard on the goal.
Three times they’d auditioned for “The Amazing Race,” their favorite show since they were students at Chapman University, back when they were just good friends, not yet a romantic couple.
Twice they’d gotten nowhere but earlier this year, as their latest audition video made its way through the casting pipeline, they decided to get ready for the show – just in case.
“Even though we didn’t know we were on the show or not, we acted like, ‘Let’s pretend we’re on the show and start training,’ ” says Du, a 29-year-old model from Tustin.
So they were on the road to visit her dad in Northern California earlier this year, to have him teach them how to quickly change a flat tire – just in case they made the show, just in case that skill ended up useful in the middle of nowhere on “The Amazing Race” – when the phone rang.
It was someone from the show, Du and Hour say, and just that fact was so exciting they didn’t even realize for a moment or two why the show was calling.
“They were like, ‘Uh, did you not hear what we just said? You’re on the show!’” Du says.
“We just kept talking,” Hour says, laughing. “We should have just been quiet.”
The Dating Couple, as they’re nicknamed on “The Amazing Race,” made their show debut on the season premiere on Friday, racing from Times Square in New York City to the first pit stop in the U.S. Virgin Islands where they finished seventh.
For Du and Hour, who aren’t allowed to talk about how they did on the show or share any specifics about where they traveled and what they did there, simply starting the race was the realization of a dream they’d shared for years, one that Du had told friends as far back as Chapman that she’d one day achieve.
It was in college in Orange that they’d met.
“I was trying to recruit him as a member of our (Asian Pacific Student Association) club,” Du says of the first time she and her future boyfriend talked. “It was in our school cafeteria, and he had long hair and braces and this scooter. He was just this goofy guy. I called him Asian Yanni because he looked like Yanni.”
Hour says he was smitten from the start.
“But she always had a boyfriend,” he says. “She did have times when she was single, and I would get excited and think maybe I should make a move, but she’d always get scooped up really quick.”
They stayed in touch throughout school and after and remained good friends. During a four-year period when Du was working as a model and actress in Vietnam and Hour was traveling in Asia, they met up for a day in Vietnam. And then, not quite three years ago, Hour says he saw Du post online that she was moving home, and he knew she was currently unattached, too.
“I saw that post and said, ‘Hey, while you’re in town why don’t you have dinner with me?’” Hour says.
“I thought it was a dinner to catch up, not really a date,” Du says. “I was completely oblivious. I remember we had Japanese food, sushi, and then afterwards he started driving me home, and he just pulled over ...”
“Don’t say I pulled over, it sounds creepy!” Hour interrupts, both of them laughing.
“... and he went in for a kiss,” Du continues. “That’s when I knew what his intentions were. I always thought he was cute. At least it was a definite sign, otherwise we’d have just gone on being friends, and ...”
“I didn’t stay in the friend zone,” Hour says.
Early in their relationship, which now has run about 2 1/2 years, they decided to try out for “The Amazing Race,” realizing that they both loved it and had seen every episode of every season.
They submitted a video audition one year and traveled to Las Vegas for a cattle call audition another. This year, their video audition caught someone’s attention at the show, possibly because they seemed closer than they had in the earlier days of dating.
“What I feel like it was is that Isabelle and I got to know each other more, and we had better synergy,” says Hour, who works in finance.
“Us today and us 2 1/2 years ago, we’re the same people but we’re also different people,” Du says. “We’ve grown so much closer now.”
During their time on “The Amazing Race” they say that closeness helped them even when the competition that sends teams around the world in all manner of difficult situations created stresses.
“It was definitely tough and tough on communication,” Hour says.
“It’s such a unique and stressful environment that you’ll never be in again, and you experience so many ups and downs,” Du says. “You’re disoriented ...”
“Hungry!” Hour says.
“... you’re hungry.”
“... sleepy!” he adds.
“No matter how much you prepared for it, and we prepared a lot, it almost doesn’t matter because in the end you don’t know how it’s going to be,” Du says.
Coming home from “The Amazing Race” both say they feel their outlook on life and how they want to live it has changed.
“The race has actually now put a standard for us, it’s raised the bar for us in terms of achievement,” Du says. “We want to accomplish things at least at that level.”
That applies to life experiences, professional accomplishments or personal challenges, Hour says. They’ve started to blog together – Myboyfriendsclothes.com is their fashion blog – and they’re talking about visiting the Maldives Islands together sooner than later.
“Our drive has definitely increased,” Hour says.
“To have that amazing experience, you don’t want it to end,” Du says. “You want it to keep going. You love that feeling to be in that adventure.
“For us, we’re like, “Oh my gosh, let’s find other things to feed our sense of adventure.”
Source:http://www.ocregister.com/articles/says-636678-hour-amazing.html