Monday 14th September 2015 (Series 73, Prelim 51)

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Giles
Series 68 Champion
Posts: 92
Joined: Sun Oct 26, 2008 3:11 pm
Location: Farnham, Surrey

Monday 14th September 2015 (Series 73, Prelim 51)

Post by Giles »

Countdown recap for Monday 14 September 2015.

C1: Champion Matty Artell (5 wins, 474 points). An apterite and student from Chester.
C2: Challenger Wayne McSorley. A stock and systems administrator from Bradford who likes online Scrabble and beekeeping and currently has 3 hives!

Nick introduces the show by saying it's "Know Your Numbers" week, which doesn't refer to Rachel's numbers but instead those that relate to blood pressure. 125,000 adults have heart attacks or strokes each year caused by high blood pressure! Go and get it checked! Nick then said he was glad that they found Rachel's heart (!) when she went to have a check-up.
DC: Susie Dent and Jon Culshaw. Jon mentions that the piece of equipment which measures blood pressure is a sphygmomanometer (pretty sure he forgot the 'mo' when saying it aloud) but no-one else in the studio appeared to have heard it before.
RR: Rachel Riley.
OT: Other words or solutions.

R01: H G E I U A T L V
R02: T S U C S O I T E
R03: 25, 6, 10, 1, 9, 5. Target: 198.
TTT: LEANCRAB - "It's not a lean crab, but it's a very thin crustacean"
R04: I A M G T E R P A
R05: G Q N E O I R F D
R06: 50, 25, 8, 7, 6, 7. Target: 228.
R07: W A N B V I O A R
R08: E O E T S G R A P
R09: 100, 3, 4, 1, 3, 7. Target: 804.
TTT: EPICSHIP - "Do carpenters often get their lunch here?"
R10: E U S L A B N D E
R11: R Z T I A M T E A
R12: E A E Y P T R N M
R13: C X D I E U O S A
R14: 5, 7, 1, 2, 2, 6. Target: 633.
R15: B E E R T O A L L (conundrum)


And now a brief interlude before our main feature:

SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER
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SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER CORBYN SPOILER
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SPOILER SPOILER TURNBULL SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER
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SPOILER ABBOTT SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER
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SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER

Revel in the oncoming proceedings.


Round 1: H G E I U A T L V

Matty: LIGATE (6)
Wayne: VALUE (5)
DC: ALIGHT (6) GLAIVE (6) GELATI (6)
OT: VIHUELA (7) VULGATE (7)
Score: 6–0 (max 7)

Matty gets off to a good start with a commonly seen word and Susie explains that a glaive is a literary term for a small sword. Vulgate is common or colloquial speech and a vihuela is a plant, actually, no, it's a stringed Spanish instrument.

Round 2: T S U C S O I T E

Matty: COSIEST (7)
Wayne: COSIEST (7)
DC: CUTTIES (7)
OT: COTTISES (8)
Score: 13–7 (max 15)

A comfortable seven each as DC gets a type of short tobacco pipe that appears in Burns' Tam O'Shanter poem. No-one sees the darren that is COTTISES, though.

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Round 3: 25, 6, 10, 1, 9, 5. Target: 198.

Matty: 198. (9-1) x 25 - 10 / 5 (10)
Wayne: -
Score: 23–7 (max 25)

Wayne blanks on this one and Matty further increases his lead.

Teatime teaser: LEANCRAB -> BARNACLE

Round 4: I A M G T E R P A

Matty: GAMIER (6)
Wayne: MIGRATE (7)
DC: MARGATE (7) PRIMATE (7) RAGTIME (7)
OT: GEMATRIA (8)
Score: 23–14 (max 33)

Wayne beats Matty for the first time, bringing the scores back to within 10 of each other. A margate is a grey fish. Another darren slips by unnoticed (which I got).

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Round 5: G Q N E O I R F D

Matty: FORDING (7)
Wayne: FORDING (7)
DC: FOREIGN (7) IGNORED (7)
OT: ERODING (7) FIREDOG (7) FRINGED (7) GROINED (7) REDOING (7)
Score: 30–21 (max 40)

7s apiece, and to ford a river means to cross it in a shallow place.

Round 6: 50, 25, 8, 7, 6, 7. Target: 228.

Matty: 225. (7/7 + 8) x 25 (7)
Wayne: 226. Mistake in working.
RR: 228. ((25 - 7 - 7) x 8 - 50) x 6 (10)
Score: 37–21 (max 50)

Wayne goes too high into the 400s, so Matty takes the 7 points. Rachel finds an interesting way to get there.

Jon talks about the New Horizons mission taking 9 years to get to Pluto and capture the amazingly high resolution photos of the recently demoted dwarf planet, and describes a scale model of the Solar System, with the two metre diameter Countdown clock as the Sun.

Round 7: W A N B V I O A R

Matty: BRAIN (5)
Wayne: RAINBOW (7)
DC: BRAVO (5)
OT: OVARIAN (7)
Score: 37–28 (max 57)

Wayne pulls one out of the hat with RAINBOW which is pretty hard to spot. Sadly, it's just a single rainbow and not a double rainbow across the sky as Matty just has 5. Notably, Rachel forgets her alphabet momentarily and laughs when she says U as she picks out an O.

Round 8: E O E T S G R A P

Matty: PORTAGES (8)
Wayne: PROTEGES (8)
DC: POSTAGE (7) TOERAGS (7)
OT: OPERATES (8) POTAGERS (8) PROTEASE (8)
Score: 45–36 (max 65)

Nice spots from both contestants as the scores remain 9 apart.

Round 9: 100, 3, 4, 1, 3, 7. Target: 804.

Matty: 804. (7 + 1) x 100 + 4 (10)
Wayne: 804. (7 + 1) x 100 + 4 (10)
Score: 55–46 (max 75)

An easy 1 large does nothing to separate Matty and Wayne.

Teatime teaser: EPICSHIP -> CHIPPIES

Round 10: E U S L A B N D E

Matty: SUNBED (6)
Wayne: BUNDLES (7)
DC: SENDABLE (8)
OT: UNSEALED (8)
Score: 55–53 (max 83)

Wayne gets BUNDLES ("of women" pipes Mitt Romney) which brings his score a bit closer to the champion's.

In Origins of Words, Susie discusses some words that Ammon Shea picked out when he read the whole 20 volumes of the OED.

Round 11: R Z T I A M T E A

Matty: MATTER (6)
Wayne: mattier x
DC: MATTER (6) MATIER (6)
OT: AMARETTI (8)
Score: 61–53 (max 91)

Matty doesn't go with the eponymous comparative but Wayne does risk it but alas it goes awry. A great darren of Italian biscuits sneaks by.

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Round 12: E A E Y P T R N M

Matty: TEMPER (6)
Wayne: TAMPER (6)
DC: PETERMAN (8) REPAYMENT (18) PENTAMERY (18)
Score: 67–59 (max 109)

An initially flat looking round produces amazing results with an archaic 8 and two 9s! Pentamery is a new one on me which refers to fivefold symmetry of animals, especially echinoderms.

Round 13: C X D I E U O S A

Matty: dioces x
Wayne: CAUSED (6)
DC: COAXED (6) EXODUS (6)
OT: EDACIOUS (8)
Score: 67–65 (max 117)

Matty misspells diocese, which means Wayne can get back the 6 points from his earlier mattier mistake. OXIDASE and EDACIOUS are there as longer words, the latter being the final darren of the day.

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Round 14: 5, 7, 1, 2, 2, 6. Target: 633.

Matty: -
Wayne: 630. (1 + 2 + 6) x 7 x 2 x 5 (7)
RR: 632. 7 x 5 x (2+1) x 6 + 2 (7)
Score: 67–72 (max 124)

Wayne lets Rachel have her choice on the numbers and she goes with 6 small. This leaves Matty with a face like this:

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because 6 small is inherently evil. Matty doesn't get anywhere near, but Wayne manages 3 away and bags 7 points, giving him the upper hand going into the crucial conundrum. Rachel says she did 7 x 90 + 2 to get 632, and that 633 is impossible.

Round 15: B E E R T O A L L

Wayne buzzes on 2.5 seconds to say TOLERABLE which is correct.
Final Score: 67–82 (max 134)

In a tense finale, Wayne buzzes in quickly and gets the answer, toppling Matty as champion. Rachel mentions how she felt the pressure and says sorry to Matty for having chosen 6 small (again demonstrating how evil that numbers pick is).

Join someone tomorrow for another recap with Wayne 'NOT THE BEES' McSorley as champion.

Further summaries are at:
http://cdb.apterous.org/series.php?series=73
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