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Championship of Champions XI
Championship of Champions XI ran from 6 to 24 January 2003, and was won by Graham Nash. It marked the debut of Countdown's 2003–8 pink-and-purple striped set. It was also the first Championship of Champions to be played using the 15 round format; all previous CoCs had used 9 or 14 rounders.
The tournament started poorly with series champion Michael Calder being knocked out by quarter-finalist Loz Sands. The following game was one of the greatest in the history of Countdown, with Chris Wills scoring a come from behind win against David Williams, spotting the conundrum ETERNALLY in barely a second to win by two points. The next three first round matches all produced close scores, but Tom Hargreaves produced a very noteworthy performance against John Rainsden, beating the former runner-up by 52 points. Julian Fell produced a similar display against Octochamp Terence O'Farrell and won by 54 points. Graham Nash completed the first round matches with a 33 point win over David Ballheimer including the impressive MICROBES in the final letter rounds.
The quarter-finals also started slowly, with Chris Wills scoring a win over Loz Sands despite an invalid word coagulent ☓ in the first letters game. John Rawnsley beat semi-finalist Rupert Stokoe without ever looking like losing, despite faltering on the conundrum.
The following game was a classic which beat Wills and Williams highest joint total score. Both Ben Wilson and Tom Hargreaves spotted the niner FACETIOUS in the third round, and from then on Tom scored in every round to rack up 131 points. The second series champion was dispatched from the competition, as Ben Wilson lost his unbeaten record.
The game after that was even more dramatic. Julian Fell and Graham Nash faced off, both players having won 12 games out of 12. The game started with a poor letters selection, but in round 4 Nash tried formica ☓ which but Fell six points in the lead with CORIUM. Both players spotted a nine in round 8 – ORGANISED for Nash and GRANDIOSE for Fell. Fell declared eight in the next round to Nash's seven, but Fell's offering of gambiers ☓ was duly disallowed and Nash had a one point lead. Equal scoring continued for the rest of the game, and the players had a perfect score between them going into rounds 12 and 13 where both players, and Dictionary Corner missed ROUILLE and SPERMATID. The game was poised for a crucial conundrum 110 – 109 in Nash's favour, and Nash buzzed in in just more than a second with MENDMEDOC to beat Fell, the first and only time that Julian has lost a game of Countdown. Chris Wills on his website later described it as the "best ever game of Countdown".
In the semi-finals, Chris Wills disposed of Series 45 champion John Rawnsley, scoring 120 points. Wills scored in every round including the nine-letter DECAGONAL but it was Rawnsley that got the conundrum to deny Wills a personal best of 130.
The second semi-final was most notable for its disallowed words, as Graham Nash had two words disallowed and Tom Hargreaves had three. The decisive factor was the 7th round where Hargreaves risked rescaling ☓ to Nash's CLEARINGS which gave Nash a lead that would never be challenged in the game. Nash dispatched with the conundrum AVIANLOUT which set up a final between two players with 14 wins from 14 games.
The final turned out not to be a classic, thanks in large part to two impossible numbers games. Chris Wills initially took the lead with GAMBADE but was beaten in two letters rounds with PENSIVE and METALS as Wills risked an invalid six. The players scored in every round from there on, but neither player scored on the last numbers game where zero points was the maximum. The conundrum OVERSPADE was turned over, with Nash having a six point lead thanks to METALS. Dramatically the time ran out with neither player buzzing in, and Nash was triumphant 79 – 73. Thanks to his success, Nash was selected for the game show Grand Slam due to his unbeaten record at Countdown.
Entrants and original series
- Michael Calder, David Ballheimer, Terence O'Farrell (Series 42)
- Graham Nash, David Williams (Series 43)
- John Rainsden, Kevin McMahon (Series 44)
- John Rawnsley, Geraldine Hylands (Series 45)
- Ben Wilson, Loz Sands (Series 46)
- Chris Wills, Tom Hargreaves, Rupert Stokoe (Series 47)
- Julian Fell, Grace Page (Series 48)