FED up of taking home the wooden spoon after your local pub quiz?
You’re not alone — millions lack enough confidence in their general knowledge to put it to the test in public.
But a study for Channel 5 quiz show Eggheads’ YouTube Masterclass found 58 per cent do NO research to prepare.
Judith Keppel is one of the champion quizzer Eggheads on the programme who face down challengers and was the UK’s first ever jackpot winner on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? in 2000.
Here are her tips on how to swot for a quiz, and below Eggheads question writers set 20 posers for you to try to test your grey matter . . .
READ THE SUN: The most valuable thing you can do ahead of a quiz is to read the newspapers. To be good at quizzes you need to know about a wide range of topics, from politics and films to sport.
A newspaper keeps you up to date with a lot of different subjects, even if you look at just the headlines. My fellow Egghead Pat Gibson reads lots of papers every day.
CONSULT DR GOOGLE: I call Egghead Kevin Ashman The Human Google because he has an encyclopedic knowledge of everything. But most of us don’t naturally have this.
Although phones are banned in quizzes, you can still use Google to your advantage when preparing. I do it all the time. If there’s a name or date I don’t know I look it up on my phone and remember it. It’s all about cultivating curiosity.
COME UP WITH YOUR OWN QUESTIONS: Put yourself in the shoes of the quizmaster and think about what makes a good question. The trick is to scan the news and think about how it might come up.
For example, Liz Truss was made Foreign Secretary last month, and is only the second female to hold the post. So they might ask who was the first — Labour’s Margaret Beckett.
TRAIN YOUR BRAIN WITH A CROSSWORD: General knowledge crosswords are a great way of amassing facts, cryptic crosswords less so but these keep your mind sharp.
A study by the University of Exeter Medical School in 2019 found older adults who regularly tackle word and number puzzles have sharper brains.
Think of your brain as a muscle you have to train. After our quiz here, check out the puzzles in this paper, on pages 41 to 43.
FIND STRENGTH IN YOUR WEAKNESSES: Don’t avoid or be afraid of your weak subjects. Brush up on those topics you know very little about.
I had zero interest in sport and realised that’s where I would always be caught out.
So I went about learning about each one, sport by sport. I learnt all the rugby positions. I found out the fly-half tends to be the glamour boy of a team so remembered all the England fly-halfs.
Do the same with any subject. If you know nothing about classical music, learn the composers and the best-known operas.
OUR KINGS AND QUEENS: We are rich in royal heritage. So more often than not, a history round includes a question about a past or living member of The Firm.
These are what I call bedrock questions — about royals, Prime Ministers and American presidents.
Some people use complicated mnemonics, or memory tricks, to recall monarchs and dates but this only overcomplicates things. Simply put in the hard work and memorise.
ALL NEWS IS GOOD NEWS: There are quirky questions in any quiz, so you need to value all types of information.
My fellow Egghead Lisa Thiel is an expert on popular culture. She can name all of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt’s kids and argues this kind of knowledge is what makes her a valuable quiz team member.
DON’T DWELL ON WRONG ANSWERS: Every-one makes a mistake. Just this week on ITV quiz Tipping Point a contestant confused ancient Greek poet Homer with the dad of US cartoon The Simpsons. It can happen to any of us, but luckily pub quizzes are not usually televised.
If you make a mistake, just focus on the next question. And remember, you are there to have fun with your friends. Enjoy!
