They came from as far afield as Culverhouse Cross, Llandaf and Splott and we now know that the capital of Madagascar is Antananarivo.
The annual NUJ Training Wales Pub Quiz drew the great and the good of the South-East Wales media, especially Carole Green from ITV Wales who rounded up 15 journalists from the channel to field three teams.
Another great and good journalist, Tim Rogers, presenter of Week In Week Out (last seen testing out a cure for road rage on this week’s programme) brought along 6 journalists and production staff from the BBC Wales strand.
The beautifully renovated Chapel 1877 on Churchill Way provided the back-drop and centre stage was Nick Dermody of BBC Online. The quizmaster supreme had questions on News & Current Affairs, Hallowe’en (given the date), Celebrity Real Names, Geography & Sport, and picture rounds on SciFi Figures, Celebrity Dolls and more …
Everyone was expecting the South Wales Argus to come and not only defend their title but make it a hat-trick after wins in 2011 & 12. John Phillips of the Argus cut a lonely figure from the paper but with his team-mates managed to pull off quite a coup (more later).
The accolade of Media Masterminds now belongs to ITV Wales with three of them in the winning team, Leveson’s Lovelies: Mike Talbot, Rob King and Richard Morgan – ably aided by freelance journalists, Jenny Sims and Brian Morgan.
Second was a team of only three, ironically called The No Hopers: Freelance Steve Jones, Heath Jeffries of the ONS and John Phillips of the Argus, bravely attempting to defend his fellow journalists’ winning streak.
Third was an unadulterated ITV Wales quintet named Totally NACA’red (News & Current Affairs, tired … geddit?): Carole Green, Sarah Powell, James Wright, Nick Powell and Ailsa Chalk.
Tim Rogers and Karen Voisey of WIWO teamed up with two Post Graduate Diploma students from the Cardiff Journalism School (JOMEC) and a team made up of 4 JOMEC students scored the best result ever for students at a Training Wales quiz. They also won the prize of 5 bonus points for the most imaginative topical team name: JOMECa Brooks.
This was the most closely fought contest in the history of NUJ Training Wales pub quizzes. The competition in the air was intense but no-one lost their temper, even when it turned out that the celebrity doll who looked like Anne Robinson was in fact Hilary Clinton.
As an attention-seeking project manager for the training programme, I obliged attendees to hang on to every word of my welcome speech by announcing that there would be a whole round on questions relating to NUJ Training Wales.
It’s been suggested that we run a Christmas pub quiz but Anna Miller and I are only just getting over the stress of running this one (Will anyone turn up? How do we know how much food to order?) but it was so much fun just watch this space!