Corporate Quiz Review

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Fitch Ratings 13th April 2010

It got darker as the night wore on, but storminess was never an issue, as Fitch Ratings turned their brainpower to the task of winning the annual Fitch Quiz Trophy ... not to mention a whole host of other goodies besides.

An atmosphere of library-like studiousness settled over proceedings as the serious business got under way. The Bean Counters put down an early ... er ... counter with maximum points on the first round, with a large proportion of the field breathing down their necks a couple of points behind. That situation continued in the second round, although the early chasing pack now started to get a bit whittled down, with Gin'll Fix It, Rogue Trainers, & Flipchart Flunkies emerging as the main challengers at this stage. The third round eased the leaders a further point ahead, with Gin'll Fix It hanging on, but the others in the leading group slipped back, as Kick AAA+SS & KOOL-AID made their bids to catch up - which is how it remained at the halfway point.

"But what of the more interesting end of the table?" I hear you ask (don't I?). Sadly, on this occasion, it wasn't very interesting in the lower reaches of the scoresheet. The Saharan Kayaking Club clearly put too much energy into dreaming up their name & scored half marks on the first round. Unfortunately, the only managed to get double figures again once, so slipped ever further behind the team above them as the quiz progressed.

The second half kicked off with a very high scoring round (Saharan Kayakers excepted) with all the major players getting maximum marks, the exception being Kick AAA+SS, who slipped up on one question. This was the beginnig of a bit of a decline for them, as their challenge dwindled away to see them finishing in 6th place. Never mind, they did win the Best Team Name prize (AAA+? Fitch Ratings? Geddit?).

In similar fashion, round 6 saw KOOL-AID start to falter & the gap between them & second place grew slowly wider as the evening drew to a close, but their 3rd spot was never really under threat.

So that left Gin'll Fix It & The Bean Counters to slog it out at the top. Tension mounted as Gin closed the gap to 2 points in a tricky 6th round, but the Beans held their nerve in 7 to leave it all to play for in the final music based round. Now, over the years, this last round has seen some dramatic late turnarounds in the Fitch quiz, so would it happen again, & would we be forced to dust off our tie break questions perhaps? No was the answer, as the Bean Counters sealed their win with a cool maximum score to end the night on an impressive 145 points (out of 160), while the Gin'll Fix It combo trailed in 6 points behind. Results here (Microsoft excel... etc etc)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

JLT Sports Quiz 25th March 2010

Once again, our friends at JLT gathered together their best sporting brains to find out who would be crowned Sports Quiz Champions 2010.

Most teams started well, with no less than 4 teams (Tiger Woods' Sex Therapists, Beer Today Gone Tomorrow, Quiz Akabussi, Chris & The Substiutes) scoring maximum points. Sadly for the others, that was to be the last time they were on a par with the Tiger Woods mob, who achieved the highest score in each round except the last to take the title with an impressive margin of 11 points, scoring 144 out of a possible 160. Sports Quiz Friends had the honour of being the only team to beat them in any round, when their final round knowledge of events of the past year in sport pipped the champions elect by a single point.

At the other end of the table, there was a brief struggle for the coveted last place, but ultimately it was brief. The writing was on the wall when Fat People Are Harder To Kidnap became the only team to score single figures on round 1. The aptly named No Idea did threaten to take part in the bottom of the table tussle in the early stages, but some solid scoring in the later rounds eased them away from the danger zone.

The only other contenders proved to be 4 Js, A Tea & A Pea, who were being dragged into definite contention for last place as they tailed off badly after the half time interval, while Fat People upped their game to get within a point of sharing last place. But the 4Js rallied at the death to beat the Fatties in the last round & secure second bottom spot.

So, a good time was had by all & we even worked out why it is that The Orange Trampoline Dismantlers From The Lower West Side Of Buxton chose such a bizarre name. Well, we think we did anyway. See the results for yourselves here (requires Microsoft Excel)

Field Fisher Waterhouse  Corporate Quiz 22 October 2009

The Barracuda Bar was packed to the rafters with 44 teams vying for the title of Field Fisher Waterhouse Quiz Champions 2010. Our markers were kept busy with the full range of scores on display. Yes, we are used to getting some maximum marks in our quizzes, but we also had a few zeros this time out!

This meant that the battle for last place was pretty much over from the start, with The Dummies never really challenged, despite showing some potential with a 12 & an 8 thrown in at the halfway stage & the final round. Better luck next time girls!

Higher up the leader board, Chipmunk emerged as winners with an impressive 10 point gap. They overcame a slightly slow start to hit the front in round 3 & continued to score consistently to edge ahead, finally breaking the opposition in rounds 6 & 7 with their knowledge of Georges & Cockney rhyming slang. This was where they won the competition, establishing their unassailable lead. You Lot Standing At The Bar eased into second place with a strong second half, but left it too late. Likewise Please Sir Can We Have Some More who finished a point behind in third place.

So, the champagne & bragging rights went to Chipmunk, & our thanks go to all at Field Fisher Waterhouse for their continuing & wonderful support. We're looking forward to doing it all again next year.

Certainly dark, in no way stormy. Results here.

 

Lovells Corporate Quiz 22 October 2009

Lovells kindly invited us along to their offices in Holborn to present this quiz. In what was probably a first for the City Friends group, our quiz audience consisted entirely of ladies, most of whom were Lovells clients. Despite the stunning views over the nighttime skyline of London, plus some delicious food & liquid refreshment, the concentration levels were at their highest as battle commenced.

The story at the top was one of calm control, as Team's Got Talent edged into an early lead & moved slowly away from their nearest rivals, finishing with a maximum on the last round to end any hopes of a late upset. There was a brief scare following a maximum in round 4 from second placed Gin'll Fix It, which saw them move to within one point of the lead, but the Talented ones weren't unnerved & edged further away over the remaining rounds.

Whiskey Wenches were early contenders for last place, but recovered toward the closing stages to claw their way off the bottom of the rankings. Their place was taken by Girls Aloud (no, not the real ones) after a disastrous fifth round spoiled some otherwise consistent scoring. The Girls were at pains to point out though that they did only have 5 in their team. In addition, one of those WAS hosting the evening, so we could put it down to a case of "doing the honourable thing" surely? Better luck next time Girls Aloud! Scoresheet here
 

HSBC Corporate Quiz  14 October 2009

Attached please find the results of last night's GK quiz for HSBC at t'Poet.

As you can see, a fantastic 28 teams were vying for first place in a winner-takes-all, one-prize-only quiz. Some, however, vied more strongly than others. The Drumsticks may have set a new all time lowest score record, as well as posting the lowest score in no less than 6 of the 8 rounds! They briefly flickered into life in round 5 (perhaps they respond well to food?) to score double figures & cut the ever-widening gap to "only" 7 points, but it all went downhill again from there. To be fair though, I think there were only three of them. Better luck next time!

Amidst a very lively atmosphere, the same few teams jostled for positions in the top 3. Early contenders Boyd's Wonders looked strong going towards halfway, but ran out of stamina to finish in mid table. After a brief early showing which fizzled out, Philips Fillies were the exact opposite, finding their form in the second half to climb up the leader board into 4th place. The top 3 spots were pretty consistently held by Quiz Team Aguilera, Loo's Vegetables, & Absolutely Hank Marvin. Those 3 were never separated by more than 6 points, with the Marvin combo holding top spot all the way while the others battled to keep on their coat tails. A grandstand finish was set up after round 7 when the Vegetables pulled themselves level with QTA in joint second spot, just 3 points behind the leaders. 3 points doesn't sound a lot, but it's a tall order to overcome that sort of deficit in one round. Never ones to shirk a challenge though (unless the challenge is thinking of a team name we haven't heard before), QTA came up with maximum marks in the final round to leave themselves 2 points clear of the Marvins. A great final round for the vegetables also meant they drew level with the Marvins to finish equal second at the death.

You might think the Marvins would be suicidal having led from the start & got pipped in the final round, but they were very philosophical. Why would that be then? Well, put it down to experience ... almost exactly the same thing happened to them at the last HSBC quiz, where they surrendered top spot with 2 rounds to go! Based on that progress, they should definitely enter the next one.
JLT Music Quiz 1 October 2009

From EmCee Pete “in his own write”

Once again we gathered in the plushness of the JLT atrium to find out who amongst them knows their M.A.R.R.S. from their Elbow when it comes to chart music of the last 40 years or so. The subjects on show ranged from Mr Blobby to Green Day, Cliff Richard to the Sex Pistols, Scouting For Girls to Nirvana, & Celine Dion to Little Richard, so a wide knowledge was going to be required to bring home the bacon on this particular night.

The atmosphere was rather boisterous in certain areas of the room, resulting in the volume going up several notches at various stages of the proceedings. If only boisterousness correlated with points, some teams would have walked it. However, it was left to the relatively well behaved Quiz Eubank to triumph with a masterly 129 out of a possible maximum 144. It was reasonably competitive at the top, with Quizzie Rascal, Pinball Wazid, E=MC Hammer (a double musical reference there, nice!), & JLT RE-member You're a Womble all starting well. In fact, Quizzie Rascal scored the only maximu points of the evening just after the halfway mark, but they were too inconsistent to catch the eventual winners. The halfway mark was also the point at which Pinball Wazid started to fall away, so they are probably blaming either the pie or the drink.

Untitled finished the evening at the foot of (if not under) the table, perhaps being one of the teams with a combo not well up on the earlier chart years I would guess. A terrible lyrics round saw Churm & The Charmers drift down to the wrong end of the scoresheet - too much reliance on the karaoke machine there possibly!

So, well done Quiz Eubank, & better luck next time everybody else, but most importantly, thank you very much to our friends at JLT for supporting us once again.

He also added - Stick that in your website & smoke it! Can’t think what he could have meant!

Scoresheet available here

 

JLT Quiz 25 June 2009

Last night was the culmination of the "JLT Quiz Season", which consists of 2 semi finals prior to last night's final, & the results are attached.

17 teams rolled their brains up & got stuck in, in a bid to get their name on the new trophy (which is in the post apparently) ... not to mention the champagne & bragging rights. The withdrawal of the defending champions left the field wide open, although the presence of multiple champions of previous years CI5 meant that others would have their work cut out to get to the top of the leader board.

So it proved, as CI5 opened with maximum marks to set the bar. However, the next 2 rounds saw them slip to 3rd place, as Who Let The MOGS Out, & One Man & His Bat edged ahead to make it a serious 3 horse race. CI5 are no quitters though, & came out fighting in the second half of the evening to score another maximum & retake the lead. They then hung on grimly as the MOGS kept the pressure up, & the Bat men looked as though they were starting to falter. It all changed in a dramatic final round, however, as CI5 slipped up & concede a 4 point swing to both the other 2 teams in contention, allowing Who Let The MOGS Out to sneak through & take the honours a the last gasp. CI5 just hung on to fininsh second, a point ahead of One Man & His Bat.

At the other end of the table, there was also edge of the seat excitement as 5 teams hovered around the bottom position during the evening, with last place swapping on a regular basis. At first, a slow start seemed to indicate that the battle would be between Cats Whiskers & SuBo's Psychiatrists. But Welch's Wizards were slowly drawn into the fray & a poor picture round saw them sink to the bottom. Not for long - round 5 proved a disaster for Boozers & Losers, who now shared last place with the Cat people. In round 6, a comebacl allowed Cats Whiskers to claw (sorry) their way off the bottom again, leaving the Wizards to share it with the B&L team. By this stage, 4 Fish & 2 Mushrooms (don't ask!) were drifting ever closer to trouble as well, to set up a nail biting finale, with only 4 points separating these 5 teams going into the last round, at which point the Wizards were propping up the table. The response was stunning however, as a final round maximum score took Welch's Wizards well clear of danger at the death - perhaps they'd been toying with us all along? Sadly it all proved too much for Cats Whiskers, who sank to the foot of rankings at just the wrong time to finish in the wooden spoon position, albeit with a creditable 97 out of a possible 160.

All that, & £4,500 raised for Cancer Research UK.

Sorry there were no pics - T’Missus needed the camera!

UIB Quiz - 6th May 2009

The number of teams was reduced due to a minor football match occuring elsewhere. As it was, perhaps the Chelsea fans would have been better off coming along to the quiz after all, although the quizmaster might not have appreciated being surrounded at the end.

This was a bit unusual in terms of corporate quiz nights, as there was (a) only one maximum score all evening (not by the winners) (b) the battle at top of the leaderboard didn't really happen (c) overall, the scoring was pretty consistent, being neither particularly high nor particularly low.

After an early tussle at the top, winners Kiss My Chuddies established a 5 point lead after round 3 & never let it slip. In fact, they were going away from the field at the end, winning by a massive 11 points. Youth & Experience did look to try & exert some pressure with the night's only maximum score in round 6, but it was all too little, too late & they faded again, although this was enough to bring them level with 3 Men & An Itie in second place.

In the lower regions of the scoreboard, last place was hotly contested in the early stages. A bad 4th round from Here Come The Girls opened up a gap which they never managed to close however, despite top scoring in the penultimate round. The girls did have the last laugh though, when the spot prize envelope was opened. This contained the finish position which would earn a bottle of wine for each team member, & the lucky position was ... last! Cue radiant smiles all round. See the results here (requires Microsoft Excel or compatible thingummy)