The first Gray Team's elimination, which paved the path for almost every future Gray Team.
The Curse of the Gray Team is an alleged curse on the Gray Teams of Endurance. In the first elimination, Gray usually gets sent to the Temple of Fate, and end up getting eliminated.
The curse began on Endurance, where Blue sends the Gray Team of the time, Max and Jenna , to eliminate the Green Team ; Blue thought that this would be a test of strength and that Gray would thus surely beat Green. However, it was instead a challenge of strategy and chance. Green ended up sweeping them in two rounds, and Gray was eliminated.
On Endurance 2, Wayne and Maryelle suffered the same fate as they were sent to temple after Green won Tower of Power. JD even noted at the time that Gray seemed destined to go first. Gray ultimately lost against Orange. In the next episode, it was discussed by JD and Jenna, the latter of whom mentions "it's just bad luck!"
The curse was temporarily broken in Endurance: Hawaii , when, in the first Temple Mission, the Yellow Team decided not to send Gray up to Temple. In fact, Gray didn't go to Temple until the final four, but survived. They went up again in the final three but survived that trip as well. They eventually became Endurance Champions.
However, the curse resumed in Endurance: Tehachapi , when the Gray-Blue alliance threatened the other contestants, and they got sent to Temple by Purple and Gray got eliminated.
The curse continued through Endurance: High Sierras . Connor (who was originally on the Gray team on High Sierras before being switched to Blue) in particular seemed very superstitious of the curse and saw the change in color to be one of the pros of being switched to a new team. The new gray team (Ike and Darci) found themselves targeted by the others, including Connor who gave them the samedhi when he and Taylor won the next endurance mission. Gray was sent to temple with Yellow after Red won the temple mission. Connor gave Yellow Darci's temple strategy which resulted in Gray's elimination, essentially causing a self-fulfilling prophecy in the process.
Endurance: Fiji featured only 6 teams and the Gray color was cut. Gray's discontinuation on Endurance: Fiji could have been influenced by the curse though it is not confirmed.
Karma reintroduced the Gray Team color. The first season's Gray team though completely averted this curse by winning the first mission and thus granted them the power to send two other teams to the Cave of Karma which ensured Gray wasn't going to be the first team eliminated. Gray was later sent to the Cave after the third mission against Yellow but won. They were eliminated though after the following mission when they were sent to Cave against Blue who won.
Trivia[]
- This is one of the most discussed-of topics on Endurance and being one of the most acknowledge coincidences on the show itself along with the three temple curse.
- The teams who inherit Gray's pieces before the final pyramid shell game challenge never seem to win with the exception of Season 3 Gray since they actually made it to the finals themselves.
- Most of the Gray teams tended to be outside of the dominating alliances in their respectful seasons and this may have contributed to their early eliminations. Notable, the one Gray team that wasn't eliminated first was part of the bigger PROG alliance that season though it was an outsider that won the first temple mission that season.