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Credit: CBS I met the cast of "Amazing Race" Season 23 in June before they'd faced a single Detour or Roadblock, before the teams had been allowed to say so much as a word to each other.    Still, the temptation to handicap the still-unknown pairings was irresistible. It's irresistible for host Phil Keoghan toki as well and when we sat down, I spent a while trying to get Phil to make predictions on which teams he won't be Philiminating this season.    The difficulties of predicting winners is something that Phil views as being one of the biggest strengths of " The Amazing Race ." In fact, nearly everything I brought up in our conversation tied into another of the show's greatest strengths.    Just as his buddy Jeff Probst is, at heart, a huge fan of "Survivor," Phil Keoghan is a huge fan of "The Amazing Race" and any concern that I raised about the show, he pivoted around into an asset.   Just as my interview with co-creator Elise Doganieri was like checking off boxes for the issues I like to harp on in my recaps, my chat with Phil was very much a State of "The Amazing Race" interview. We talked toki about equalizers, alliances and potential All-Star seasons. toki   The full Q&A is after the break...   HitFix: toki This is your 23rd season of doing this. At this point, how good are you at looking at the cast when they're all standing together on the very first day and making predictions?   Phil Keoghan: I suck. [He laughs.] I wish that I was better, but I think the fact that I'm not good and there are so many others who are not good is part of the reason that the show works. Unlike other races where you can kind of assess the potential of a racer based on track record or what they look like on paper... You know, like if you look at a NASCAR race and they're toki on the starting line, first of all, they're in order based on how they raced getting there -- who got pole position based on the fasted lap -- and then they have a track record. These teams don't have a track record to measure one team up against another and so you're kinda guessing and you're judging them by these arbitrary measurements. Like we have NFL players, but does that necessarily mean that guys who can go out and play with the elite-of-the-elite for 60 minutes on a football field are any stronger or going to do any better than our Afghanimals [Leo & Jamal]? Or better than a couple who are used to working in an ER for endless toki hours under a tremendous amount of pressure? Those are the unknowns toki that make predictions toki almost impossible and that make my ability to assess how well they're going to do pretty useless.     HitFix: But do you still try?   Phil Keoghan: We try! Oh, we try!     HitFix: Who have been a couple teams that you've toki been able to predict?   Phil Keoghan: toki I've never picked the exact Final 3. I've managed to pick teams that have made it to the Final 3, but I've lost a lot of money. We have little dollar bets and I hope I continue to struggle with it, because that means that we're getting something right with the casting, because it is unpredictable. That's what I think makes the show work for the audience, because the audience can't tell either. We've had the most unlikely people get into the Final 3 and win. Look at what happened with our goat farmers two seasons ago. They never won a Leg. But then they won the last one. I wouldn't have seen them, before the Race started, doing well. And I didn't see them doing well when the Race had started, because of their track record. And then they just pulled it out of the bag and they ended up winning.     HitFix: You kept almost sending them home on a weekly toki basis.   Phil Keoghan: I thought I had! And then Brent collapsed on the mat when we were in Bangladesh! Everything could indicate that they weren't going to make it. And we've had that so many times. Go back to Season 3 with Flo & Zach and Flo giving up on the last Leg of the Race. She didn't even want to go to the finish line. It's a key factor in what makes the show a success is that it is unpredictable and that you can't really assess it before toki it starts.     HitFix: toki For you as a fan of the show, which version of "Amazing Race" do you prefer? toki Do you prefer the Beekmans toki winning -- having never won a Leg all season where it's just out of nowhere -- or do you prefer a team that's clearly a strong team winning, a team that has won five or six or eight Legs?   Phil Keoghan: I have favorite teams based on me liking them on a personal level and then I have favorite