All American Handyman – Week 3 Recap

It was “From Clutter and Chaos to the Dream Garage” week, and the Handyman contestants were whittled down to 7 after this week’s exciting, albeit somewhat predictable elimination. Here’s the Holmes Spot recap for week 3 of All American Handyman…

In this week’s “fix-it” challenge, the contestants were given 90 minutes to replace a broken window. Simple enough for any competent handyman or woman, right? Wrong. The kicker was that the new window was larger than the old one, and the Handyman hopefuls had to cut into structure to make the new window fit.
The contestants started out strong, but Mike and Scott noticed a lot of mistakes as they observed their work in progress. 

 Mike was not impressed by Scott C. (“Sarge”). His work was a tad rushed and “imprecise.” As time began to run down, Mike observed Sarge putting the new window in inside out, and then upside down.

Sonne decided to build the new window’s structure on the floor instead of building it in place and ran into problems when the structure wouldn’t fit into the wall’s frame.

Julia was once again working at a snail’s pace and continued to fall behind the other contestants. As usual, she failed to finish her project.

Rodney ran into problems when he overcut the wrong piece of structure, leaving a gaping hole in the wall. In the end, he was missing the jack studs, rendering his header useless. However, Scott told Rodney that he admired how he made a mistake in the beginning, but kept on going without getting discouraged.

Carol got flustered under the pressure as Scott, Mike, and Anitra observed her work. The more frustrated she got, the redder her face turned. Mike asked her if she needed any help, but Carol felt intimidated by his “tone” and essentially shooed him away. She even accused Mike of giving her attitude during the judging process, putting Mike on the defensive.

Michael failed to put any cripples/jack studs under his header, leaving it unsupported and pretty much useless. He acknowledged his mistake, stating “You can’t win them all.”

There were some contestants who did well, however. Chris L. impressed Scott when he “beefed up” his header with glue and nails. In fact, Mike called Chris L.’s structure “perfect.” However, Chris L. failed to finish the project in the time allotted. Scott H. was also observed to be doing quite well, and worked at a good pace. He finished the project with flying colors.

In the end, Scott H. was the clear winner to the judges and contestants alike. He “slaughtered it” according to Scott. His project was pretty much perfect and he was awarded the round 2 “build-it” advantage. Mike’s only criticism? “The window’s dirty,” he pointed out with a smirk on his face.

Round 2’s “build-it” challenge was to create a well-organized garage oasis in 3 hours, using a variety of organization accessories. The garage was to include a work bench and need to have enough space to park a car in. Ryan Ostrom, chief marketing officer from Craftsman, once again served as guest judge.

The teams for the build-it challenge were randomly selected.

Team 1 – Scott H. and Scott C. “Sarge”

Team 2 – Carol and Sonne

Team 3 – Michael and Chris L.

Team 4 – Rodney and Julia

The teams were judged on teamwork, how they utilized the available space, and how they used the accessories they were given.

Scott H. won the advantage in round 1. The advantage was a two minute head start to get all the organization accessories his team needed. The accessories included Craftsman VersaTracks, various hooks, and racks. Scott H. and Sarge’s strategy was to use their advantage to take everything they could, leaving the other contestants with very slim pickings.

During the challenge, Carol and Sonne had a hard time seeing eye-to-eye. Within a short amount of time, however, they found their groove and began working well together. When Mike and Scott entered their garage to judge it, they noticed a poorly constructed shelf which lacked proper support. The shelf was also dangerous because a person could easily hit their head on it. Overall, they did a lot of little things right, displayed relatively good teamwork, but didn’t execute the project well as a whole.

Scott H. and Scott C. created a fairly well organized garage, but didn’t use the big wall to its full potential in Mike’s opinion. They also didn’t make good use of the glut of accessories they accumulated with the two minute advantage Scott H. earned during round 1. In the end, they admitted to using the advantage as a way to sabotage the other teams as opposed to helping themselves win the challenge. In Mike’s words, they “didn’t take advantage of [their] advantage.”

Rodney and Julia’s team had a lot of problems. Rodney formulated the project’s plan “in his head” – not a good idea when you’re supposed to be working as a team. Rodney used Julia as his own personal “go-for” yelling “JULIA!” over and over and over again during the challenge. Julia did not step up and take any kind of leadership, instead, she allowed herself to be used as more of an assistant to Rodney. In the end, the work bench they were supposed to build together was weak and structurally unsound. Mike also found the makeshift bike hook constructed from a small piece of VersaTrack and a piece of wood laughably awful. In fact, he pulled it off the wall and took it with him on his way out.

Chris L. and Michael did very well throughout the entire challenge. They built a solid workbench, and made good use of the VersaTrack, although it was a bit randomly placed on the wall. All in all, they executed a good plan, and created a fairly good shelving unit. However, Mike noted that the shelving unit was very deep, and cripples/jacks should have been used to support the deep shelves.

Chris L. and Michael were judged by Mike and Scott to be the top team in the build-it challenge. This win was the third win in a row for Chris L.

The bottom team was judged by Mike and Scott to be Julia and Rodney. Their lack of team work combined with some poor craftsmanship sunk them into last place. Mike stated that Julia looked “bored and tired.” Because, according to Mike and Scott, she wasn’t progressing in her skill level, and that she worked abnormally slow when compared to the other contestants, Julia was eliminated from the competition. Rodney was spared from elimination because he was deemed “creative” and “eager” and therefore had the most potential for improvement.

That’s the All American Handyman week 3 recap! If you missed week 1 and week 2, you can read the Holmes Spot recaps, or you can go to HGTV and watch the full episodes.

ALL AMERICAN HANDYMAN CONTESTANTS - WEEK 3