The Amazing Race 30 premiere date set; news on Survivor 36, Instinct, more

The Amazing Race 30 premiere date has been formally set, and it’s even earlier than we assumed we’d get it.

New episodes for the reality show, (which this season will feature Cody Nickson and Jessica Graf of Big Brother fame) begin airing on Wednesday, January 3 at 8:00 p.m. Eastern. The show will air on Wednesdays throughout the winter, but will be pushed back to 9:00 p.m. Eastern following Big Brother: Celebrity Edition starting on February 7. (Read more about that show’s premiere over at the link here.)

It’s hard to have any complaints about this start time for The Amazing Race 30 given that the past few years have seen it buried on Friday nights and also put on Thursdays at 10:00 p.m. Eastern. This is a family show for the most part, one that benefits from airing at a family hour. Families are already used to watching Survivor in this timeslot, so why wouldn’t they also enjoy the opportunity to watch the race here?

One thing you should know is that The Amazing Race will be airing two-hour episodes on many dates — January 24, February 7, February 14, and for the finale on February 21. this will be the shortest amount of time ever that the show is on the air — that may be too much of a good thing for some, but we’ll easily take it over the Race getting saddled with some terrible timeslot.

Other scheduling odds and ends

Survivor season 36, which does not have an official title as of yet, will premiere on Wednesday, February 28 with a two-hour episode. Following that it will air per usual at 8:00 p.m. Eastern.

Meanwhile, new comedy Living Biblically is going to start airing on Monday, February 26 at 8:00 p.m. Eastern, while new drama Instinct is coming on Sunday, March 11 at 8:00 p.m., leading into NCIS: Los Angeles and Madam Secretary. We still don’t understand CBS not using NCIS: Los Angeles as a lead-in — this is the same dubious move that the network made with Wisdom of the Crowd, though to be fair,they made many other dubious moves along the way with that show.