The Challenge: USA season 1 episode 5 recap: 'In Tyson We Trust'

Sometimes you've got to make a big move to win. That applies to not only The Challenge and The Challenge: USA, but also Survivor and Big Brother. But in this week's episode of The Challenge: USA, a new social and political power player emerged from an Amazing Race alum instead, and it served as the catalyst for what's going to be all-out chaos for everyone else moving forward. Let's recap!

After last week's episode sent Shan and Xavier home, the algorithm reveals this week's pairings: Danny and Angela; Derek and Cayla; David and Alyssa; Tyson and Cashay; Enzo and Kyra; Kyland and Shannon; Domenick and Desi; Cinco and Azah; Ben and Justine; and Leo and Sarah. Sarah is pissed that she's partnered with Leo, who everyone sees as the weakest male left. Meanwhile Derek and Cayla's plan is just to not get last so they can fly under the radar of bigger players who want to make big moves.

Over in the bunk area, Ben is braiding Sarah's hair, keeping their Survivor alliance going strong. But Ben is constantly worried about Tyson since both he and Sarah voted Tyson out on Winners at War, and they know he could come for them at any moment with no warning. So Sarah and Tyson talk about how they need to keep Survivor strong and how Ben is a good ally for both of them in this game, and it feels like Tyson is genuine when he agrees. But again, you never know with him which way he'll go. He does love a blindside!

Meanwhile, Cashay tries to talk to Cinco about how to treat each other as exes going through this together, but it doesn't really go anywhere productive. I don't envision a happy ending for this couple.

The Challenge: Barreled Treasure

Teams start on a barge and jump into the water, swimming 150 yards to buoys that contain a code. After memorizing the code, players then swim another 75 yards to a cargo ship with 100 barrels on it. Once they climb on the ship, they must find the barrel with the right code painted on top, grab the puzzle pieces inside, and then swim back to the barge. Then teams have do it the entire thing a second time to get the rest of their pieces before solving the puzzle. Whoever solves their puzzle first wins. And there's a twist: if a team opens the wrong barrel, they have to swim back to the buoys to re-memorize the code and do it all over again. Yikes. This is a lot of swimming, and there are still a lot of players left who cannot swim.

Cayla and Derek are actually the first team to get the buoys, and they're both shocked at how easy it is to memorize the codes. Some teams aren't going to agree with them. Meanwhile Tyson is literally dragging Cashay through the water, and Leo doesn't seem to be making any kind of progress in his swimming. Cayla and Derek both memorize their code, divide and conquer on the ship, and get their first puzzle pieces quickly while other team struggle ... namely, Cashay and Tyson, because she opens the wrong barrel so fast the cameras didn't even catch it. Tyson's so pissed he's yelling, but they get back in the water to go back to the buoys.

Back on the ship, Alyssa and David find both of their barrels quickly, and other teams are finding theirs, but Derek and Cayla have an early lead. They drop off their first bundle of puzzle pieces and continue on their second lap. They get their second bundle and start swimming back, but Ben and Justine are hot on their tails. Tyson and Cashay finally make it back with their first bundle and he literally throws the pieces against his board. He is absolutely furious.

But Tyson doesn't have to worry because Cinco/Azah, Sarah/Leo, and Enzo/Kyra are all doing so much worse than him — Azah can't swim, and neither can the men on the latter two teams. Plus Enzo and Leo choose to take extra time to climb down the net to get into the water rather than just jumping in. Time is of the essence here, guys! Do they not understand that?

Derek and Cayla make it back and start working on the puzzle, and soon Ben and Justine join them. Alyssa and David eventually start on the puzzle in third place, and somehow, some way, Tyson and Cashay start on the puzzle in fourth. That says a lot about Tyson's swimming ability that he was able to pass that many people while hauling a whole other person behind him during the swim, plus having to return to the buoys a third time. And then, even more shocking, Tyson and Cashay actually finish the tanagram puzzle before everyone else, winning the entire challenge. Wow. She can't even swim, opens the wrong barrel, and they still smoke everyone. That is incredible.

Cayla and Derek finally finish in second place, Justine and Ben finish third, Angela and Danny in fourth, David and Alyssa in fifth, Desi and Domenick in sixth, and Shannon and Kyland in seventh. Now the race for last place is on. Azah is really gassing out, to the point where Cinco is literally begging her to continue. Back on the barge, Kyra and Enzo finally finish as Cinco and Azah make it back to start their puzzle. It's a real race now between Cinco/Azah and Sarah/Leo, but Sarah and Leo get the win and narrowly avoid going into elimination, sending Cinco and Azah in instead.

Back at the house, Cashay is literally laughing at how her journey doesn't make sense, because not only did she just win a challenge, but she won a swimming challenge ... and she can't even swim. The irony! Over on the main MTV franchise, you just know Scuba Nelly T is fuming that this Love Island girl accomplished what he hasn't been able to in a record-breaking long time. Meanwhile Cinco tells Azah to be wary of Cashay because "she will manipulate," so he thinks they shouldn't toss out any names of potential elimination opponents during their meeting with her and Tyson. And that meeting is awkward. It turns into a game of chicken where both teams don't say any names, and the standoff ends with no real options on the table.

Elsewhere in the house, everyone is gossiping and strategizing who they think Tyson and Cashay are going to pick. And Sarah can't stop complaining about how poorly Leo did (apparently he told her he was "good" with swimming before the challenge began!) and that gets Cashay thinking about how she never wants to be partnered with Leo because they'd lose for sure.

Outside on the steps, Cayla sits down to talk with Tyson because she and Derek are worried that as an Amazing Race/Big Brother pair, they're a likely choice for a Survivor/Love Island winning team to throw into elimination. She clues Tyson in to the fact that Ben is really pissed at how much Tyson's been winning so far, and she suggests he might take a shot at Tyson if given the chance. It's a smart move from Cayla because it gains her some trust with Tyson, plus it puts the target on someone else. But was it enough to save her and Derek and make Tyson turn on his Survivor alliance?

Elimination

The answer is a resounding yes. And, like I said before, we all know Tyson loves a good blindside, but instead of coming for Ben, he instead aims at ... Sarah. Turns out that Cayla's intel did have Tyson gunning for Ben, but since he's partnered with Justine, Cashay refused to throw in her fellow Love Island alum. Cashay floated Sarah/Leo instead because none of the women want to be partnered with Leo, and Tyson felt that Sarah "sunk her own ship" by talking so much about how useless of a partner he was. And then by taking a shot at Sarah, Tyson is indirectly taking a shot at his real enemy Ben since he's so close with Sarah. As Danny perfectly puts it: "This is the Survivor way of taking a shot at somebody: taking out their closest ally." Ruthless, savage ... and downright genius. But only if it works. If Sarah and Leo win against Cinco and Azah, there's going to be hell to pay for Tyson and Cashay.

Elimination challenge: A Dark Turn. Partners are tied together as they run into a dark shipping container where they use their hands to feel and memorize the correct order of a stack of different sized film reels. Then they run outside the container to stack new film reels on a pole in the right size order. The team to correctly stack the entire tower of reels on the pole first wins.

Both teams immediately showcase their different strategies — Cinco and Azah run into the container to memorize right away while Leo and Sarah stay outside to gather all four of the the different sizes of reels and use their fingers to measure each one so they can memorize better even when they can't see. On the sidelines, Cashay starts freaking out because she can already tell that Sarah and Leo's strategy is good, and she knows Sarah and Leo could perform better under pressure than Cinco and Azah. She's already regretting taking this shot.

Sarah and Leo finally enter the dark container and start memorizing a little behind Cinco and Azah, but their strategy is sound. Cinzo and Azah come out to start building their stack but they get confused after only a couple reels about the differences between the sizes. Meanwhile, when Sarah and Leo come out of the shipping container, they grab most of their pieces and stack them in one go with no hesitation. After a second trip inside, Sarah and Leo finish their stack and call for a check, and they're good. TJ blows the horn, sending Cinco and Azah home, and Sarah and Leo go absolutely crazy while celebrating. She keeps pointing to Tyson, saying that she's coming for him now, and he knows he's in some deep s---. "You want to go to war with me, not against me, I promise you that," Sarah says.

Challenger of the week: Cayla for coming in at the 13th hour to not only save herself with some smart social and political strategy, but also for being the catalyst for this all-out Survivor war that's coming. I am so ready for the chaos next week as Tyson (and Cashay, but really mostly Tyson) deals with the fallout from this failed big move. Things are getting spicy!

The Challenge: USA airs Wednesdays at 9 p.m. on CBS.

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