Wednesday 31 August 2016

Catching Up: Mastermind Heat 6


Episode 6

Way back in the mists of time I took part in my first ever Mastermind show, in the 2006 series. Tak about a baptism of fire. The first contender, Kath Drury, scored 17. The second, my mate Neil “Legend” Phillips scored 17. I felt like I was looking down the barrel of a gun. Neil was answering on REM, which was the subject offered by the first contender in this heat, Helen Lippell. I dare say that even allowing for the lower potential scores in the last few series of Mastermind, her 13 wasn’t quite as good as Neil’s. It wasn’t bad, though, and certainly looked likely to give her a chance at the halfway stage.

Richard Gill didn’t quite convince me with his round on the presidency of Harry S. Truman. Oh, don’t get me wrong, in the current series 11 on SS is perfectly respectable, but as a platform for a serious attempt at either a win or a repechage slot it left him with a lot to do.

Now, if you’re going to do a subject where the team allow you to limit the range of your subject, you better be prepared for some pretty obscure questions. Mind you, back in that same show from 2006, I took the Modern Sumer Olympic Games, and I didn’t limit the range, yet I still got asked some pretty obscure stuff, let me tell you. Ironically we both scored 14 – although in the context of the show James Haughton’s 14 today is probably worth about 16 in my day. With a score in the teens on GK he should at least give himself a good chance of a repechage slot, I reckoned.

Daniel Adler is a) a Counterpoint Champion, b) a finalist in Clive’s 2014 series, and c) a good friend of LAM. All of which meant that he was labouring under the twin burdens of being the clear favourite for this heat and support from the Clark sofa. He was answering on Borgen, which is a Scandinavian TV series apparently. Being that my acquaintance with Scandiwegian TV starts and ends with the Swedish Chef on the Muppet Show, you’ll appreciate that this was not a high scoring round for Dave. It was for Daniel, though. 16 is about as good as you can get on a two minute SS in the current show. Suddenly all the others were playing for a repechage slot.

To be fair they gave it a good old lash, too. Richard Gill’s 15 was such a good performance that I felt sorry for him that he hadn’t managed a couple of more points in his specialist. 15 was very good, 26, though, was never going to win this heat, and to be honest there was no guarantee it would even come second. It was good enough to help him leapfrog over Helen Lippell. I feel a little sorry for Helen Lippell. 25 is a quality score, and yet she ended in 4th place. I haven’t checked, but I wouldn’t mind betting that this is the highest 4th place score in the series so far, and may well stay that way.

There’s not a great amount of tactical thinking in Mastermind – whether you think you have a realistic chance of a win, or whether you think your best chance relies on getting a high enough score for a repechage slot, both of them involve scoring as many points as you can and not incurring more passes than you can help. James didn’t look as if he was scoring as well as Richard had, but then he’d scored more in Specialist. In the end he made it into the teens, to post 27. For an old hand like Daniel that won’t have represented a particularly daunting target, but sometimes funny things can happen in a GK round.

They didn’t in this one, though. Daniel missed a couple he might have had if everything had gone absolutely perfectly, but even allowing for that his 15 put him way ahead, and he finished with a total of 31. I dare say that will remain as one of the highest scores we’re going to see in the whole of the first round, and by any standards it was an impressive performance. There’s still a long way to go to another final, but it was certainly an impressive day at the office, Mr. Adler. Very well played.

The Details

Helen Lippell
REM
13
0
12
6
25
6
Richard Gill
The Presidency of Harry S. Truman
11
0
15
2
26
2
James Haughton
History of the World Cup 1982 - date
14
0
13
0
27
0
Daniel Adler
Borgen
16
0
15
0
31
0

2 comments:

Dan said...

I should mention that my nerves were fairly shredded before we started the recording. I made it to the studio with about ten minutes to spare, having been asked to stand in for a cancellation around 9:30 that morning (and 200 miles away). Helen (formerly of the Felinophiles on OC) didn't help with a pretty good Specialist Subject score to kick off, a score I'd never got anywhere near on my previous attempts. A most uncomfortable few minutes while the others had their turn, I can tell you.

Did anyone spot Rachel Neimann in the audience? I've almost forgiven her for getting to Cabin Pressure as a subject first. Almost. And Ted Robbins is back too following his illness, which is nice.

Incidentally, the programme was one of the Guardian's TV Picks Of The Day, where there were musings on whether they'd be a question on Harry Truman's middle name (Humphrys and Richard chatted about it after the round), and a suggestion that my questions should be in Danish. Which would have been fine, if I'd had subtitles.

Semis are next week. I've had a few hints about the repechage places, but we'll see.

Paul Gilbert said...

25 is not the highest 4th-place score in this series - that honour goes to Ian Dunn's 26 in Heat 1. 26 seems to be the Humphrys-era record 4th-place score (excluding finals where there are 6 contestants) - Paul Norwood also managed it in 2010.