In the video below, we see Dan Debenham, the host of the Relative Race TV show, at the recent 2025 RootsTech, answering questions about Relative Race. He speaks a bit about the history of the show and especially about the new season. Watch it and learn a few secrets, including what Dan prays for every day about the show. I hope his prayers come true! Thank you Cheri Hudson Passey for facilitating this interview and sharing it with all of us!

Season 15 of BYUTV’s Relative Race premiered last Sunday! Who watched it? I’d love to hear your comments in the comments box below if you did. If you haven’t seen it, you are missing out, so go here to watch. It was such a tearjerker! My husband even cried at a few parts. This is the first season involving a Hispanic team, as well a team involving an uncle and niece. In fact, it has two uncle/niece teams! So fun! It also has two mother/daughter teams. We’ve seen a mother/daughter team before, but this is the first time we’ve seen two mother/daughter teams in the same season, as far as I can remember, and two uncle/niece teams as well.

If you don’t know what Relative Race is, read on. It’s a reality TV show where people find relatives whom they have never met before. The tears and stories that flow after these introductions are just so heartwarming! These people were usually adopted at birth or at a very young age and don’t know who their birth parents are. People apply to be on the show. If they get accepted, they have to submit to a DNA test so their relatives can be matched up with them. The show involves four teams of two people each. The two people can be related or not. Usually they are, as husband and wife, siblings, parent and child, in-laws, and sometimes they aren’t even related. Each show involves a race for the whole day. The race involves two mini-races: first completing a challenge, then second, a race to find a home after given an address, where an unknown relative is behind the door. The teams aren’t allowed to use any smartphones with GPS, they can only use paper maps and oral directions from everyday citizens of the town they are visiting. They have to turn in their smartphones on Day 1 and get a dumb phone in exchange to use for texting and simple phone calls. Ten days compose a season. On Day 10 the overall winner gets $50,000. Here’s what one team of winners did with their winnings.

At the beginning of each show, it just feels like Christmas as I wonder what new relatives the searchers will find. Then as they find them, especially if it’s a mother or father, or sibling, I feel so tender and joyful for those people. It makes me cherish my current relationships a lot more.

Fun fact: I’ve been blessed to meet three people from the show: Team Black of Season 9, Kyle and Layton, at Costco, and Ashlee of Season 13, also of Team Black, at the Spanish Fork UT Pioneer Day parade. It was so fun to meet them!

Want to read and see more Relative Race? It’s the best reality TV show ever! Watch all the shows here and read all my blog posts about it here. I envy you if you all 15 seasons of the show to watch! It’s a great show to especially watch on Sundays. We do it on Sunday nights. I definitely feel the spirit of Elijah when I do.