Father And Son Part As Friends

When "The Amazing Race" headed north Wednesday night, things went south for the father-son team of Dennis and Andrew. The two had so much difficulty getting out of Mexico that even winning a crucial "fast-forward" reward wasn't enough.

"It turned out it was, like, the busiest day for Cancun. It was the last day of summer vacation and it was just crazy, trying to get out of there," Dennis Hyde told Early Show's Julie Chen. "The airport was packed. We were actually with two of the other teams, but as they got their tickets, planes filled up and we ended up leaving hours later than everyone else"

While the other teams were completing tasks in England, the conservative Southern Baptist and the openly gay college cheerleader maintained a positive attitude. Andrew Hyde in particular, kept the hope very much alive.

"I'm happy all the time. I just can't help it," he said. "Even though I was like, 'We're down, we're out, we're in big trouble here,' I was,like, 'We are going to go out with a bang. If we're going out, we're going out with a bang. That's how we do it in Kentucky.' I kept my hopes alive. Kept our spirits up. I kept clapping and smiling. I think we went out great. I had a blast."

An exciting moment for the team was winning the fast-forward reward at the Duxford Imperial War Museum, where Dennis got to drive a tank through a battlefield obstacle course in less than than 90 seconds.

"That was a lot of fun driving the tank. I think we surprised everybody. There were several people there, who just didn't expect anybody to do it right away. But I've had some experience on some other equipment and we just had a good time," said Dennis.

Andrew said he could not have been more proud of his father. "I really was. They told us at the war museum there in Cambridge, they said,'This is tough to do. If you don't get on your first try, you can try again and try again.' He got on his first try. Man those guys working there, they were shocked," he said.

But it was not enough to keep them in the game. Nevertheless, Dennis and Andrew said they achieved their goal: to get closer to each other.

"We came on to this (race) as father and son. We fussed and that was our relationship, a leader and a follower, and on the race, we finally became friends,"Andrew said. "You know, I'm 21 now and just stepping up to the plate, I guess, doing my own thing now, and now when we hang out, we talk as buddies. And that's more than I could have ever asked for. And I did not expect, you know, that to really happen. And it did."

"Of course, a lot of things, he and I can share with each other because we're the ones that experienced it. I talk to him a whole lot more than we did before," Dennis added.