C1: Series 54 Champion Conor Travers (17 wins, 1963 points from 18 games) is a Cambridge mathmo. In 2006 he became Countdown's youngest ever series winner at 14. His only loss in 18 games was on a crucial conundrum against Paul Gallen in the 12th Championship of Champions. In this tournament, Conor is looking like the favourite, having beaten Ben Wilson in the preliminary round, Mark Tournoff in the first round, and Chris Hawkins in the second round with a perfect score of 119. This makes him one of only three players to have maxed a 15-round game.
C2: Series 60 Champion Kirk Bevins (14 wins, 1622 points from 15 games) is a trainee actuary and darts referee. In addition to all the achievements he's made which I listed last week, in that second round match he beat the king of apterous, Innis Carson, in a match that finished 112-102 after a second conundrum. He is another one of the three people to have maxed a 15-round game on TV. The third, as of last Friday, is Jon O'Neill, and he'll play the winner of this match in Thursday's semi-final.
DC: Susie Dent and Jenny Eclair.
RR: Rachel Riley.
OT: Other words or solutions.
R01: R S M E O I B F R
R02: D N Z E O I U R L
R03: P N B A E A L I O
R04: S M R A E O Q H R
R05: 25, 4, 8, 9, 7, 9. Target: 794.
TTT: EVEDINED - "Eve dined on prawns, but only after they'd been this."
R06: S D G A I U C L W
R07: L N T A E O R I L
R08: P M V E A O T U P
R09: S D J E I E N D A
R10: 7, 10, 6, 9, 2, 8. Target: 738.
TTT: LIVEDHIS - "Lived his life in this type of way, and it's not good."
R11: R D T O E A D X U
R12: T R G E A U N C T
R13: S M T E I O R E U
R14: 75, 25, 50, 100, 3, 8. Target: 174.
R15: I G O T N I N E S (conundrum)
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Round 1: R S M E O I B F R
C1: FORERIBS (8)
C2: ISOMER (6)
DC: REFORMS (7) SOMBRE (6)
Score: 8–0 (max 8)
If you were thinking of FIBROMES^, like I was, no dice. It's FIBROMAS. But Conor spots the only eight, and impressive spot it is too.
Round 2: D N Z E O I U R L
C1: ROUNDEL (7)
C2: ROUNDEL (7)
DC: ZONED (5) UNOILED (7)
Score: 15–7 (max 15)
Kirk's off the mark with ROUNDEL.
Round 3: P N B A E A L I O
C1: ABELIAN (7)
C2: ABALONE (7)
DC: OPALINE (7) BIPLANE (7)
OT: AEOLIAN (7) PIANOLA (7)
Score: 22–14 (max 22)
Q. What's purple and commutes?
A. An abelian grape.
There's more where that came from.
Conor's mathsy word ABELIAN (which describes a group with certain properties including commutativity* of its operation) is matched by Kirk's ABALONE (an edible mollusc).
* irrelevant way-roundness of operands to an operation, e.g. 4 + 5 = 5 + 4.
Round 4: S M R A E O Q H R
C1: HOARSER (7)
C2: REMORAS (7)
DC: ROAMERS (7)
Score: 29–21 (max 29)
Kirk goes with REMORAS, which are fish that attach themselves to larger fish and feed off their external parasites. Jenny remarks that Kirk knows an awful lot about words to do with sea creatures. Kirk mentions that it must be because he's a good swimmer.
Round 5: 25, 4, 8, 9, 7, 9. Target: 794.
C1: 794. 25*4*8-7+9/9 (10)
C2: 794. 25*4*8-7+9/9 (10)
Score: 39–31 (max 39)
A not-too-tricky numbers game leads us into the anecdote with Conor having not dropped a point, but Kirk only 8 points behind.
Teatime teaser: EVEDINED -> DEVEINED
Round 6: S D G A I U C L W
C1: GUILDS (6)
C2: ALCIDS (6)
OT: GLACIS (6) WILGAS (6)
Score: 45–37 (max 45)
An unpromising selection, but these two champions dig sixes out of it. An ALCID is a bird of the auk family. Also available were GLACIS, which is a sloping bank approaching a fort, designed to expose attackers to defenders' missiles, and WILGAS which are Australian trees.
Round 7: L N T A E O R I L
C1: RELATION (8)
C2: ORIENTAL (8)
DC: LATRINE (7)
Score: 53–45 (max 53)
RELATION (or its partner ORIENTAL) is a word that we see quite frequently, and which players of Conor and Kirk's standard can be expected to spot instantly. With all those high-probability letters in it, you'd think it stems with quite a few letters to make nines. Nope. It's no PAINTERS or NOTARISE (both of which stem with half the alphabet) - RELATION only takes A, F, H and S.
Also in this round, Nick mentions in reference to Jenny that the word ECLAIR comes from the French for lightning. Then Susie says they're called that because they're so delicious that you eat them very quickly.
My computer is called eclair. Not because it's particularly fast, it's just that for the last decade or so I've named all my computers after bakery products.
Round 8: P M V E A O T U P
C1: UPTEMPO (7)
C2: MUPPET (6)
Score: 60–45 (max 60)
Kirk amusedly offers MUPPET, but Conor goes in front with UPTEMPO.
Round 9: S D J E I E N D A
C1: DEADENS (7)
C2: NEDDIES (7)
DC: ANISEED (7) DANDIES (7)
Score: 67–52 (max 67)
Kirk isn't sure about NEDDIES. It's in - a NEDDY is a child's word for a donkey, an Australian term for a racehorse, or Tesco's term for a beefburger.
Round 10: 7, 10, 6, 9, 2, 8. Target: 738.
C1: 738. (10*8+2)*9 (10)
C2: 738. (10*8+2)*9 (10)
Score: 77–62 (max 77)
Kirk's got the second numbers pick - in fact, because of the draw structure, he gets two numbers picks in all his games - and he's 15 behind, so he picks six small. It's a relatively easy one though, and Conor can be seen doing this at about 13 seconds:
Five rounds to go, and he's still on a max game. Could it be two in a row for Conor, and two in a row for the show?
Teatime teaser: LIVEDHIS -> DEVILISH
Round 11: R D T O E A D X U
C1: ADORED (6)
C2: DOTARD (6)
DC: TUXEDO (6)
OT: DARTED (6) DEODAR (6) DETOUR (6) DOUTED (6) ORATED (6) ROUTED (6) TOURED (6) TRADED (6)
Score: 83–68 (max 83)
Plenty of sixes available. Kirk goes with DOTARD, a word for an old, especially foolish or senile, person. Perhaps he remembered it from round 4 of his last game?
Round 12: T R G E A U N C T
C1: TRUNCATE (8)
C2: TRUNCATE (8)
DC: GAUNTER (7)
Score: 91–76 (max 91)
Only one eight available, and will they spot it? Course they will. It's Conor and Kirk.
Round 13: S M T E I O R E U
C1: TIRESOME (8)
C2: EMERITUS (8)
DC: METEORS (7) MOISTURE (8)
OT: MISROUTE (8)
Score: 99–84 (max 99)
I was initially surprised at Conor's fifth vowel pick, as I couldn't think what he'd be picking for. Indeed, when I checked Lexplorer, the only letters that can be added to SMTEIORE to give nines are consonants. But looking at it more deeply, you're 15 points ahead after R12, the last thing you want is for your opponent to find an obscure nine (TOXIMETER, for example) and then be 3 ahead going into the numbers. And if you've seen TIRESOME, and you happen to know that it doesn't stem with any vowel, a vowel pick in that situation suddenly seems like a good idea. Also, if Kirk hadn't seen TIRESOME then a vowel pick will arguably make it less likely that other more easily-spotted eights will be available.
An insight into the great mind of Conor there, which will probably be refuted by the man himself saying "actually I just picked randomly".
Round 14: 75, 25, 50, 100, 3, 8. Target: 174.
C1: 174. 100+75-(3-50/25) (10)
C2: 174. 100+75-(3-50/25) (10)
Score: 109–94 (max 109)
Kirk realises that only a tricky numbers game can give him a hope of winning the game now, so he goes four large. Unfortunately for him the numbers is dead easy and it's Conor who's through to Thursday's semi-final. But not only that, after 14 rounds he's on 109 points out of 109. So far there have been four perfect 15-rounders on Countdown, and three of them were made by today's two contestants. Can Conor make it number five?
Round 15: I G O T N I N E S
Conor buzzes on 0.5 seconds to say INGESTION which is correct.
Final Score: 119–94 (max 119)
Boom. Conor spots INGESTION in less than a second to make it back-to-back maxes for himself, and back-to-back maxes for the show after Jono's triumph on Friday. Kirk congratulates him, and says that he thinks it's a max, although he couldn't have known for certain at the time. At the beginning of this show Rachel remarked, quite rightly, that Conor and Kirk have "cult status, even amongst that elite group" of participants in this tournament. And even for a player like Kirk, there's no shame in losing to Conor, especially when he's on form like this - Conor hasn't dropped a single point in his last 41 rounds.
So Conor will face the third member of the 15-round maxers club, Jon O'Neill, on Thursday. Tomorrow is Jack Hurst against David O'Donnell, and Smiley Rawlo plays the winner of that the following day. And on Friday, after eight weeks of play between contestants whose careers span 30 years, we find out who becomes Countdown's ultimate champion.
And when the champion is crowned, Mark, Innis and Zarte will be part way through hour 16 of their 25-hour Comic Relief Countdown marathon (have I mentioned this before?). Please give them all the support you can.
Anyway, amidst all this carry-on, Rachael Moran has been stuck on 3 wins since December. Next Monday is the start of series 68 proper, where we'll pick up from where we left off. See you then.
Further summaries are at:
http://www.apterous.org/cdb/series.php?series=-16
