What a show. No, seriously – what a show. That was good enough to be a final, let alone a semi final, and let alone a heat. A fitting end to the first round.
First into the chair was 2017 semi finalist James Haughton.
And boy, didn’t he mean business. Answering on Christian Huygens, the pendulum
man (alright, he did other things as well) James gabbed the subject between his
teeth right from the start of the round and proceeded to devour it. By the end
of the round he’d accumulated the highly impressive score of 13. I had managed
to kick off with 3 points on this subject which was three more points than I’d
expected.
Second into the chair was Stuart Field. Stuart a picture of
absolute concentration, was answering on the TV series Jonathan Creek. Despite
being a favourite of Mrs. Londinius back in the day this was a series to which
I’d never paid much attention. Which turned out to have been a fatal mistake on
my point. With the result that I scored no points. Stuart on the other hand
managed his own double figure round with 10. Having said that he looked most
annoyed with himself on his return to the chair.
Only Aoife Gamble could tell you for certain whether she
found it particularly daunting have to come to the chair following two such
good specialist rounds. She started off her own round on Artemisia Gentileschi
brightly enough too, but once she hit a pass spiral in the middle of the round
she found it hard going until the white line of death had encircled the score box
on the screen. By the end of the round Aoife had scored five points, which was three
more than I had.
Mike Wheeler brought the round to a conclusion. He answered
on European Mammals. I’d earmarked this subject as giving me the best chance of
scoring points tonight, and it did provide me with another 3 points. So my
aggregate of 8 was some way short of double figures, but still a little better
than I had predicted. Mike knew his subject, but a couple of wrong answers left
him just a little short on 9 by the end of the round.
So to the GK. Trust me, fireworks were just around the
corner. First though, Aoife returned for her round. Fair play to her, knowing
that she was so far behind at the halfway stage she never stopped smiling
throughout the round and managed to post a respectable 7 to finished on 12
points.
Right then, fireworks part one. Mike Wheeler made a little bit
of an uncertain start to his GK round. He missed a couple of the fist few. He
missed hardly anything for the rest of the round though. His score just kept
climbing and climbing as he just kept on giving he right answers. In the end he
scored a very fine fifteen, to give him a total of 24. Alright, he wasn’t
guaranteed a win with that score, but the two remaining contenders were going
to have to traverse the corridor of doubt to overhaul him.
So that was exactly what Stuart did. He produced a GK round
the like of which we have only seen once or twice in the last couple of years. Stuart
scored 17 to equal the highest GK score of the series so far from Michael
McPartland. Added to the 10 from the specialist round Stuart was now in the
lead with a total of 27, and had posted the kind of GK round which marked him
out as a most serious contender – not just for the final, but for the overall
title as well. If he won this heat.
To be fair this looked likely. But what do we often say?
Negotiating the challenge of the chair gets easier the more that you do it, and
James Haughton already had the invaluable experience of getting to the semi
finals before. He wouldn’t match Stuart’s GK. He didn’t have to, though. He
needed 14 to tie, and 15 to win. He could have done it too. He had 14 but
couldn’t find the other point. So what did this mean? Tiebreak! That’s what.
I don’t wish to prolong the agony. Both of these fine
quizzers deserved to go through to the semi finals, but only one of them would.
And it was Stuart who did. He answered two of the five tie break questions
correctly, and James managed just the one. And if the production team should
happen to be reading this, well, I’m sorry, but that is more than enough of an
argument for the repechage slots to be reinstated, surely. Very, very bad luck
James. Congratulations Stuart, and best of luck to you in the semis.
And while I’m at it, thanks to all the contenders in the
first round. Without you, there’s no show.
The Details
|
James Haughton |
Christian Huygens |
13 |
0 |
14 |
0 |
27 |
0 |
1 |
|
Stuart Field |
Jonathan Creek |
10 |
0 |
17 |
0 |
27 |
0 |
2 |
|
Aoife Gamble |
Artemisia Gentileschi |
5 |
4 |
7 |
6 |
12 |
10 |
|
|
Mike Wheeler |
European Mammals |
9 |
1 |
15 |
1 |
24 |
2 |
|
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