Ep 127: Avi Chanales, Neil McInnes (June 16, 2016; originally aired January 25, 2011)

Rounds: Here.


It's the third night for Avi Chanales, and Richard turns the conversation to the subject of tutoring that Avi does.  Avi explains that his university is located in a notoriously underprivileged community, so once a week he goes to public schools in the area to tutor fifth graders in mathematics and reading.

Tonight's challenger is Neil McInnes, a managing director of a company called Way Out Evacuation Systems.  It's unusual for a company to get explicitly mentioned like that; I would have thought the show's producers were wary of providing advertising.  Anyway, that company's main business is 'glow in the dark' technology, used for escape signs on ships and submarines, or incorporated into stair-nosings in stadiums.  As Richard says, this is for cases when an emergency happens and the ordinary lights fail.


Neil started off with a small gain in the first round, then was unlucky that his declaration in the second round was not in the Macquarie.  That let Avi tie up the scores, and then a second invalid answer from Neil in the first numbers round put Avi into the lead.  A shared round followed, then Neil closed the gap to a single point in round five.  Avi fought back immediately, solving the second numbers round to go a crucial eleven points ahead.  The next two rounds were shared, and Avi was safe going into the conundrum.  Neither contestant was able to solve it, so Avi got through with the win, 43 to 32.

I had a decent game; I did drop three letters maxima, but only one of those was findable for me.  The numbers were cooperative, and I managed to solve the conundrum to push my solo total into the seventies again, which is where I like to be.