The Times Crossword Championship Day

Some photos and the results.

On Saturday I had a long day out in London to attend the Times Crossword Championship for the 5th time. Dawn gave me a lift to the station and I was in good time for the 7:25 to Ipswich where I would join the 8:10 train to London.... ...or so I thought.

About 5 minutes before we were due to arrive in Ipswich the guard came and asked if I was going to London. When I said I was, he told me he had just heard that there had been a massive signalling failure in the Shenfield region and no trains were going to London. His advice was to take the next train back the way I had come and carry on to Cambridge where I would 4 minutes to across to platform 8 for the 9:44 fast train to London.

I was joined by plenty of others in the same predicament.

So about an hour and a half after I had left Bury St. Edmunds station I was at it again! Luckily the train arrived 2 minutes early into Cambridge and I was able to get across to the 9:44 train in time and arrived at Kings Cross at 10:35. Phew!

There was a big queue to get in through the airport style security when I got to The Times offices.

Off to the side of the queue was a gathering of setters. They are not allowed to enter the competition, but had come along for the fun.

Everyone had name badges.

There was coffee, some mini croissants and fruit before the start.

A chance to catch up with old friends.

Time to take our seats for the Qualifier round.

The room is on the 17th floor of the building and there are great views.

I took my seat, number 54.

Here I am in action using my Spem in Alium pencil from this singing day earlier in the year. You get an hour to solve 3 puzzles.

The puzzles were much harder this year and I didn't get to hold my number up to say I was finished  - the 60 minutes were up and I still had a few answers missing... but so did lots of others. As it turned out, only 10 out of 110 competitors had finished all 3 puzzles correctly!

Time for the buffet lunch.

Then there was a question and answer session with Mick Hodgkin (Puzzles editor), Jason Crampton (Crossword editor) and Colin Thomas (the recently appointed Assistant Crossword editor).

The results were displayed on the screens. Despite having 6 answers missing and 1 spelt wrong, I had qualified for the semi-final!

I took seat number 36 this time.

I raced through the first puzzle (apart from a couple of answers) but I found the second much harder and the third... well I recognised the style as being that of John Henderson who's puzzles I always have a lot of trouble with. Brain fade kicked in and I got well and truly stuck. But never mind, I was never going to be challening for a grand final place anyway.

The semi-final results...

...showed that the current champion (Mark) and 3 past champions were in the final, along with Chloe Hutton who came second last year and won the prize for bet newcomer.

It was a race to see who could finish. It was quite a tough puzzle. Some people in the audience had a go at it at the same time, but I kept my copy to do later. You can find it online here.

 

Mark Goodliffe, won for a record 14th time, solving the fiendish final puzzle in 8:55. The other prize places were taken by 2018 champion Roger Crabtree in second with a time of 13:00, just ahead of 2023 champion Matthew Marcus on 13:28. 1997 champion David Howell came fourth, with last year’s winner of the Richard Rogan Prize for best-placed newcomer, Chloe Hutton, in fifth place. This year’s Richard Rogan Prize was awarded to Craig Fothergill.

Here is Mark with the trophy.

After a drinks reception, it was on to The George.

It was very busy and got even busier. I didn't take many pictures. I met up with David1 and Gothick in the coach house bar (seen here with Mick Hodgkin and Professor Sid - read about how his AI Programme Darvok got on in this article in today's Times).).

Some ladies took a photo on David's camera for us.

Outside was busy too.

I'd been checking the trains from Liverpool Street and everything seemed to be running fine again. So shortly after 8pm I said my goodbyes and headed for my 9pm train home, getting in just after 11pm.

A long and tiring day, but enjoyable. Will I be back next year? I think so.

You can find a post with links to the results here on Times for The Times, a gallery of photos from the official photogropher of the day here and more of my own photos on Flickr here.