Co-event

A Countdown tournament is a tourament similar to a Scrabble or Chess tournament. Players meet up with their Countdown board games and play a number of rounds, usually 5 or 6, and the player with the most wins is the tournament winner. In the event of a tie, the number of points scored it used to separate them. There are two disctinct types of tournament, head-to-head "match play" tournaments and "duplicate" tournaments. For example the Countdown in Lincoln tournaments use head-to-head games with random letters, while the Countdown in Bristol tournament uses a duplicate system. The word duplicate comes from duplicate bridge which inspired duplicate Des chiffres et des lettres tournaments in French-speaking countries. Duplicate means that the letters are predetermined, in the same way that the cards are predetermined in a duplicate bridge tournament. Player play head-to-head, but all players have the same letters, numbers and conundrum. The tournament is still sorted by wins and points scored

Notable Countdown tournaments

• The Edinburgh Countdown Club was the first to organise tournaments
• Countdown in Lincoln
• Countdown in Bristol
• Countdown in Redhill
• Various online tournaments via MSN messenger.