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Chris Philpot (born September 1989) was a contestant in Series 51. Aged fourteen at the time of his appearance, Philpot competed against Ariane Sherine, now notable for her work as a Guardian columnist and creator of the Atheist Bus Campaign. The game was initially close with Sherine holding a slight lead. Spotting COLLATE in round seven gave Philpot a three point advantage going into the third half, but the words PUMICE and RELISTED allowed Sherine to regain her lead and she saw out the game in style, with Philpot only scoring six further points in the contest.

Philpot made a mildly notable use of his short Countdown career by becoming the first - and thus far only - contestant to read out his own cue card. A typographical error on the card lead to Richard Whiteley mispronouncing the name of Philpot's secondary school. When Philpot pointed out the error, Whiteley replied, "you read it out!" Philpot also accumulated minor acknowledgement for an uncomfortable moment after declaring PUBIC in round 11. Furthermore, at the end of the programme following his defeat Philpot told Whiteley that he had particularly wanted a Countdown teapot. Sherine, who doesn't drink tea, altruistically gave him her teapot after her final game.

In 2009, the now nineteen-year-old Philpot challenged Sherine to a rematch on his student radio programme. The game was played over just one letters round, one numbers round and a conundrum. Special radio-themed conundrums were provided by members of c4countdown. In the game itself, both contestants spotted SPAYING in the letters round and, after a relatively easy numbers round, it was once again Sherine who prevailed, unravelling Damian Eadie's conundrum HEARRADIO after 13 seconds to win by 27 points to 17.