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Best friends Paullet Gillespie (left) and Diane Kuzyk are hoping to be selected for the first Amazing Race Canada airing later this year. "After everything that our kids have thrown at us over the years nothing will phase us," Kuzyk said in their audition video.

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Local ladies looking to compete in Amazing Race Canada

Balzac resident Paulette Gillespie and her best friend Diane Kuzyk from Calgary say they would make perfect contestants for the first season of The Amazing Race Canada to air this summer.

“(Being on the show) is on our bucket list so we figured, ‘let’s do it,’” Gillespie said.

The women submitted an audition video to the show about a month ago but waited to put it up on YouTube until after the Feb. 28 deadline for submissions passed because they didn’t want to give other hopeful contestants any ideas, Gillespie said.

The three-minute video is filled with the light-hearted humour that the pair said will make them a stronger team.

“Diane and I just kind of click. We don’t freak out. We’ll laugh first than think, ‘oh, we might be in trouble,’” Gillespie said.

The video featured the two women introducing themselves and the name of their team, Best Friends @ 50. Gillespie and Kuzyk are presented via a players stats card. Gillespie’s lists her age as “none of your business,” her height as “short” and her weight as “don’t ask.”

Both the women are homemakers and were a little offended that it wasn’t included as an occupation on the application.

They outlined some of their job duties in the video as taxi driver, maid, fast-order cook, banker and doctor.

Perhaps the highlight of audition is when the two don sparkly red and yellow unitards with flowing sheer fabric attached to the arms. Their voices are altered at this point to a high-pitched chipmunk voice as they describe their sense of style.

“Obviously we don’t care what we look like and will embarrass ourselves,” Gillespie said.

The video was scripted and directed by Gillespie’s husband Brian and can be viewed at www.youtube.com/watch?v=89EK4ygQpV4

“It’s been our favourite show since it started,” Gillespie said of the original The Amazing Race.

She said the best friends feel like it is their time to do something for themselves because both women’s children are grown and the chance at The Amazing Race Canada came just as the women are approaching 50.

Gillespie said their age will both help and hinder them because the physical challenges may be difficult but their patience will allow them to think things through first.

“I’m just hoping we don’t have to change drivers very much,” Gillespie said because she suffers from motion sickness when she is the passenger.

The Canadian edition of the race is not a worldwide sprint like the original show but will remain within Canada.

The website for the show states this is because “most Canadians have not travelled beyond their own province” and the show give contestants the chance to “discover the world within the borders of Canada.

“I’m looking forward to the northern territories and Eastern Canada,” Gillespie said.

Jim Quan from CTV communications said the exact number of auditions received for the program is not yet known but the number is in the thousands.

“There has been just so many (entries),” he said.

With so many hopeful entries it is not yet known when the final teams will be announced but Quan said he expect things to move quickly as filming for the show will begin within the next few month to make it for the show’s summer 2013 time slot, according to The Amazing Race Canada website.

Gillespie and Kuzyk have watched some of the other auditions for the show and said a lot of the ones they have seen are cut and dry.

“Our chances are as good as anyone else’s,” Gillespie said.

She said regardless if the pair makes it on The Amazing Race Canada or not they have already had a lot of fun.

“This has made my year already,” Gillespie said.