University Challenge - Quarter Final Edinburgh v. Emmanuel

The Teams

Edinburgh

Ben Russell Jones

Lewis Thomas

Rishi Sundar (Capt)

Al Karunaratne

Emmanuel, Cambridge

Nicole Pullinger

Nicholas Thatte

Cara Malcolm (Capt)

James Wrathall

I will try to be a little more prompt next week. For one thing, I’m running out of excuses.  A glance at the form book shows that following a narrow defeat in the first round, Emmanuel have been ging well, beating St. John’s in their first quarter final. By contrast Edinburgh were undefeated going into this contest, having defeated Trinity in their first quarter final. So who would march on into the semis, and who would be consigned to quaffing in the last chance saloon?

A superfast buzz from captain Rishi Sundar identifying clues pointing towards bow and arrow launched Edinburgh. Opening lines of early 20^th century novels yielded two correct answers. Ben Russell Jones came in too early for the next starter, losing 5, allowing Nicholas Thatte to give the correct answer of the letter s. I expect that something also beginning with the letter s might have crossed Ben Russell Jones’ mind at this moment, but I digress. Plants from the ever popular “Poisoning for Beginners” brought one bonus. Nobody knew that General order 100, which led to the Lieber Code of conduct in war which was heavily influential on the Hague convention was issued in the American Civil War. I thought that the next starter was a quote that sounded like Darwin. Close but no cigar – as Lewis Thomas pointed out it was from Alfred Russell Wallace. Pairs of words in which you obtain the second by adding an extra R to the first brought two correct answers. Ben Russell Jones from Bridgend quite rightly knew that the Red Lady of Paviland was discovered on the Gower – a little more than half an hour west of his hometown. Ida B. Wells brought a timely full house. For the picture starter we saw a sentence, in French, offering the definition of an English word used in French as a loan word. My schoolboy French supplied he answer of un sandwich, while James Wrathall accepted the challenge from JP and pronounced it in a French accent. We both scored two out of three bonuses on this. It was a timely score for Emmanuel, since Edinburgh had seemed to be getting up a head of steam. As it was, at just after the 10 minute mark Edinburgh led by 60 - 35.

Al Karunaratne was just a little too quick on the buzzer for the next starter, and had the mortifying experience of hearing the answer he was going to give become part of the question. I didn’t understand the question, but Nicholas Thatte, somewhat disbelievingly, gave the correct answer of the electric motor. Terms containing three consecutive examples of the same letter brought Emmanuel a full house, and the lead. For the next starter it was Edinburgh skipper Rishi Sunar who lost 5 by coming in too early. Emmanuel were unlucky not to capitalise, having said “Mary Queen of Scots”. Right person, but not the right title of the play in question, that being “Mary Stuart”. Nicholas Thatte knew that if it’s an annelid used in medical therapy, it has to be leeches. British Overseas Territories yielded just the one bonus. For the next starter, Ben Russell Jones timed his buzz to perfection, waiting until the last detail in the question made it obvious the answer was Claude Lorrain. Bonuses on the novel “Hyperion” brought a single bonus. The music starter saw none of us recognise the work of Bellini. Cara Malcolm knew that Killarney National Park is situated in County Kerry. This earned the music bonuses, each of which had a connection to the moon. These did none of us any good. Nobody knew that Elizabeth Acevedo was the first writer of colour to win the Carnegie Medal. Nicholas Thatte was first in to recognise a mathematical formula of an ellipse. Architecture, and the temporary galleries of the Serpentine Gallery, brought two bonuses. This all meant that, right on the cusp of the 20 minute mark, Emmanuel had now crossed the psychologically important triple figure threshold and led by 110 – 65.

 This lead stretched further as James Wrathall identified that two given cities preceded Bangkok. Partnerships between film editors and directors brought just the one bonus, but with the lead stretching it was starting to look like crunch time for Edinburgh. Rishi Sundar won the buzzer race to identify Puck as the source of the quote ‘Lord, what fools these mortals be’. A full house would have been useful, but they only managed one bonus on locations of towns in Roman Britain. For the second picture starter we saw a painting I’ve always loved by Joseph Wright of Derby – the Astronomy Lecture. Ben Russell Jones had that one. More paintings of astronomers at work yielded two bonuses, and took Edinburgh to a triple figure score. Lewis Thomas buzzed in first to give the correct answer of poultice to the next starter. Matrices, the subject of the bonus set, did nowt for me, but Edinburgh took two, and were now a mere 5 behind. Lewis Thomas took his second consecutive starter, and the lead, knowing the Franz Joseph archipelago. A full house on flags stretched the lead to 20 points, ad little time remained. Ben Russell Jones probably knew the correct answer to the next question – the Torah – but it came out Talmud, and he lost 5. Nicholas Thatte, a superb snapper up of such unconsidered trifles, supplied the correct answer. Bonuses on geometrical wedges brought the two bonuses needed for Emmanuel to take back the lead. It looked as if the next correct answer would win. And that answer was supplied by Ben Russell Jones, who must have worried that he had blown his team’s chance with the previous misfire. After JP confirmed that his answer of mathematician Peano was correct, his joy was unconfined, and rightly so since the contest was gonged before the first starter was finished. Edinburgh had just squeaked the win by 150 to 145.

Great match, all of you, and many congratulations to Edinburgh. As for Emmanuel, they know how to battle it out, and they’re still in the contest.

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

Hirudotherapy is a term used for the use of leeches in medical treatment.

Mastermind 2022 First Round Heat 24

Good morning dearly beloved. No, I’m afraid that I don’t know any details about what caused one of last night’s contenders to withdraw. Look, what with covid, this is the world we live in at the moment, I guess. It isn’t the first time that only 3 contenders have taken part, as far as I know. I think that Magnus mentioned in “I’ve Started So I’ll Finish” that the first final was between three contenders – however I could have that wrong. Let’s concentrate on the three contenders that we did have.

Graeme Jackson was answering on Grace Kelly, the answer to the question - which Hollywood film star had an Olympic Gold Medallist father, won a Best Actress Oscar, and went on to become European royalty? Graeme Jackson impressed with his round, snapping answers out quickly and economically, missing but little. I surprised myself managing to get a couple right to start me on the way. Ironically, considering that there were only 3 specialist rounds last night, it was one of my better performances, since I managed to get into double figures.

Four of these points came from Jill Leatherbarrow’s round on Ellis Peter’s Brother Cadfael novels. It was a long time ago, a good 2 years at least, that I read a lot of our local library’s stock of the novels, but I did take a couple of obvious points – Shrewsbury and St. Winifred’s – and a couple of details I remembered from other books. Jill did well, just missing out on double figures, but it was clear that she knew her stuff. Off the top of my head I don’t know how many Cadfael novels there are, but I know enough about some of them to vouch that Jill’s knowledge of them is pretty comprehensive.

The last contender of the first round heats to take the seat for his specialist was David Preece. Now, I have to confess that anything regarding the Beatles usually has me licking my lips and murmuring – fill yer boots ‘ere, son - . As such I’d say that my 5 points was decent, although missing out on Brian Jones was frustrating. Never mind, David doubled my score. 10 points, as I so often say, is a good score in the current era of the show. It meant that there was daylight between him and leader Graeme, but not so much that he faced an impossible task in the GK.

Jill returned to the chair first for the GK round. She was not going at all badly, either, but for the last half minute she was just unable to find any more correct answers which left her becalmed on a respectable 16.

David’s job was clear. Going by what we’ve seen in the majority of the shows, he was going to need a score of at least 20, which meant he needed a double figure score on GK to really give himself a chance. He got it too, just, squeezing in some French cheeses as the white line of death snaked its way around the score. To put this into perspective, it meant that Graeme Jackson would need a score of 9 to get an outright win. That’s not a massive target, but on the other hand, it isn’t a negligible score either.

As the round progressed, Graeme was missing a few he might possibly have got in a less pressurized situation. However, crucially he was just keeping his nose ahead on the clock. He gave his 8^th correct answer to equal David’s score, and then his 9^th to give him the win. That was as far as he went, though anything else is just gilding. He became the 2th qualifier out of 24 for the semis. Well done, sir, and I wish you good luck in the semi finals.

Now, I asked myself, how are they going to fill in time until the end of the show? They did it by putting up the faces of the 24 semi finalists in groups of 4 and showing the piece to camera that one of each group did after winning their heat. It’s always nice to see contenders talk about the standard of quizzers who have won a series, so I didn’t mind this bit at all.

So that’s the first round done, dearly beloved, and we’ve already seen this year’s winner. As to who that will be, or at least, the contenders most likely to get to the final, well, I would d a preview, but I’m off on a sketching trip to Warsaw a little later today, so I think I might leave that for a few days.

The Details

Graeme Jackson	Grace Kelly	12	0	9	2	21	2
Jill Leatherbarrow	The Brother Cadfael Novels	9	1	7	1	16	2
David Preece	The Beatles Recording Sessions	10	0	10	2	20	2

University Challenge Quarter Final - Reading v. Imperial

The Teams

Reading

Sylvain Jesudoss

Margaret Ounsley

Michael Hutchinson (capt.)

Kira Bishop

Imperial

Max Zeng

Fatima Sheriff

Michael Mays (capt.)

Gilbert Jackson

Well, here we are again, dearly beloved. I’m so sorry that it has taken me so long to post this. It was a busy week, and then I’ve been preparing for a trip to Warsaw next week – my first European sketching trip for 2 years. No excuse really. Still, shall we have a look at the form book? In heir first quarter Reading won a tough match against Birmingham 170 – 13, while Imperial thrashed Kings in their first quarter. I know many who fancy Imperial as favourites to take the title. Well, I’m not so mean that I’m going to scupper anyone’s chances by tipping them to win.

It didn’t appear as if Reading had heard that Imperial were favourites as Margaret Ounsley recognised several uses of the word gross for the first starter. Etymologically unrelated words beginning with the same first three letters were a UC special set of the sort where you should expect to get a full house, and Reading were happy to oblige on this score. I didn’t know that the Dunlap Broadsides were printed copies of the American Declaration of Independence but Michael Hutchinson did, and what’s more, he did so early. Reading took two bonuses on my favourite 19^th century novel, Vanity Fair. -Right- thought Imperial – that’s enough of that – and Gilbert Jackson buzzed in to identify the description of the moon Europa. I thought Platonic solids are what you feed babes if you want them to grow up to be philosophers, but no, it’s something to do with Geometry apparently. I didn’t get any of the bonuses on them, but then neither did Imperial, so fair’s fair. When the picture round showed us the coat of arms of a European country’s navy I though – here comes Geographer extraordinaire Max Zeng. He did too, and correctly identified Italy. Surprisingly Imperial only took two bonuses on quarters of the shield and the maritime republics they symbolised. Margaret Ounsley knew that the cap or helmet of Hades confers invisibility upon the wearer for the next starter. Bonuses on opera yielded us both a single bonus. Nobody worked out that the three letters which stand for numerical values which appear consecutively on a qwerty keyboard (X – C – V ) spell out the number 95. We were right on the cusp of the 10 minute mark, and Reading had a lead of 60 – 30.

The lead increased as Michael Hutchinson was first to buzz in to recognise Madagascar as a producer of vanilla and other specified commodities. Diane Fossey – who was apparently not the choreographer of Cabaret – brought us both a full house of bonuses. At this point the Imperial skipper found his buzzer range and won the race to identify some of the illegitimate kids of Charles II. The Maths and Physics bonuses that followed did no good for any of us. The Italian artistic term ciaroscura suggested to me that Sciagraphy is the study of the projection of shadows. Neither team got that.The Whiteboy Shuffle and the Sellout are works by Paul Beatty (I’m afraid Paul Who? in LAM Towers), which Fatima Sheriff well knew to take the next starter. So called coloured cities of Rajasthan followed and we both took two correct answers for Jaipur and Jodhpur. Gawd knows what meiosis is all about, but Max Zeng correctly supplied it as the answer to the next starter. So all four of the Imperial team had correctly answered starters now, and you sensed that the Imperial Juggernaut was really starting to work up a head of steam. (I love a mixed metaphor. That’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it.) This impression seemed to be confirmed when Imperial took a full house on bonuses of shared papal names which gave them the lead for the first time. Gilbert Jackson was in early to identify the work of Saint-Saens. Works by other composers parodied in said Carnival  brought another full house. 5 minutes earlier you’d have put good money on Reading being the first of the two teams to break through the 100 barrier, yet Imperial had done it, while Reading still languished on 80.Which European country – began JP and I thought – Max Zeng’s in here. Mind you so was I , knowing that Poland was partitioned more than once in the 19^th century. Going there on Tuesday. Faked correspondence brought two more correct answers. Incidentally this meant that Imperial had achieved the relatively rare feat of scoring 100 points during the course of which their opponents scored 0. Mind you, they lost  of them when Michael Mays came in too soon for the next starter. I bet that Reading understood the question better than I did, but neither of us came up with the answer – linear momentum. Undeterred by the previous starter Michael Mays was in very quickly to identify the word patina. Wasn’t she Troy Tempest’s girlfriend – aqua Patina? Two word terms of which the first word is new brought another two correct answers. All of which meant that Imperial led by 145 – 80, and it seemed as if the semi final beckoned for them.

It seemed even more so when Max Zeng identified a treaty between Russian and Chinese empires. Anagrams of transuranic elements looked to be an easy set, and I told myself I could only have a lap of honour if I had a full house. I did too, and so did Imperial, although to be fair they didn’t get up and run around their chairs like I did, so I think that’s a moral victory for me. At last Michael Hutchinson managed to buzz his way back by identifying a photograph of Nina Simone for the second picture starter. Other performers featured in the 2021 Documentary Summer of Soul brought two bonuses – one of whom I once met in Athens airport – BB King (long story, ask me if you ever meet me). Fatima Sheriff won the buzzer race to identify that the two composers referenced in the question were both Bernsteins. 20^th century poets as described by Seamus Heaney brought just the one bonus. Gilbert Jackson knew various species of Macaque for the next starter. Fortresses brought two bonuses, which saw Imperial again through the 200 points barrier. Max Zeng knew Boron for the next starter on the periodic table. Now, be honest, when JP announced that the next bonus set was on apples in art, did you instantly think Rene Magritte? I did. He was the last bonus, and Imperial also took the first on Cezanne. Sez who? You had to stick with the next question, but the mention of the worship of Artemis at the end gave both Margaret Ounsley and me the answer of Ephesus. Bonuses on McLarens brought two correct answers. That was it, the contest was gonged, with Imperial winning 225- 110.

Well done to both teams. Congratulations to Imperial, first through to the semis. You’ll probably be tagged favourites by most now, but I have faither in you that you can cope. Not panicking after Reading’s lightning start was impressive. Bad luck Reading, but you can still make it.

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

The three letters which stand for numerical values which appear consecutively on a qwerty keyboard (X – C – V ) spell out the number 95. Great question I was too slow to work out.

Mastermind First Round: Heat 23

For the last two weeks, dearly beloved, the scores have been modest. So last night, as we’re winding towards the end of the first round, I couldn’t help hoping that we’d see something in the way of pyrotechnics this week. Did it happen? Well, let’s come to that afterwards.

Meanwhile, let’s begin with Judith Edwards’ round on the Hornblower Novels. That’s a good old, traditional MM specialist subject, that wouldn’t have looked out of place during the Magnus era, isn’t it. Personally, I have never read any of the novels – not making any point about this, just saying that I haven’t. General knowledge gave me two points here. Considering the famine rations that my specialist round scores have been on for the last few weeks, I was going to take all that I could get. Judith got into double figures, which is the mark of a good round these days. 10 points means that you’re never going to be too far behind at the half time whistle.

Ten points was also the total that Lizzie Mackarel scored on her own round on Joni Mitchell. Two gimmes gave me my two points on this round, and I was not too proud to say thank you very much for them either. Judith in the previous round had prepared her subject well, despite missing a couple, and it’s fair to say the same thing about Lizzie. 2 contenders down, and two still in it.

If I had a banker subject last night, it was The Wives of Henry VIII. This was offered to us by Mark Spencer Turner. Did it work out for me? Well, I took 4 of these, and was very happy to do so. It wasn’t an easy set at all, and Mark scored a rather modest 6. The look on his face suggested that some of those that he missed were areas he hadn’t considered during his preparation for the round. It’s a fact that if you leave gaps, the question setters will often find them.

Last but not by any means least in the first round was Helen garner. Helen was answering on the Films of Tom Cruise, and this round conformed to what we’ve seen this series, that is, a set of questions almost all of which concentrated on the details of the events in the films, rather than production details. Helen did extremely well – not a perfect round as she did have one pass, but any specialist subject round that scores in the teens now is out of the top drawer.

Let’s call a spade a spade, Mark was 7 points off the lead when he returned to the chair and there was no way he was going to be able to win. Under those circumstances I thought that he struggled manfully with his questions. I don’t think he found it easy, but he struggled grimly on to accrue a respectable 8 points for a total of 1. Which did actually mean that he was in the lead briefly.

It can be enlightening to watch the different tactics that different contenders use in their respective rounds. In 2007, after accruing 2 passes in my first round specialist subject, I made up my mind never to pass another question, and I didn’t for the rest of the series. However it can also be a valid tactic to go for speed by passing anything where the answer doesn’t come immediately. I’d say that Judith had decided on this tactic, since although she got into double figures again with another ten, she also took 6 passes.

By contrast, I’d say that Lizzie Mackarel was trying as hard as she could not to pass, although she did pass twice in the end. Lizzie was another contender who couldn’t quite disguise her frustration when answers turned out to be wrong, and while I’d never advocate a McEnroe-esque outburst, I can get on board with contenders who show that I matters to them. Lizzie scored 10 too, but her lower pass rate meant that she was now in the lead.

You sensed this would not be for long, though, and it really wasn’t. I thoroughly enjoyed Helen Garner’s round, for the range of knowledge that she showed, the speed at which she answered most of the questions, and the way that she seemingly dredged a couple of answers up from her boots – like the Cernow/Cornwall one, for example. She passed the target and kept going, ending with 27, and the admiration of Clive Myrie. I understand Clive’s excitement at the size of Helen’s winning margin, but I somehow dount if it made the other contenders feel much better.

Well done Helen! This was the best performance on the show for several weeks. At the end Helen said her aim is to go all the way. On this showing, that certainly looks like a possibility. Best of luck in the semi-final.

The Details

Judith Edwards	The Hornblower novels of C.S. Forester	10	1	10	6	20	7
Lizzie Mackarel	Joni Mitchell	10	0	10	2	20	2
Mark Spencer Turner	The Wives of Henry VIII	6	2	8	4	14	6
Helen Garner	The Films of Tom Cruise	13	1	14	1	27	1

Sirin Kale (Kamalvand) First hand account of First Round Mastermind Heat

I don’t know if you caught the article by Sirin Kale – who appeared on Mastermind as Sirin Kamalvand last week – about said Mastermind appearance. If you didn’t, can I respectfully suggest that if you’re a regular reader of LAM, then you’ll probably enjoy it a lot. As you’d expect from a professional journalist, this is a very well written account, funny and self-effacing. Go on, if you haven’t read it, click this link. We’ll wait for you until you get back.

I've Started So I'll Panic - Sirin Kale

I didn’t see this article until this morning. I saw a link posted on the Mastermind Club’s Facebook group, then saw the link posted by Martin on a comment left on this week’s Mastermind review. Thanks to both for that.

I always enjoy reading what contenders in the regular series have written about their experiences. One of the things I found most interesting in Sirin’s account was about the horse trading which went on over her specialist subject. I made a point when I wrote the review of saying that I don’t recall a single character of a single TV series being a specialist subject before. Sirin explained how she was not allowed her first choice, The Kardashians (the family, sadly, and not the alien antagonists in Deep Space Nine) nor her second, The Spice Girls, nor her third, Jane Austen. After having her fourth choice subject, ER accepted, Sirin came to realise that 331 hours of television would be too much to absorb for the time available, and negotiated the production team down to just Doug Ross. To be honest this makes all the horse trading over my own first round appearance in 2006 where all of my subjects were rejected in the audition, seem less unusual. While on the same subject, Sirin writes Sirin said, “It seems the producers can refuse many of a contestant’s choices, leaving them to tackle subjects they don’t feel comfortable with. The contestants then don’t have as much time to swot up as they would like.”

Yes, that’s certainly true. But how else could it be done? When I applied in the mid-noughties, your subject choices had to be all nailed down before you received the contract to sign. Without wishing to be horrible, if you get to do subjects that you are 100% happy with and confident about, well, be grateful that you’ve been lucky. For example, in 2006 I had to come up with the Modern Olympic Games off the top of my head. Ideally, it would have just been track and field athletics in the modern Olympic Games. The production team would have preferred all sports in the modern Summer AND Winter Olympic Games. We compromised on just the summer. A hell of a lot more work than I originally planned. Given the choice between accepting that, or not appearing, I reasoned that it was something I could live with. I accepted the subject and got working on it. Likewise, for my grand final the following year, I wanted to just answer on the 1178-1831 old London Bridge. The team insisted on every bridge that has stood on the site and been called London Bridge. I accepted ad did the work. Nobody forces you to accept. If you honestly can’t ‘do’ the subject in the time available to you, it’s better to refuse and try again another time.

Sirin writes, “I later wonder if the producers zeroed in on me because I am a woman of colour, not because I was particularly good: historically, Mastermind has been an overwhelmingly white, male show.” It’s difficult for me to comment on this. I’ve never been party to a conversation with a member of any Mastermind production team over the subject of selection criteria. It’s not the same thing at all, I know, but I did wonder whether the reason why I was accepted at the first time of asking for two consecutive series was because I live in South Wales, while if I was still in London it might have been a lot less likely.

Describing how she felt walking back to the chair for the GK round, Sirin tells us, “All my energy and focus has been on not tanking my specialist subject. Walking back to the chair, I think: should I have prepared for this? Could I have prepared for this?”

That really is the question. If you asked me - did you revise General Knowledge at all for Mastermind? – I would give you the honest answer that I did not revise or learn anything in General Knowledge specifically for my appearance in 2006, or for my first-round heat and my semi final in 2007. I did try to improve a few areas for the final, not to make myself an expert in my weak areas, but enough to help me avoid missing any bread and butter questions in these categories. However, if you asked me – did you prepare for the General Knowledge rounds on Mastermind? I’d reply – absolutely did. My preparation consisted of more than 30 years of being an avid watcher of TV quiz shows since I was quite a young kid, 19 years of playing regularly in pub quizzes and quiz leagues, and 12 years of regularly setting quizzes in the Aberavon Rugby club.

Sirin makes the point that she had only 6 weeks between earning a spot on the show, and the recording. This is the shortest period that I ever had to prepare for one of my own shows. The longest was, if I recall correctly, 12 weeks. With such a relatively short preparation time, I think she was right to concentrate on specialist. The likelihood of being able to ‘question spot’ GK questions in such a short time is very small. At the start of the article, she says, “ I love pub quizzes, sure, and I’m good at them. Pre-Covid, I was part of a crack team called Quizlamic State, who regularly took home first prize in our local one. As team coordinator, I developed a reputation for ruthlessness, brutally ejecting friends and, on one occasion, my boyfriend, if I thought they were underperforming. At university, I was picked for our college’s University Challenge team, though we didn’t get on the show”

I think that’s reasonable grounds for thinking that your GK would be good enough to bring you respectability at least. Yes, if you watched the show you know what happened next. I think that Sirin gives a pretty good clue as to why it might have happened. “when I apply for Mastermind, I haven’t watched it for years. How hard can it be? I think, with the breezy optimism of a rookie journalist thumbing a lift into a war zone.” If Sirin had watched the show, she’d have had an idea of the level and style of the GK questions, and it would have also served as some preparation for the ordeal of the chair in the GK rounds, and maybe wouldn’t have had the ‘mare with the first question which she admits set her on a downward spiral.

One other thing I noticed about the article was the reference to one of the other contenders who repeatedly ignored the director’s requests not to slouch in the chair. (A similar thing happened to me in my first appearance). “One won’t stop slouching in their chair. Producers stop filming and ask them to sit up straight, but they refuse and slump back down again within minutes.” Sirin mentions no name, but I can’t help wondering if this is the contender whom I noticed as one of the most expressive contenders we’ve had for many a long year. Especially when Sirin notes that after the show “I collect myself enough to congratulate the winner, and watch, amused, as the slumper scowls all the way back to their dressing room. I’d have killed for their score, but they’re clearly devastated.”

All in all, this is one of the best first-hand accounts of an appearance on Mastermind that I’ve read in a very long time. If by any chance you ever come to read this Sirin, thank you. You might not have won Mastermind, but you’ve won a fan.

University Challenge 2022: Quarter final: Birmingham v. King's, London

The Teams

Birmingham

Mark McParlan

John Robinson

Michael Joel Bartelle (Capt.)

Jaimy Sajit

King’s London

Ananth Sathyanath

Rachel Bedwin

Atyab Rashid  (Capt.)

Oliver Beard

Howdy pardners, and thanks for joining me for a drink in the last chance saloon. Joining us on Monday night were Birmingham, impressive in their early rounds, yet beaten by Reading in their first QF, and King’s, London, less impressive in their early matches, but still battling. They took a hell of a beating in their first QF against Imperial. So the form book fancied Birmingham. Which just goes to prove how little you can trust that volume.

Oliver Beard took first blood, recognising various definitions of the word pulse. A rather nice set on place names which contained the name of captains from Star Trek franchise followed. I predicted Picardy and Ormskirk – one out of two ain’t so bad. Mallorca, though? I didn’t get that one. Kings didn’t get a point for Picardy either, because captain Atyab Rashid answered Picard – a salutary reminder to listen to the question. John Robinson buzzed early to try to identify a word, but the tactic didn’t pay off. Given a free shot at the whole question, Atyab Rashid correctly answered gossip. Bonuses on Winston Churchill’s History of the English Speaking Peoples brought two correct answers. I’ll be honest, my knowledge of chimera is solely limited to the Greek mythological soundalike, but it was something biological and Rachel Bedwin knew it. Biology starter was followed by chemistry bonuses. Kings had none of them . . . but (drum roll) . . . I had one! Dredging up a random name from a chemistry lesson over 40 years ago, Fehling, I took the last, and began the wheezing odyssey that is my lap of honour around the Clark sofa. Birmingham clearly wanted to break Kings’ hold on the buzzer, and rightly so, but this led to Jaimy Sajit coming in too early for the next starter. Once again, given the luxury of the full question, by the time we got to the question mark the answer had become a lot clearer, and Rachel Bedwin buzzed in identify the D in an abbreviation as Diptheria. Events that took place in years that are multiples of 100 brought just the one bonus. But if you’re taking all the starters, as Kings were, you don’t necessarily need that many bonuses. For the picture starter we saw the family tree of a fictional family, and Atyab Rashid identified this as the Corleone family from The Godfather. More fictional family trees brought just the one bonus, but it meant that Kings led by 70 to minus 10 at the ten minute mark. Squeaky bum time for Birmingham.

As if suddenly freed from shackles, three members of the Birmingham team went for their shooting irons with the next starter, with Mark McParlan proving fastest then supplying the required answer of Ur. Characters in Homer’s Odyssey brought them two correct answers, wiping out the minus score and putting them into the black. Nobody knew that the creatures referenced in a quote from Shakespeare’s Henry V were bees. Oliver Beard recognised various references to the year 1802 for the next starter. Medical bonuses brought bonuses on medicine, and as if Birmingham’s buzzer success had spurred them to put on a spurt, they took their first full house. Ananth Sathyananth knew the term Moire to take the next starter. Bonuses on French art yielded nowt to them. For the music bonus John Robinson identified the work of De La Soul. Other tracks that also sampled the drum track from James Brown’s Funky Drummer brought two bonuses, and that was two more than I got. Michael Joel Bartelle played a captain’s innings by buzzing early in to answer a question about Schoenberg. Literary works showed a welcome name check for Alan Garner – maybe a little out of fashion nowadays, but a fine writer. This set yielded just one bonus. The following starter continued in literary vein, requiring the answer of Children’s laureate Malorie Blackman. We both took two bonuses on astronomy. John Robinson took the next starter, working out that William Wyon was associated with the Royal Mint. The Wyon’s designed some of the finest cins and medallions of the 19^th century – I’m the proud owner of a Benjamin Wyon coin commemorating the 1831 opening of new London Bridge. This earned bonuses on British beaches, of which Birmingham took one. Still, their efforts meant that at the 20 minute mark, they had reduced the deficit to a single full set, as Kings led by 100 – 75.

For the second picture starter we saw an illustration showing a dark bird sitting on a pallid bust of Pallas above a doorway. “The Raven” answered John Robinson. Jeremy P. might have been tempted to reply ‘nevermore’, but simply confirmed this was correct. Illustrations of three more of Poe’s works followed, and like Birmingham the only one I identified was by Aubrey Beardsley (whom Oscar Wilde liked to call Awfully Weirdly). A very good shout by King’s captain Atyab Rashid to identify the moribund Manchu language widened the gap again. Franz ‘Who?’ Boas brought the one bonus. Michael Joel Bartelle recognised bones of the pelvis for the next starter. A full house on British Prime Ministers meant that the teams were level on the scoreboard. Whose nerve would hold? Neither team knew the work of Rachel Kushner. A philosophy starter proved meat and drink to Atyab Rashid, who knew his Neoplatonism from his elbow. At exactly the perfect time, Kings threw in a full house on tessellations. With very little time left on the clock, it looked as if Birmingham were going to have to take the next starter and a full house of bonuses to force a tie break. Neither team knew it, and the contest was gonged before there was time for another.

Bad luck to Birmingham, and sorry to see you go, but well played for making a good fightback. But speaking of good fightbacks, well done King’s! One win away from the semis, now, and who’s to say they can’t do it? Not me.

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

The word gossip (noun) was not originally a pejorative term, but originally meant a godparent or sponsor, and then came to mean a female friend.

Mastermind First Round Heat 22

Apologies if this review seems a little grumpy, dearly beloved. I don’t mean it to be, but I was ill at the dog end of last week, and it’s been a difficult day at work today. So if I seem a little out of sorts, please be forgiving. This too will pass.

Yesterday’s show didn’t start too badly for me. I mean, I would never describe myself as a fan of Madonna’s music, but then she’s kind of always been there, so it seems, a bit like the Brecon Beacons. So I managed three of these. If you can score 11 on your specialist, as Ashleigh Evans did, then you have every right to pat yourself on the back and congratulate yourself on having done a good job on your preparation. Question level-wise I thought that this was a pretty fair set of questions.

It's often interesting to look at the kinds of specialist subjects that are offered in each series. I may be wrong, but I don’t remember a set of questions on just one character from just one TV series – albeit a long running one. That’s not meant in a pejorative way, by the way. I think that the jeopardy you put yourself in when you’re answering on a subject which has a pretty narrow focus, like this one, is that the question setters have a right to expect that you will have learned your subject in real detail and will set questions to test this. So while Sirin Kamalvand certainly knew a lot about George Clooney’s ER character, she was still caught out enough times to ensure that while she reached respectability, she didn’t really put herself into the best position at half time.

Some contenders look impassive as they take to the chair for the first time. Some contenders look nervous as hell. Then there are those who look as if they are loving every minute of the experience. Into this category fell our third contender, Jason Hill. And well he might, for he knew his subject, The Rivers of Yorkshire (which was apparently rejected by Boney M as the title for their number 1 single) well enough to get a double figure score. Just one point behind Ashleigh, Jason was going to be in the shakeup when we got down to the serious business of the GK round.

Not before Eva Harrison had her chance at The National Hockey-League 2000 – present, though. I always like to see fellow teachers giving it a lash, and Eva certainly did respectably. I would make the same observations about Eva’s round that I made about Sirin’s. Taking a narrow focus – 20 years – did mean that the question setters were going to really test her detailed knowledge, which is probably why, like Sirin, she ended with 8 points. Perfectly respectable, but some way off the lead.

So to the GK round.

Right, let me start with a disclaimer. Not doing very well in a general knowledge round shows nothing about you, other than you didn’t do very well in that general knowledge round. It is certainly no reflection on your intelligence, despite certain sections of social media claiming otherwise. Why do I make this point now? Well, in the same way that the luck of the draw can throw up a heat in which several contenders throw in superb GK rounds, the luck of the draw threw up a heat in which all  contenders scored, well, for want of a better word, rather modestly. It was what it was.

First back to the chair was Sirin. She scored 4. To be honest, there’s not much I can say to sweeten the pill. It just wasn’t a good round. Eva’s round was a lot more interesting. She had the joint highest score of the GK round, with 7, but what made her round interesting was the way that I thought she managed to get some of the harder questions right, while missing what I would think of as bread and butter. Of course, it’s all in the eye of the beholder and the ear of the behearer. What was also interesting was the play of emotions across Eva’s face. It looked like the round really mattered to her, and that’s something I can get on board with.

Jason returned next, still clearly enjoying the experience immensely. After a reasonable start with the first few questions, this smile was somewhat tested as the round progressed. 6 points, which was his total for the round, is certainly not a disaster. But it isn’t great, even if it did mean that Jason was in the lead with one contender to go.

Surely Ashleigh was going to smash this, I thought. Well, not really. Yes, he did have the joint highest score of the round, but at the end of the day this was still only 7. It was enough to bring him the win by a couple of points, though, and that was what mattered. Well done, sir.

For me, though, it does beg the question – should we be going back to semi final slots for highest scoring runners up? I’m sorry if I am starting to sound like a stuck gramophone record, but yes, I think we should. The luck of the draw will always play a part in any knockout competition. But come on. Andrew Fanko scored 25 in his heat, 7 more than Ashleigh scored in his. Ashleigh won, and he has a place in the semis – and quite right too. He earned it. But Andrew doesn’t have a place in the semis, through sheer bad luck. His score would have won many of the heats. This probably just serves to highlight why the original series had repechage places, and why the Humphrys era had them for the best part of 10 years. So come on, Hindsight and Hattrick – look at this one again please. You have a great show – but this is just one way you could make it even better.

The Details

Ashleigh Evans	The Music of Madonna	11	0	7	2	18	2
Sirin Kamalvand	The ER character Doug Ross	8	0	4	2	12	2
Jason Hill	The Rivers of Yorkshire	10	0	6	0	16	0
Eva Harrison	The National Hockey League 2000 present	8	0	7	1	15	1

University Challenge Quarter Final - Edinburgh v. Trinity, Cambridge

The Teams

Edinburgh

Ben Russell Jones

Lewis Thomas

Rishi Sundar (capt)

Al Karunaratne

Trinity

Hattie Innes

Navonil Neogi

Ludwig Brekke (capt)

Luke Kim

Now, I know what you’re thinking. – What does the form book say, Dave?- Well, Edinburgh scored a mighty 270 in the first round when they beat Peterhouse in the first round, but only just beat Bristol in a quality match in the second. Trinity took out Durham by a margin of 100 in their first-round match, before destroying St. Hilda’s in one of the most impressive performances of the second round. So the form book pretty much washes its hands of the whole business and says it’s anybody’s game. On paper, that is.

I had nothing for the first starter until the word ‘opium eater’, and then answered ‘confessions’ at the same time as Rishi Sundar. Bonuses on trees brought just the one correct answer. For the next starter there was an awful lot of water that passed under the bridge between ‘thin wafers of which element’ and ‘integrated circuits’, but I guessed silicon as in chips, and so did Al Karunaratne, seemingly disbelieving that it could be that simple. Who cares? -thought I, and set off on my lap of honour around the Clark sofa. Physics in popular music promised little, but I had REM and EMF. Edinburgh also took two. A great buzz by Lewis Thomas saw him identify Jeanne Baret as reputedly the first woman to circumnavigate the world. Medieval History – specifically battles of the Wars of the 1th century – brought a full house. I was fuzzy on the next question, but Ben Russell Jones knew that the answer was Fuzzy logic. Their bonuses were on the artist Kehinde Wiley, who painted the official portrait of Barack Obama. They took one, but missed out on another from that popular misconception that it’s Grand Central Station beneath Madison Square Garden. It isn’t – it’s Pennsylvania Station, but I’ve heard question masters say that it is before now. They’re always right, you know. I didn’t know Puncak Jaya on the island of New Guinea for the picture starter, but then neither did anyone else. The next starter asked for a cartoonist, and it was some time before it became obvious that the answer was going to be Rube Goldberg. Lewis Thomas won that buzzer race. The picture bonuses showed three peaks, each of which is in the top ten highest peaks on islands in the world. Two of these put Edinburgh up to 100, and completed a shut out of Trinity up to the 10 minute mark.

The game wasn’t over, of course, but Trinity really needed to find their buzzer fingers. I really don’t know why they struggled so much at the start of the match. Yes, Edinburgh were very good on the buzzer, not unbeatably so. The wait for their first starter continued, as Ben Russell Jones answered that Napoleon’s fateful number was 18. Fair enough. The magnitude of stars provided just the one correct answer. Finally Trinity got their first shot at a starter as Luke Kim buzzed in to identify the 16^th century scientist who was the subject of a 2009 opera. What’s more, he was right when he said Kepler. I didn’t care for Jeremy’s snarky “You’re awake. Good!” The pantheon of Gods in the Elder Scrolls video game thankfully drew on sources that gave me a couple of points. Trinity scored a timely full house. Lewis Thomas was the first to join up the dots on the next starter and come up with the correct answer of Portland – as in vase, and bill. Fish whose name contains the name of a mammal provided one correct answer. I don’t know how I have got to 57 and a half years of age without knowing about gombocs, but I have. Still, now that I know about this class of three-dimensional homogenous bodies I find it to be a word which I would like to use more in conversation. Neither team knew it either. Parmentier in the next starter suggested we were looking at spuds, and again it was Lewis Thomas who took this one. Words beginning with sph yielded two bonuses. For the music starter Navonil Neogi was in quickly to recognise the werk of teutonic miserablists Kraftwerk. Three more performers or groups who have cultivated robotic stage personas – announced Jeremy. Gary Numan and Daft Punk will be there, I predicted. I was right too, although I didn’t know Janelle Monae (another member of the Who? family in these parts, I’m afraid. I was surprised Edinburgh didn’t have a punt at Daft Punk. They didn’t need to, though. Neither team knew the term Cats paw. I can only suggest that none of them are fans of the original series of Star Trek. A Maths starter littered with letters and words like factorial followed, and Navonil Neogi correctly answered the Exponential function. Gesundheit. A couple of bonuses on language families reduced the gap between the teams to double figures, but it was still looking like a long, long way back for Trinity. Especially when Lewis Thomas took the next starter, recognising a definition of the phrase ‘nuclear family’. New writers in the 70s brought a couple of correct answers. The normally sure footed Lewis Thomas came in way too early on the next starter asking for one of the new sports which debuted in the Tokyo Olympics. He zagged with sport climbing, and lost , allowing Ludwig Brekke to zig with skateboarding. A full house on flags that are mostly green meant that Trinity trailed by 80 to 185 at the 20 minute mark, and they were not going to win, but at least they were on the brink of a triple figure score.

Neither team recognised a description of the sternum. Now, for the next starter we were asked who painted the 1917 Bride and Groom with Eiffel Tower. I am sure we were shown this picture as a bonus in a picture round earlier in this very series. I remembered it as Chagall, which is more than either team managed. Neither team knew Zambia for the next starter either. This brought us to the actual second picture starter – and it was Ben Russell Jones who recognised the work of Kazimir Malevich. More works where the artist made interesting and extensive use of white brought just the one bonus. I knew that French words for war and wasp both begin with GU – I still remember reading about the adventures of Sylviane la guêpe in an ancient French text book we used in the first year in the comp. Bloody crap it was, too. Musicians and instruments put Edinburgh just one starter away from 200. I visited Prague in 2017, and so I saw the Dancing House, and very proud of it the good people of Prague are too. Ben Russell Jones won the race to identify where it is. Wild Goats didn’t sound like the most promising subject for a set of bonuses, but Edinburgh managed a couple of them. I didn’t really get the next question, but it required nautical mile and nanometre, and it went begging. Now, I absolutely loved dinosaurs as a kid after being given the How and Why Wonder Book of Dinosaurs  at a young age. I think it was my first ever favourite book. So the 6 year old me would definitely have known that the dinosaur whose name translates as double beam is Diplodocus. Al Karunaratne knew it too, although his tone and gesture suggested that this had been a bit of a shot in the dark. Places connected with the name Caesarea earned a full house. Lewis Thomas did a rather strange thing. The next question asked for a Scottish University. He knew it was either Strathclyde or Stirling. He gave the wrong answer of Strathcylde, and so said the right answer, Stirling, immediately after. Ta muchly, thought Ludwig Brekke, and answered Stirling, looking across to Lewis Thomas as he did so. It was a rare moment of light in what had been a pretty grim evening for Trinity. Subatomic particles provided the bons First three flavours of quarks to be discovered? Immediately I said the first three to come into my head – up, down and strange – and they were right! Nastily the contest was gonged when Trinity were on 95, with a bonus yet to come which might well have taken them to 100. The final score was 230 to 95.

I’m not crowning Edinburgh as favourites yet – I think they’ll be relieved about that, but they did very well indeed. Trinity are no mugs at all – they didn’t get many chances at bonuses but did very well with those they did get. But oh, they must get their buzzer fingers working from the start next time out.

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

Jeanne Baret is widely believed to be the first woman to circumnavigate the world.