The Teams
Wadham,Oxford
Aarav Billore
Athur Bellamy
Johnny Worden (Capt.)
Anjali Cheung
Imperial University
Charlotte Stokes
Mattia Elkouby
Matthew Spry (Capt.)
Jaime Salamanca Camacho
The tale of the tape suggested that Wadham were going to
find this match hard going and even Amol seemed to think so judging from his
introduction of both teams. A list of films with the same word in their titles
saw a rare misfire from Imperial, allowing Arthur Bellamy in with ‘my’ to give
Wadham an early lead. Bonuses on psychotherapy yielded nowt. Wadham lost half
of their points through an incorrect early buzz for the next starter allowing
Imperial the full question, to which they supplied the correct answer of
Burundi. One of my all-time favourite artists, Aubrey Beardsley – who was also
the joint winner of the first London Marathon- brought a first full house of
the night. It wouldn’t be the last. Jaime Salamanca Camacho took his first
starter of the contest with Leonard Euler. Terms beginning with polyp brought another
full house. For the picture starter we saw an elegantly written out speech from
Macbeth, and first to identify it was Mattia Elkouby. Three more of the same
saw Imperial take just the one bonus. Jaime Salamanca Camacho took a second
starter recognising a description of the work of Courbet – that’s Gustave
rather than Harry H. The jazz musician Terence ‘Who’ Blanchard brought another
full house. At the words Bartolomeo Cristofori Jaime Salamanca Camacho buzzed
in with the answer that he invented the piano. (You ‘ave it son, I’ll play it.)
Imperial gobbled up types of sushi for another full house which meant that on
11 minutes they led by 110 – five.
The agony continued for Wadham. When you’re under the cosh
like this you have to try to break the other team’s rhythm. Buzzing in early
was the right tactic, but sadly they lost their remaining five points for an
incorrect answer. Which allowed a free shot on goal to Imperial which they duly
converted. Osmium brought another full house. Charlotte Stokes took a
ridiculously long-winded starter on the term checkpoint ensuring that all four
members of her team had taken at least one starter. Union territories of India
saw the inexorable onslaught continue with another Imperial full house. For the
music starter nobody recognised the work of prog rock dinosaurs King Crimson.
Charlotte Stokes knew that Thomas ‘Kiss Me’ Hardy invented the term cliffhanger.
This earned the music bonuses, three tracks on which Robert Fripp played, They
took just the one. Mattia Elkouby won the buzzer race to identify Dr.
Strangelove for the next starter. Manga bonuses did nothing to slow Imperial’s
progress – the resulting full house brought Imperial to 200 unanswered points.
Matthew Spry knew the river required for the answer to the next starter was the
Derwent. You won’t be surprised that Imperial took a full house on the History
of Mathematics. You should be surprised that I did as well. Me? I was
flabbergasted. And knackered since it necessitated a lap of honour. Jaime
Salamanca Camacho knew Cepheids for the astronomy starter that followed. Second
symphonies – which made me think ‘they took the credit for your second symphony
– rewritten by machine etc etc. – saw Imperial manage to get one correct answer
by giving ‘Shostakovitch’ until it was correct. Jaime Salamanca Camacho recognised
that the punishment being described from Dante’s Inferno was for the sin of
simony. Religion and social science brought. . . well it brought another three correct
answers. At this point I wouldn’t have blamed Wadham for collectively buzzing
together for the next starter and giving ‘I’ll get me coat.” as a response. As it
was, the score was 265 – 0 at 20 minutes.
A wee bit of Kandinsky was the second picture starter, identified
by Matthew Spry. More circles pictures brought another full house. Surely
Imperial would soon be through the 300 barrier. Finally Arthur Bellamy put
Wadham’s account into the black, recognising clues leading to the word giant. The
Large Hadron Collider in CERN brought 1 bonus. Jaime Salamanca Camacho knew that
a teacher who moves from place to place is peripatetic. Well, a moving target
is more difficult to hit. 20th century Prime Ministers brought the
seemingly inevitable full house. The word dream in the titles of proto sci fi
works brought Matthew Spry another starter. London theatres brought – shock horror
– just two bonuses. Nobody took the next starter on Narvik. Look, gawd alone
knows what the next starter was about, but Mattia Elkouby said the answer was
five and that’ll do for me. American female poet of the early 60’s? If it ain’t
Plath, I don’t know the answer. She did nowt for Imperial, as they missed all
three bouses. Aarav Billore knew about descendants of Alexander the Great’s
army for the next starter. Bonuses on the HIV virus saw a harsh ruling deny
Wadham a full house. Well, it was purely academic as it was. There was no time
for the next starter to be answered, and the final score was 345 – 25.
Wadham left with a BCR of 33.3, while Imperial managed a
staggering 79. It seemed to me that they had one of those nights when all of
your guesses come off, and every fifty-fifty coin toss lands heads up for you.
BUT. Imperial were magnificent. They could have performed substantially less
well and still won. They have good buzzing throughout the team, and their
coverage is very wide. No, they’re not guaranteed to win the series by any
means. But that performance should have put the fear of God into the rest.
Amol Watch
I was delighted to see Amol talking about Imperial’s bonus
conversion rate when introducing the teams. We’ve been banging on about BCRs
for years here in LAM Towers. He used to mention it quite regularly but it’s
been a while. I felt he was a bit down on Wadham in his intro, especially
considering the shellhacking they were going to get in the match.
At 15 minutes and 36 seconds, Amol said “Plenty of time
Wadham.” Bear in mind that the score was 175 – nil at this point. I get it, but
I don’t know, in this case probably the less said the better.
I think his momentary speechlessness at the end said
everything you could say about Imperial’s imperious performance. Even if he did
call them ‘absolutely ludicrous’
Interesting Fact That I Didn’t Already Know of
the Week
West Germany in 1974 and Japan in 2002 are the only
countries to host/co host a FIFA world cup without any matches being played in
their capital cities.
Baby Elephant Walk Moment
What term is applied to the monitoring mechanisms designed
to assess for DNA damage and correct alignment of spindle fibres during
different stages of the eukaryotic cell cycle, and which allow the cell to
decide whether it should proceed with or terminate cell division? The term is
also used to refer to a place along a road or border at which travellers are
stopped for inspection, including . . . Hey , you had me (asleep) at
eukaryotic. Dum de dumdum dum dum dum dum dumdum.
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