Birthday Championship Spoilers For Tuesday January 22nd 2013

[James Robinson]

So, we're now onto the 3rd game of this 1st round proper and like the start of last week, we're heading into the past once more with 2 players from the 9 round era taking part in today's matchup.

First up is a quarter-finalist from Series 28, Chris Hawkins, who had the misfortune to be up against a certain Master Eadie in his quarter-final back in 1994. His opponent is Jill Bright, who was also a quarter-finalist, albeit back in 1998, but as well as making an appearance at CoChest in 2011, she is best known for being the 1st and as far as I'm aware, only, person to get back-to-back 9's in the first 2 rounds of a game in screen.

Here are the stats:

Firstly, Series 28 Quarter-Finalist Chris Hawkins - 6 Games, 4 Wins, 348 Points (Average: 58 - All 9 rounders)
Highest Score: 69 vs. Jane Willis (2nd Game)
Lowest Score: 43 vs. Damian Eadie (Quarter-Final)
9's Achieved: 1/4
Total Points/Max/%: 348/487 (71%)
Letters Points/Max/%: 210/307 (68%)
Numbers Points/Max/%: 98/120 (82%)
Conundrum Points/Max/%: 40/60 (67%)

Secondly, Series 38 Quarter-Finalist Jill Bright - 8 Games, 6 Wins, 458 Points (Average: 57.25 - All 9 rounders)
Highest Score: 81 vs. Wilma Anscombe (2nd Game)
Lowest Score: 50 vs. Kevin Philpott (7th Game)
9's Achieved: 3/5
Total Points/Max/%: 458/633 (72%)
Letters Points/Max/%: 306/393 (78%)
Numbers Points/Max/%: 132/160 (83%)
Conundrum Points/Max/%: 20/80 (25%)

I'll be back in the recappers' chair later on.

[szodiac]

Funny how Scrabble players always see sevens

Mauro

[Jordan F]

Chris certainly played very well, I think he'll be a strong opponent for either Conor or Mark in the next round, in particular VIHUELAS was a great spot. Jill played well, but Chris was on top form on this day.

[John Brackstone]

unfasten in round one

[szodiac]

Well played Chris and Jill. I think only Wayne Kelly managed to avoid those CSW only words of all the Scrabble players in the competition. Chris slipped up with YAWNIEST and PETTINGS but his impressive VIHUELAS certainly made up for it.


Mauro

[szodiac]

Chris certainly played very well, I think he'll be a strong opponent for either Conor or Mark in the next round, in particular VIHUELAS was a great spot. Jill played well, but Chris was on top form on this day.

I'm not so sure. Conor and Mark are far too experienced at Countdown than all the Scrabble players put together. I may be proved wrong.

Jill was never in this game, IMO.

Mauro

[Nick Deller]

A decent but slightly patchy performance by Chris here - he spilled the beans to me a few days ago about how the game went, and reckoned he was definitely more willing to take risks because he already had a decent lead. I knew he'd spot VIHUELAS because he taught it to me, but I had no idea if it was ODE-friendly! He also told me he didn't do much Countdown-specific study - though he clearly watched the show on January 7th and demonstrated that he'd learned how to pronounce BORGATE!

In the interests of Series 28/Peterborough Scrabble Club solidarity, I supplied Chris with quite a lot of apto-lists to plough through between this recording and the batch currently in studio. We'll have to wait a few weeks now to find out if it worked...

[Nick Deller]

Aaaaand Chris has messaged me to answer a query that hasn't been asked yet (but it will be, oh it will be!). In the VIHUELAS round, he's seen spelling out V-I-H-U-L-A-S without the E, and on a retake he fluffed the spelling again with VIHULEAS. He reckons he was probably given the benefit of the doubt because when he first *pronounced* the word, it was very clear that the E was present and intended to be in the right place.

[Jojo Apollo]

Good to see Jill in the line-up, I remember her two nines in a row in the nine rounder. Well done to Chris on the win. I'd like to see a picture of that jigsaw with 24,000 pieces.

[Nick Deller]

I'd like to see a picture of that jigsaw with 24,000 pieces.

Ask and you shall receive! One picture of the whole thing filling up Chris's entire living room, one closer-up view of a single 6000-piece section of it. And remember, as I'm crap at internets, the link probably won't work at the first attempt.

[Ryan Taylor]

Some great spots from Chris today particularly the back-to-back NEUROSIS and VIHUELAS. However, as good as these were, there were the odd misses (ANNULETS, ENDGAME, BROMIDES and perhaps that PETTINGS round) which would most certainly be costly against someone with the consistency of Mark Tournoff or Conor Travers who he will play next. So definitely a great player and one that's capable of beating either Conor or Mark in a one-off game, although I just feel the above misses would be swept up by players further on in the tournament. Lovely quick conundrum solve too btw! Although that whole conundrum sequence seemed to start and end very quickly. All a bit of a rush!

[Jojo Apollo]

I'd like to see a picture of that jigsaw with 24,000 pieces.

Ask and you shall receive! One picture of the whole thing filling up Chris's entire living room, one closer-up view of a single 6000-piece section of it. And remember, as I'm crap at internets, the link probably won't work at the first attempt.

Wow!!! That sure is an impressive jigsaw. Thanks Nick.

[James Robinson]

2nd Numbers Alt.: ((50 x 6) - 75 - 8) x 4 = 868

URODELE in round 3, TANGIEST in round 11.

[Johnny Canuck]

Great matchup today between two classic finalists! For what it's worth I played along and drew against Chris 81-81. VIHUELAS was a phenomenal spot. Good luck to him when he takes on Mark/Conor.

[Brian Moore]

I'd like to see a picture of that jigsaw with 24,000 pieces.

Ask and you shall receive! One picture of the whole thing filling up Chris's entire living room, one closer-up view of a single 6000-piece section of it. And remember, as I'm crap at internets, the link probably won't work at the first attempt.

Wow!!! That sure is an impressive jigsaw. Thanks Nick.

Even more impressive is sticking it to a wall with carpet on, though I think the coal might fall out of the fireplace.

Even if today's game wasn't the greatest, it's good to see faces from further back given a chance, and it's not all NBGs. It's been a feast so far.

[Adam Gillard]

NBGs

What does that mean?

[Brian Moore]

NBGs

What does that mean?

http://www.c4countdown.co.uk/viewtopic. ... 99#p121099

[James Robinson]

First Round Game 3 2020 Word Update

This game might not have been shown, but I'm sure some people are intrigued....

The max would have increased by just one point (from 123 to 124) if played today thanks to and 8 available in Round 4, that wasn't around in 2013.

Intriguingly, that 8 would've also changed the scores, as Chris had it disallowed in the original show, so the score would've been 103-45, instead of 95-51.

New Words Now Allowed:

R2: GOATIER, PARIGOT, PEATBOG, PIGBOAT, PREBAIT
R3: ROWELED
R4: YAWNIEST (increases MAX from 7 to 8, and would also have given Chris 8 more points....)
R8: GOADMEN
R9: BOARDIES, RADIOBES
R11: GENIPATS
R12: AEROCAR
R13: PLOUTERS, POULTERS