When you appear on Mastermind, there’s really only one aspect of the show that you have any control over and that’s your specialist subject. Now, you can prepare thoroughly and things can still go wrong for a number of reasons – nerves, feeling ill on the day of the recording, or maybe a mismatch between your understanding of the parameters of the subject and the setter’s understanding of it. By and large, though, the more effectively that you prepare, the better you will do. Yet bearing this simple axiom in mind, it is remarkable how many times we see contenders failing to really hit the heights on their specialists. If you watch the 1977 series which is being repeated at 9:30pm on Monday nights on BBC Four, you’ll see that this is by no means a recent development. In last night’s BBC Four show we saw three contenders underachieve on GK, which meant that the other, despite having a ‘mare on GK, still won.
Well, heat 10 of the 2026 series kicked off with Kate Peck
answering on the music of George Michael. This was my ‘banker’ subject of the
night, which says more about my lack of knowledge of the other subjects than my
knowledge of George Michael, but it still delivered me three points. It
delivered Kate a good round. For most of it she looked as if she was heading
for double figures, but fell just short to finish with 9. That’s a good score
in the current era.
The only other specialist I thought that was likely to
bring me any more points was the next up. Gareth Peel was answering on tennis
star Monica Seles. Surprisingly this one gave me more points than George’s
music did. I landed 4, to take me up towards respectability for the aggregate.
Gareth, like Kate before him, looked as if he was heading for double figures
and what’s more he achieved it finishing with 10 points and a singe pass. Good
round.
There was only one of the four specialists which I could
not score on and if you’d asked me before the show which one it was going to be
I would have picked Justin Uzomba’s round on Kerry James Marshall. Yet I did
get a point, more by luck than judgement. There was no luck involved in Justin’s
terrific score of 11, though. Like the previous two contenders his round had
double figures written all over it in fact the only surprise was when he ended
up passing one. Quality.
Three specialists and three really good rounds. Was Eileen
Thatcher going to be able to complete a full set with the Lord Peter Wimsey
novels of Dorothy L. Sayers? Yes, she was. Sometimes I say that there’s
something in the air, something infectious that seems to make successive
contenders struggle in some shows. Well, what there was in the air with this
show was confidence and knowledge, and Eileen too powered through her round to
take a fine 11 and 1 pass. Quality.
Well done everyone! The fact we so rarely see all four
contenders in a single heat do so well on their specialists made this a better
heat already than many of this series.
Was it a case of ‘after the Lord Mayor’s Show’ in the GK?
Not really, no. Kate Peck, who would be forgiven for thinking herself a little
unlucky to be in fourth place after scoring 9 on specialist, gave a competent
performance on GK, scoring another 9 for 18 in total. Which would have won or
tied some of the earlier heats in the series. Good work.
We were all returning to the chair for GK in the same order
in which we’d undergone the specialists so it was Gareth Peel back next. Now,
Gareth’s first half dozen or more answers were delivered with such confidence
and authority that I thought he was going to be on for a second double figure
round in the same show. But the wrong answers and a couple of passes crept in
and he lost a bit of momentum. In the last part of the round he steadied the
ship and took the last question to give himself 9 for a total of 19 and the
lead.
Now, I don’t think that we saw a single bad round last
night, but we did see a round where one of the contenders seemed to struggle
just a little bit. That was Justin’s GK round. Now, don’t get me wrong, the 7
he scored brought him to a perfectly respectable 18 points, a total which has
been a winning total already during this series. However he did look just a
little disappointed not have claimed at least a share in the lead with one
contender still to go.
This was Eileen. She needed 9 to put the result beyond
doubt, and this she achieved. You know, there’s a lot to be said for keeping
your head, answering what you know, giving the percentage answer for what you
don’t and just carrying on answering. In the end it brought Eileen 11 points
for a total of 22. The feat of achieving double figures in both specialist and
GK is one we haven’t seen that many times during this series yet, and so many
congratulations for that. In fact congratulations to all four contenders for
making an exciting show. I wish Eileen the best of luck in the semi-finals.
The Details
|
Kate Peck |
The Music of George
Michael |
9 |
0 |
9 |
3 |
18 |
3 |
|
Gareth Peel |
Monica Seles |
10 |
1 |
9 |
2 |
19 |
2 |
|
Justin Uzomba |
Kerry James Marshall |
11 |
1 |
7 |
1 |
18 |
2 |
|
Eileen Thatcher |
The Peter Wimsey
Stories of Dorothy L. Sayers |
11 |
1 |
11 |
1 |
22 |
2 |
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