The Brainteaser Experience By James Aukett
			The first round in our heat was Scramble, where a word is broken up into syllables, then jumbled up before the contestants have to work out what the word is. Five points are awarded to the contestant that buzzes in first with the correct answer. I started off quite well, amassing a 25-0 lead before Stuart commented: "His button keeps beating mine!" However, some of the words we had to unscramble were quite difficult, but Stuart was then able to give two consecutive right answers, before I sneaked in to get the last word correct, which resulted in me leading 30-10 at the end of the first round.
			SUMMARY OF "SCRAMBLE" (J) indicates I got the answer correct. (S) indicates Stuart got the answer correct. (N) indiactes neither of us got the answer correct. COMMOTION (J) 5-0 DEMANDING (J) 10-0 SPECIALIST (J) 15-0 ELEVATION (N) 15-0 GHOULISHLY (N) 15-0 INSTANTLY (J) 20-0 COUNSELLOR (J) 25-0 MANUMISSION (N) 25-0 VIRTIOLIC (N) 25-0 LANGUISH (S) 25-5 ENTERPRISING (S) 25-10 SURROUNDING (J) 30-10
		The second round was Crossfire, which is vaguely similar to a crossword puzzle. Ten points are awrded for each correct answer. The player with the most points at the end of the first round (which happened to be me!) gets control of the round until he or she gets a wrong answer, when control goes over to the other contestant. The round ends when all the answers on the puzzle have been revealed. It was quite tricky to begin with, as neither me or Stuart knew either of the first two answers. Then, since control had passed back to me, I achieved three consecutive correct answers before control went back to Stuart. He got two answers on the trot right, before control eventually went back to me and I got the last answer on the puzzle correct.
		SUMMARY OF "CROSSFIRE" (J) indicates I got the answer correct. (S) indicates Stuart got the answer correct. (N) indicates neither of us got the answer correct. 7d incicates 7 down on the puzzle, 10a indicates 10 across, etc.... 5d ROOKIE (N) 30-10 4a BRAGG (N) 30-10 8a KEEGAN (J) 40-10 9a BETH (J) 50-10 7d DELHI (J) 60-10 10a ISABEL (N) 60-10 3d ABDOMINAL (S) 60-20 6a CLEO (S) 60-30 2d COPLAND (N) 60-30 1a BUBONIC (J) 70-30
		And it was the end of the heat. I had beaten Stuart 70-30, and a shake of hands for sportsmanship between us somewhat gave Craig the impression that there was a fix of coughing going on (you guessed it!), to which I gave a fairly weak cough. But the game had to go on, and so it was that I was to face Mark in the semi-final.... (Since my appearance on Brainteaser, there has been the addition of an extra round in the first heat called Wordplay, where contestants simply have to solve an anagram of a word that is five to nine letters long. The contestant that buzzes in first with the correct answer gets ten points, and this round usually determines which contestant goes through and avoids the possibility of a tie-break, which had happened in some previous cases....)
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