University Challenge 2023 - First Round : LSE v. University College Oxford.

The Teams

London School of Economics

Dominic Ede

Laurent Balt

Ali Hassan (Capt.)

Hannah Brown

University College, Oxford

Alex Wallop

Leah Fogarty

Ansa Cunanan (Capt.)

Alice Chakraborty

Hello, dearly beloved. Well, what a difference a week makes, eh? Here at LAM I would like to extend our condolences to His Majesty and the whole of the Royal Family. Whether you’re a royalist, or whether you're not in favour of monarchy, I think everyone has to agree what an example of duty and steadfastness Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II set, and what love she had for her people. Rest in Peace, Your Majesty.

Let’s begin then.”You have been in Afghanistan, I perceive” was the giveaway for the first starter, being the first words of Holmes to Watson. Ali Hassan, the LSE skipper was happy to take that one. World’s tallest structures throughout history was what I’d like to think of as a good quizzer’s set – if you’re a regular quizzer you’ve heard all of them many times. LSE took two but talked themselves out of Lincoln Cathedral. For the next starter, when I heard the words ‘mnemonic’ and ‘May I. . . “ I slammed my metaphorical buzzer through my metaphorical table and shouted – Pi. Less wallop was used by Alex Wallop, but he still got it right. Yeah, I did consider a lap of honour but decided to take my chances that another would be along before the end of the show. Now, if I just used the words ‘ukuleles in cinema’ to describe the next set of bonuses, would you be as surprised as me that the names George and Formby never featured in any of the answers? You’re probably too young. UC took one bonus. As sometimes happens a relatively gentle sport question foxed both teams as neither knew that Phil Mickleson became the oldest person to win a golf major recently. Both teams sat on their buzzers a little with the next starter – asked which large island was home to various species, both waited until orangutan was mentioned, at which a buzzer race ensued, won by Ansa Cunanan. The Shrodinger equation (which is an equation and at the same time not an equation – see what I did there?) means nowt to me. However, UC had two of them right, and . . . I had one of them! Seriously. Whenever the question is – what is the value of . . . I always answer either zero or one. This time I zagged right with zero. Cue lap of honour around the Clark sofa. The picture starter was a fiendish idea – showing a map of a body of water, with the coastlines shown, but nothing else shown of the surrounding landmasses. I had not a scooby. Neither did the teams. The Oxford skipper was back in to give the name of Anne of Cleeves correctly for the next starter. For his pains this brought him the picture bonuses – more of these fiendish bodies of water. I was out with the washing until the last – the Persian Gulf. UC found the same. So, just short of the 10-minute mark UC had clearly had the better of the opening exchanges and led by fifty – twenty.

A buzzer race to identify the only constituency won by the Green Party in the last General Election saw Laurent Balt get his team as well, back into the game with Brighton Pavilion. The 17^th century brought just the one bonus – they might have had the Long Parliament as well, I thought. Nobody knew about magnesium chloride for the next starter. Ansa Cunanan recognised the definition of the term falsifiability. Good shout that. A grab bag of random questions about letters of the alphabet brought just a single bonus, although I nearly awarded myself a bonus for the periodic table question. Inertia won. I felt slightly better about never having heard of the game Wingspan for the next starter when neither of the teams knew it either. Again, neither team could work out that 8,700+ hours is the time taken by Earth to orbit the Sun. Now, I’ll be honest, I am not familiar with the work of US poet Amanda Gorman, the answer to the next starter. I’m a great fan of the work of Mr. Dave Gorman, but I don’t think he’s any relation. The UC skip again took the starter for his team and was really looking like the clear difference between these two teams. I’ll be honest, I didn’t know centaurs in astronomy – although in common with UC I did have the last of this set of bonuses. A fine buzz on the music starter from Alice Chakraborty identified the symphony we heard a wee bit of as the work of Gustav Mahler. More trombone solos saw me guess the first two, but not the last while UC didn’t get any of them. Again, both teams sat on the buzzers for the next starter. The moment you hear Islets of Langerhans you have to sling buzzer. Alex Wallop zigged with kidneys, so Hannah Brown picked that particular piece of low hanging fruit, knowing that these are situated in the pancreas. Descriptions of objects in paintings in the art institute in Chicago (where Andre Previn left his baton) saw LSE take 2 but they really should have had 3, had they just been able to remember the name Nighthawks. Now, I’m very sorry, but I shouted Xerophyte o the next starter while both teams were just shaking their heads – it’s basically a word taken from the Greek for dry – as is Xerox, interestingly. No, I’m too modest to have taken a second lap of honour, even if, in my heart of hearts, I rather felt I deserved it. The excellent Oxford skipper knew that if it mentions ‘Navarre’ chances are the Shakespeare play in question is ‘Love’s Labour’s Lost’ to take the next starter as stop the rot. Food and drink brought us both a pair of bonuses. A fine early buzz from Alex Wallop identified orange as a colour common to the flags of Armenia, Ivory Coast and Sri Lanka. Apparently, they wanted the new black. Maggie Hambling brought a full house, and a very healthy lead of 125 – 55 at just after the 20-minute mark.

Ansa Cunanan recognised two beardy 19^th century palaeontologists for the next picture starter. Now, as a kid I was crazy about dinosaurs – still quite interested now, ‘samatter of fact – so I was delighted to get a full house on the dinosaur skeletons that followed. Not exactly difficult, but you can only answer what’s asked. UC did too. For once Ansa Cunanan gave a wrong answer to a start allowing Laurent Balt to identify Gabon from a description of its neighbours. Place names beginning with Mon provided a timely couple of bonuses. I’ll be honest, I didn’t think Sun Protection Factor had much to do with computer science, but it was the best answer I had to what SPF stood for. To be fair neither team knew Shortest Path First – which I thought I invented when I used to go jogging in the mid 90s. Of course, the Oxford captain won the buzzer race – knowing patriotic tone poem + Sibelius = Finlandia. Novels of the 1980s and 90s saw them take just one. Surprised they missed out on the first line of the Crow Road, as that’s become a bit of a new quiz chestnut. I don’t pretend to understand the next starter, which was maths, but Dominic Ede had it. Wisteria brought a couple of bonuses. Just shy of 100 points, I thought that LSE were too far behind UC, but were not totally out of the running of a repechage score. It didn’t help when Ansa Cunanan, as he had done for much of this match, buzzed them out of it, correctly recognising biographers of Charlemagne. Fictional countries. It didn’t matter that they only picked up one of a distinctly gettable set of bonuses – they were already in the parc ferme. Still time remained for a final flourish by LSE – identifying Staten Island from a description. Just one bonus on Missionaries – careful – was less than they really needed. There was no time left for LSE to have a go at the next starter after UC lost five for an incorrect early buzz. Didn’t matter. They won comfortably by 175 – 110.

You’ve just gotta sling some buzzer to give yourself the chance to go through, folks. You can’t wait until you know that you know the answer, you have to buzz when you think you might know the answer. Hard lines to LSE – they’re in place on the repechage board – I can’t see them staying there, sorry. Well played UC. Some gaps in knowledge, and they were heavily reliant on their excellent captain who scored no fewer than 8 starters. They won though, and if you can keep doing that you’re going to do well.

Interesting Fact That I didn’t Already Know Of The Week

Magnesium chloride is an alternative to common salt in de-icing roads