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Barrington grad, partner win million in 'Amazing Race'

The Sweet Scientists will enjoy a sweet $1 million.

Amy DeJong, the 24-year-old Barrington High School alumna, and her partner, Maya Warren, tasted sweet victory in the final leg of CBS' “The Amazing Race.”

And in the end, it was DeJong's brain power as much as her physical endurance that helped her team gain the high ground.

In the final episode, which aired Friday night, four teams remained, but thanks to DeJong's amazing skill at memorizing the numbers off a series of shipping containers, she and Warren were able to race to the finish line and claim victory.

The final frantic episode began in Manila, Philippines, and finished in California.

Perhaps a clue to how everything would end was in the way the show painted the duo as likable underdogs.

As the episode opened, the team made up of professional wrestlers expressed their displeasure at finding the scientists had survived despite finishing last in the previous episode. Producers allowed four teams into the finals instead of the usual three.

“I cannot deny my utter frustration at seeing Amy and Maya walk through there (the airport in Manila),” wrestler Brooke Adams said.

Meanwhile, another team was confident to refer to the scientists as “low hanging fruit” and declare they had the highest probability of losing, suggesting in the process giving Amy a kick in the shins.

But the Sweet Scientists gained a quick advantage by being the first to find Los Angeles City Hall to grab their first clue.

From there, it was a struggle to maintain their lead, as they were the first to find City Hall. They fell to third place on the way to performing their first task, a movie stunt that involved Warren crashing through fake glass.

But the duo gained momentum when they moved onto their next task, a Coast Guard search and rescue.

The team was only the third all-female team to capture the grand prize.

Warren had a message for the audience at the end.

“Look what scientists can do. Look what scientists can be, especially women scientists. Hopefully, we'll inspire some people along the way, but I hope that we continue to grow and learn and become even better women,” Warren said.

DeJong was unavailable for comment Friday, but some of her excitement could be gained by looking at her Twitter feed from the past week.

At the Manila airport, she tweeted, “Off to the city of angels! Excited to see everyone again.”

She also said, “Just realized that I no longer have to hide my passport from people.”

And she showed appreciation for the humor of receiving her orders at the Manila airport in a manila envelope: “STILL dying laughing about that manila envelope we brought home from Manila! Love it.”

The food science graduate student from the University of Wisconsin-Madison also made reference to the snarky wrestlers by retweeting a message from “Jane Ayer” that said, “Pretty sure those wrestlers wouldn't be talking smack about @AmyEDeJong and @MayaWarren if they visited UW and had Babcock Hall ice cream.”

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