The Amazing Race Part Two, held at the annual Conversations Europe speech conference, is a continuation of the first Amazing Race that pit Nuance® Mobile Messaging against the Guinness Book of World Records’ fastest 'triple tap' text messager Ben Cook. This time, we took the challenge to another level!

In the first round, Eli Tirosh, the recently crowned West Coast Champion of a national texting championship, challenged Nuance Mobile Messaging and lost each of the two rounds soundly. Unlike Ben Cook, Eli used a mobile phone with a full qwerty-keyboard to compete against Nuance's speech recognition technology that allows mobile phone users to create and send text messages simply by dictating a message. Contestants were scored based on the time required to complete the entry of the exact text message, including appropriate spelling, punctuation and capitalization. Click here for the final scores.

In the second match-up of man vs. machine, one of Britain’s top racing drivers, Perry McCarthy, also known as “The Stig” from BBC’s Top Gear (the original secret racing driver in black), took his chances against speech recognition. Perry was first asked to open an incoming text message and read it aloud. He was then asked to download a song from his iPod music player, all while driving a simulated racing game. Perry's objective was to drive safely and keep his eyes on the road throughout the process. He crashed 27 times while trying to navigate the course and his devices at the same time! In contrast, the driver using Nuance's SMS reader technology had his incoming text automatically read aloud to him, enabling him to stay focused on the game and his driving without taking his hands off the wheel or eyes off the road. Similarly, when it came time to download a song from his MP3-enabled phone, the driver using Nuance's speech-enabled MP3 capabilities was able to simply speak the name of the song into his device, which automatically retrieved and played the song. Speed was not the critical measurement in this 'eyes-free driving' competition, but rather minimizing distractions and ensuring safety by allowing the “driver” to keep his hands on the wheel and eyes on the road.

Round 1: Eli Tirosh

Message 1: “Just last week, there was a text messaging competition in New York City. Today, the west coast champion is racing against speech technology. Who will win? :-)”

Eli Tirosh:	50.17 seconds
Nuance Mobile Messaging:	21.83 seconds

Message 2: “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious – How many of you out in the audience even know how to spell that word?”

Eli Tirosh:	24.00 seconds
Nuance Mobile Messaging:	13.49 seconds

Round 2: Perry McCarthy

Each driver received a text message with instructions to access and play a specific song. Drivers received their assignments using a Nokia 5500, one with, and one without, speech applications installed. While Perry needed to take his eyes off the road to read the incoming text message, the driver with Nuance® speech solutions on his phone continued to drive safely on the course while the incoming message was read aloud to him. Perry was then forced to navigate his iPod manually to find and play the requested song, while the Nuance driver was able to simply say the name of the song he needed to play. Due to the number of times he was forced to take his eyes and hands away from the simulated driving environment, McCarthy crashed 27 times, while the Nuance driver finished the course without any mishaps.

Perry McCarthy:	27 crashes
Nuance driver:	0 crashes