University Challenge 2025 - Round 1 - Imperial v. Manchester

Before we get started on last night’s UC, if you haven’t see the latest Only Connect can I say that you might like to do so. The two teams, The Bloomsbury Group, and the Tea Totallers put on a contest that was frankly better than some Grand Finals. Hardly surprising considering the amount of quiz talent across the two teams. After a dazzling display of brilliance from both teams, the Bloomsbury Group won. But I reckon both teams are going to go far this year. Fatima Sheriff, the winning captain, was part of the Imperial team that won UC in 2022, ironically beating her team mate Michael Hutchinson’s Reading team in the Final. Has anyone yet won both UC and Only Connect? Answers on a postcard, please.

The UC review may now begin.

The Teams

Imperial

Charlotte Stokes

Mattia Elkouby

Matthew Spry (Captain)

Jaime Salamanca Camacho

Manchester

Adam Dodd

Millie Sutherland

Joel Crossley (Captain)

Nathan Easow

It was a battle of the multi champs last night on UC. Imperial (five times winners, three times in the last five years) and Manchester (four times winners between 2008 and 2013). That’s some serious previous form.

Millie Sutherland came in too quickly on the first starter. She was unlucky for if she’d been a second later she would have heard nine-banded, which gave me and Matthew Spry the answer that the creatures in question were armadillos. Thalassocracies – altogether now, gesundheit! – brought a full set of bonuses in fairly short order. I thought that both teams sat on their buzzers a bit with the next starter. Asked for a pair of roman deities appearing in a set of paintings , Venus and Mars is always likely to be a good shout. That provided Jaime Salamanca Camacho with his first starter of the night. Mythological firsts brought a second consecutive full house. Matthew Spry lived a little dangerously by pausing almost too long before giving the correct answer of Henry Kissinger (how we’re missing ‘yer) for the next starter. I am not familiar with the Baillie Gifford Winner of Winners Prize, but I took a full house, while Imperial missed out on the last through not listening carefully enough to the question. Nonetheless it had been a great start for them. Likewise, Mattia Elkouby missed out on a correct answer to the picture starter. We saw a map with a location highlighted, and a blank periodic table with the space for one element highlighted. The name of the element was taken from the location. Mr. Elkouby gave us the location, Stockholm but we wanted the element – Holmium. Hard lines. This enabled Nathan Easow to lift Manchester out of negative equity with Therevada. The picture bonuses on more elements and locations brought us both a full house which I celebrated with a lap of honour around the Clark sofa. I didn’t have a scooby about the chemistry starter that followed but Mattia Elkouby knew it was chromatography. Two bonuses on the circulatory system ( which for some reason made me think of Hanger Lane) meant that the score at the ten minute mark stood at 90 – 15 to Imperial.

Did you know that Gjirokaster is in Albania? Matthew Spry did. Large dams did nothing to stem the flood of points for Imperial and they added another full house. Despite Amol’s encouragement for Manchester it was Jaime Salamanca Camacho who took the next starter on swans. Celebrations depicted in opening scenes of Daniel Craig Bond films sadly did not include the Hanwell Carnival, but then that might have prevented Imperial from taking the full house that they did take. And the agony continued for Manchester as Mattia Elkouby buzzed in with valence for the next starter. The end of history – which we all know is y – saw Imperial falter a little as they scored just the one bonus. Didn’t matter. They were closer to 200 than 100 already. It’s been a while since we had a jazz starter and Jaime Salamanca Camacho came in very early to identify Rhapsody in Blue. I loved the story which followed about how Gerschwin, thinking he’d refused to compose the piece, had to compose it in a hurry when he read about where and when the premiere was being held. More musical rush jobs took Imperial to one full set away from 200.Jaime Salamanca Camacho knew about the mathematician Bernhard Riemann for the next starter. Observatories brought me a second science based full house of the night, and took Imperial to a score of 200. The next starter became a frantic buzzer race when the title “Leaves of Grass” was spoken, and Nathan Easow showed a clean pair of heels as he won to answer Walt Whitman. Bouses on Art brought two correct answers. Captain Joel Crossley built on the good work by knowing that Matadi is a port in Congo. Personally I still think you ought to distinguish between the Republic of Congo and the Democratic Republic of Congo in your answer, but there we are. Writers whose names are anagrams of constellations – Hardy and Hydra eg – brought two more correct answers. Sadly Joel Crossley pushed his luck a little too far and only gave half the answer to the next starter after buzzing early, allowing Matthew Spry in with Sun and Son. Two bonuses on decimalisation meant that by the twenty minute mark Imperial were home and dry with 220, while Manchester were some way short of a repechage score with fifty.

They didn’t get any closer with the second picture starter which showed pictures of Mary Shelley and her ole mum Mary Wollstonecraft. Jaime Salamanca Camacho added that one to his starter collection. More family pictures brought two bonuses. James Crossley beat Imperial with diffraction for the next starter. The heritage orchestra supplied a bonus. The deliberately excruciating rhyme alluded to in the next starter pointed to Byron’s Don Juan, and Mattia Elkouby took it. The enzyme amylase, always such a popular topic of conversation around the dinner table, brought two bonuses. Could Imperial break 300? Well Matthew Spry’s answer of the human development index HDI for the next starter would help. A full house on people born in 1923 pushed them to the brink. Matthew Spry raced in to answer that Brisbane is set to host the 2032 Summer Olympics. Incidentally I think that will make Australia the first country to host Summer Olympics in three different cities (and none of them is the capital city!). You can have that one for free. One bonus would have been enough to put Imperial on 300, but Emily Dickinson failed them on this score. Look , don’t ask me about Qubits. It was the correct answer that Jaime Salamanca Camacho gave to the next starter which brought up Imperial’s triple century. Wartime Cabinet Ministers yielded one bonus. Didn’t matter now. Imperial were over 300 and Manchester weren’t going to get a repechage score. Joel Crossley knew a series of events occurring in years ending in 89, but they didn’t get the one bonus on a French river before the gong sounded. Imperial 310, Manchester 75.

Manchester were living off famine rations from their buzzers, but managed a good BCR of 62 on the bonuses they did earn. Imperial had a BCR of 71. A great score, and a great performance. As impressive as the BCR they scored was the fact that Mattia Elkouby, Jaime Salamanca Camacho and Matthew Spry each took multiple starters – with the two latter taking 6 each.

Amol Watch

Fair play to Amol, he usually makes a telling off still seem friendly, as seen when he warned Matthew Spry about hesitating on a starter. With Jeremy Paxman you always felt he wanted to say – don’t do it again or I’ll smash yer face in.

Amol’s encouragements have been more timely this series than they seemed to be last year, but it can’t have been much consolation to Manchester when he felt moved to issue his first before 11 minutes were on the clock. A few minutes later he reiterated his encouragement, this time with rather more urgency.

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

The official terminology for rule by Maritime Empire is Thalassocracy.

Baby Elephant Walk Moment

In analytical chemistry a compound’s RF value or retention factor can be used to identify components of a mixture in what class (here there was an incorrect interruption) of analytical techniques based on a compound’s interactions with stationary and mobile phases? Dum de dumdum dum dum dum dum dumdum.