University Challenge 2024: First Round - Balliol, Oxford v. Imperial

The Teams

Balliol, Oxford

Elise Cox

Oliver Ellingham

John Maier (Capt)

Nikita Trojanskis

Imperial

Justin Lee

Adam Jones

Suraiya Haddad (Capt)

Sourajit Debnath

Another Monday, another UC. For the first starter neither team could dredge up Starboy, an alter-ego of The Weeknd, a popular musical artiste of these strange times. Various people linked by the initials KC gave Imperial first blood through Adam Jones’ buzzer. Poems with questions for opening lines brought two correct answers for both of us. Justin Lee, who would have an excellent night on the buzzer, took his first starter knowing that Rosilia de Castro was a leading exponent of poetry in Galician. Connective tissue in human beings brought a single bonus. Me? Kleenex, every time, although other tissues are available. Balliol skipper John Maier came in too early for the next starter, allowing Justin Lee in with corals. Haitian film maker Raoul Peck brought two bonuses – Imperial could have had three apart from a slip of the tongue. We saw a quotation in its original language for the picture starter. I never studied German, but ‘Opium des volks’ screamed Karl Marx to me, so I screamed it at the telly. John Maier thought so too, and this earned Balliol their first set of bonuses. More quotes from political philosophers. We both got Cicero and Machiavelli, but missed out on Montesquieu. Not a sentence I think I’ve ever used before in any other context, that. Sourajit Debnath recognised various films whose titles contained the word Drive. Literary characters with names ending in - io brought a full house. Sadly Lurkio was not one of them. Oliver Ellingham knew that the only flower mentioned in my favourite Keats’ poem, Ode to Autumn, is the poppy. Events that only lasted 44 days – just like Liz Truss Premiership – made me certain Brian Clough at Leeds Utd. would come up. It did too, as the 3^rd question. Balliol had the other two. So as we reached the 10 minute mark the score stood at 30 – 80 to Imperial.

Nikita Trojanskis knew the answer to a Science question for which I certainly did not earn a lap of honour. Incidentally Nikita is from Riga, a really very lovely little capital city that I discovered for myself at Easter this year. Italian iced deserts – no, justonecornetto wasn’t one of them – brought a full house. Benin bronzes! I yelled in response to the next question, just before Justin Lee set Imperial moving again with the same answer. (Sorry, but as much as I love the British Museum, which I will always applaud for never charging entry during the Thatcher years, I’m very much a give-them-backer.) Later additions to classical works of sculpture followed. Then came the music starter. Adam Jones was first in to recognise the work of Rachmaninoff. Bonuses consisted of three pieces composed in or  around 1853, the year of Sergei R’s birth brought a relatively rare full house. Amol was impressed. A really simple WWI question led to a buzzer race that Justin Lee won to identify Serbia as the recipient of the ultimatum that led to the outbreak of war. History bonuses, on short words with U in the middle were a gentle set that quite rightly yielded another full house. Adam Jones had a rush of blood to the head and came in far too early on the astronomy starter that followed, losing five points for his pains. Given a full run up Oliver Ellingham gratefully snapped up that particular trifle knowing a list of names and characters from Tolkien. That’s what I’m Tolkien about. Measurement scales brought me a lap of honour. Let me tell you, I’m all over the 1954 Nobel Prize won by Linus Pauling. Then – Gawd Blimey – I got one that Balliol didn’t. What do you have to add to Kelvin to convert it centigrade? Well, come on. Kelvin starts at absolute zero, so it’s got to be 273 to the nearest whole number, hasn’t it? Well, yes, it had. Then the last bleedin’ question of the set started talking about logarithms and deltas and bravos, and the internal orchestra struck up with the Baby Elephant Walk. I think that all you had to do was work out that Db stood for decibel, but I’d switched off by then. There was a bit of a long preamble to the next question, but as soon as Ford Maddox Brown (which incidentally was the only shade that the very first Model T’s were available in. Nah – it was actually Brewster Green. ‘So long as it’s black’ came a little later.)As soon as Ford Maddox Brown was mentioned Adam Jones won the buzzer race with perennial UC favourites The Pre-Raphaelites. Questions on Cameroon brought two more correct answers, and that Imperial juggernaut was steaming on towards the event horizon. It was Adam Jones who also knew the good old quiz chestnut that URL stands for Uniform Resource Locator. I was amused by the next set on people who share their names with currencies. Sadly the Russian Music Hall duo of Rouble and Kopek did not get a namecheck. Adam Jones took his hattrick recognising a description of the term hermeneutics – gesundheit. Fictional characters who share initials with their creators brought a full house in double quick time. As we passed the twenty-minute mark Imperial marched on with a lead of 21 – 75.

In simple terms, Imperial had probably won. But could Balliol reach the 155 target for any hope of a repechage slot? Amol, to be fair, had not used the magic words on them yet. So to the picture starter, and obviously the work of Egon Schiele. Suraiya Haddad had that one to add to Balliol’s woes. More paintings of artist’s families brought just one correct answer, but the answers they offered for the other two were sensible. BAM! “Plenty of time available’ offered Amol. Allowing for the forgiveable inaccuracy of the statement, he was leaving it late this week. It didn’t seem to slow Imperial this time. Justin Lee knew that Geoffrey of Monmouth thought that Britain was named after Brutus from the Popeye comic strip in TV comic. A full house on Irish history raised the distinct possibility that Imperial might just reach 300. However John Maier knew that merry, cheerful and lively are all ways of describing the musical instruction allegro. My uncle had an Allegro, and it was not cheerful, not merry and not in the least bit lively. When it actually worked, that is. Bonuses on town planning yielded just one correct answer. Justin Lee knew his onions about Quiche Alsace for the next starter. Particle accelerator bonuses did nothing for any of us. Oliver Ellingham picked out the word monsoon for the next starter. The Deadly Viper Assassination Squad of the Kill Bill movies brought us both two bonuses. Balliol were now in triple figures, but some way below the board. Oliver Ellingham knew the Christie novel The ABC Murders for the next starter. Two bonuses were taken on concerts. A full set would put Balliol onto 155 now. Sadly John Maier interrupted incorrectly on the next starter and lost five, allowing Justin Lee to identify John Roberts as the US Chief Justice. A great UC set on giga timescales yielded one bonus – the Cretaceous period was a whole gigamonth ago. John Maier wasn’t finished though. He buzzed early and buzzed well to identify Yves ‘Who?’ Klein. Languages that feature in the national anthem of South Africa brought no points. But Oliver Ellingham knew the next starter, putting vectors with scalars. Oh, but that naughty gong ended the competition, leaving Imperial with 285 to Balliol’s 145.

That was a good match, wasn’t it? Imperial impressed with strong buzzing and a bonus conversion rate of 71 percent, to Balliol’s 66 percent. Sadly, Balliol won’t be back this year, but have nothing to be ashamed of.

How is Amol Doing?

I think that Amol must have realised that people (me) are starting to suss out his status as an undercover Jedi, because he seemed to keep his powers more under wraps in this match. He left it very late to encourage Balliol. I thought that Amol’s correction of the pronunciation of Laocoon was a little unnecessary. Likewise, I think that commenting ‘Got there in the end, didn’t we’ was just a little condescending for the Tolkien question.

Interesting Fact That I didn’t Already Know of the Week

The hills and mountains on Saturn’s moon Titan have ames taken from the works of JRR Tolkein (although not from Fly Fishing.)

Baby Elephant Walk Moments

A new category for questions that set my mind wandering.

This little beauty I had to watch several times before I could even get to the end of it.

“He described his eponymous thermodynamic potential as “the greatest amount of mechanical work from a given quantity of a certain substance in a given initial state without increasing its total volume or allowing heat to pass to or from external bodies.” Dum de dumdum dumdum dumdum dum dum.