The Challenge: Battle of the Eras wasted no time getting into the action. The first challenge of the season found Devin Walker and Leroy Garrett struggling mightily — and Johnny “Bananas” Devenanzio says fans only saw the half of it. While discussing the Wednesday, August 14, premiere, the 42-year-old MTV star told Us Weekly exclusively that Devin, 35, and Leroy, 39, were in the water for “an eternity.
” “I think Devin’s boat sank. But in all fairness, these weren’t boats. It was like if you took one of those straw hats and flipped it upside down.
That’s what it was. You were trying to row like in a saucer. It was difficult,” Johnny explained.
“I have experience in boats, so even though I’d never rode in anything like this, I kind of understood the technique that it required. I don’t think Devin and Leroy got that figured out very well.” Season 40 of The Challenge has the cast divided into four teams: Era 1 (cast members from seasons 1-10), Era 2 (seasons 11-20), Era 3 (seasons 21-30) and Era 4 (seasons 31-40).
After the first challenge in Wednesday’s premiere, the bottom male and female from each era were automatically sent to an elimination round. “There was so much pressure [during] that first challenge because we knew that half of the house was going into elimination,” Johnny said. In a twist for the season, the opponents for the elimination round will be selected by the winners of each era following a group discussion in each era’s resp.