Kirk Bevins

A 17-year old Kirk during his first appearance on Countdown.

Kirk Bevins is the champion of Series 60 and of the overall 2009 season of Countdown. He is also currently participating in Series 68.

He originally appeared on Countdown near the start of Series 51. He played reasonably well, though not brilliantly, and was beaten by octochamp Richard Pay. In one round he went blank as he could only see SHAGMAN, and comically guessed TURROTING for the conundrum instead of TORTURING.

He has been a prominent member of the online scene for several years, participating in numerous major tournaments and winning the first ever Goatdown Championship against Conor Travers and the Apterous Winter Closed 2009 Championship Flight. For some time, he was ranked #1 on Apterous with a top score of 155. In February 2010, he became #1 human player on there again, overtaking Craig Beevers's long-standing record.

Kirk has also attended every COLIN, CoBris, CoNot, Co:Lon, COHUD and CobliviLon event thus far, winning his first two COLIN 2010 and CoLei3 in the same year. He then held onto his title at COLIN 2011.

Kirk during the Series 60 final.

Due to his success at Countdown tournaments and online, Bevins appeared on the show again in Series 60. In his first show he set the record for the highest score for a challenger of 127, beating Jonathan Coles's earlier 124 record. His next show was not a century – he fell to 97 including only solving one of the numbers rounds correctly. His third show was the first ever perfect game in the 15-round format, meaning no potential points were lost in any of the fifteen rounds. In his fourth game, he produced 3 nine-letter words and at one point could potentially have beaten Julian Fell's record of 146. However, he missed BEHOVE, then his opponent Peter Bennett controversially chose four large in the final numbers game. This left Bevins on 130 before the conundrum. Although he now couldn't beat Fell's record, solving the conundrum would have given him the second highest ever score of 140, a position currently held by Chris Davies with 139. However, in the event it was Bennett that got the conundrum and lost 130 – 55.

Bevins' fifth, sixth and seventh games were all centuries, meaning that in his final heat game he needed 113 to equal Fell's record 924, and 114 to beat it. With his final numbers round and conundrum he got exactly 114 and beat Fell's long-standing record of 924 points for an octochamp run by just a single point, solving the conundrum in under a second to secure his place in Countdown history. This record was eclipsed when Series 61 contestant Andrew Hulme amassed a total of 930 points in his octochamp run.

In Series 60, he had an average score of 115 when becoming an Octochamp. Throughout his whole time on Countdown, he has an average of 107 per game.

Kirk Bevins down his local pub with his darts team.

On 10 November 2009 and 11 December 2009, Kirk was seen on the show again, on both occasions as the audience member who solved the conundrum when neither contestant could get it.

On 15 March 2010, Bevins took part in a special episode against the other 2009 series winner Chris Davies, to find the overall champion of that year. In a close game, with the leader changing places several times, Bevins finished victorious.

He returned to Countdown in 2013, as one of 41 contestants taking part in the 30th Birthday Championship. After receiving a bye to the first round, he won his first match against the Series 38 champion John Ashmore by a score of 130 – 92, which was also his and the show's 2nd televised max game. He then played Series 61 semi-finalist Innis Carson in a phenomenal match, which Bevins won on a second conundrum, after both he and Carson incorrectly guessed the first one.

Outside of Countdown, Bevins is a keen darts player, and also appeared on the Channel 5 gameshows Memory Bank and BrainTeaser in 2004, and on The Weakest Link in 2008.

Preceded by Junaid Mubeen

Series winner Series 60

Followed by Chris Davies

Episodes

#	Date	Type	Contestant 1	Score	Contestant 2	Presenters				Guest	Lex	Max
3642	11/02/2004	P	Richard Pay	90 – 69	Kirk Bevins	Richard Whiteley	Carol Vorderman				Lucy Summers	Michael Aspel	Susie Dent	111
4768	2/03/2009	P	Ann Abel	54 – 127	Kirk Bevins	Jeff Stelling	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Dr Phil Hammond	Susie Dent	130
4769	3/03/2009	P	Kirk Bevins	97 – 67	Fiona Shaw	Jeff Stelling	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Dr Phil Hammond	Susie Dent	116
4770	4/03/2009	P	Kirk Bevins	126 – 47	Ben Nicholas	Jeff Stelling	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Dr Phil Hammond	Susie Dent	126
4771	5/03/2009	P	Kirk Bevins	130 – 55	Peter Bennett	Jeff Stelling	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Dr Phil Hammond	Susie Dent	150
4772	6/03/2009	P	Kirk Bevins	111 – 39	Barrie Robinson	Jeff Stelling	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Dr Phil Hammond	Susie Dent	120
4773	9/03/2009	P	Kirk Bevins	114 – 53	Anne Adams	Jeff Stelling	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Colin Murray	Susie Dent	129
4774	16/03/2009	P	Kirk Bevins	106 – 71	Ian Payn	Jeff Stelling	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Colin Murray	Susie Dent	131
4775	17/03/2009	P	Kirk Bevins	114 – 31	Rosie Owen	Jeff Stelling	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Colin Murray	Susie Dent	129
4837	11/06/2009	QF	Kirk Bevins	115 – 90	Julie Russell	Jeff Stelling	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	John Stapleton	Susie Dent	117
4841	17/06/2009	SF	Kirk Bevins	98 – 88	Neil Zussman	Jeff Stelling	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Dr Phil Hammond	Susie Dent	128
4843	19/06/2009	GF	Jimmy Gough	59 – 102	Kirk Bevins	Jeff Stelling	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Dr Phil Hammond	Susie Dent	115
S26	15/03/2010	S	Chris Davies	77 – 81	Kirk Bevins	Jeff Stelling	Rachel Riley					Gary Osborne	Susie Dent	120
5634	1/02/2013	30B1	John Ashmore	92 – 130	Kirk Bevins	Nick Hewer	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Mark Foster	Susie Dent	130
5645	18/02/2013	30B2	Innis Carson	102 – 112*	Kirk Bevins	Nick Hewer	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Dr Phil Hammond	Susie Dent	120

* includes 10 points from a tie-break conundrum

External Links

• Kirk is God, the Facebook group.

Watch all Kirk's Series 60 episodes on YouTube