Brendan Whitehurst

Brendan Whitehurst octochamp statistics
Final position	Semi-finalist
Seeding	3
Points total	821
Conundrums solved	4

Brendan Whitehurst in Series 79...

...and again in Series 80!

Brendan Whitehurst was an octochamp in Series 80 who made his début in Series 79. He is a supermarket worker from Derby. He became an Apterite after recording his heat shows.

He appeared on 7 December 2018 against Mark Jeary and won with a strong 110 points. He then won the last 3 games of the series, and was placed aside for the series finals. He returned to Countdown on 23 January 2019 to continue his run in Series 80, following Championship of Champions XV, and here he wrapped up his unbeaten run, joining the 800 club in the fourth show of the new series.

Whitehurst's aggregate score of 821 points secured him a spot in the Series 80 finals in June as the number 3 seed. In his quarter-final, he took on Steven Turnbull and fell behind fairly early due to the latter's darrenic pair of EARWIGS and HOOLIGAN. However, he then mounted a strong comeback during the third "half" and solved the final six-small numbers round to go into the conundrum with a 1-point advantage, and after neither player unscrambled RINGACHED in the time, he therefore advanced to the semi-finals, where he played against Dinos Sfyris. Whitehurst fought hard in the match until Sfyris eventually pulled away and Whitehurst took his first defeat to date.

In 2021, Whitehurst took part in ZoomDown Series 4, and became the second tetrachamp of the series with a total of 433 points. When he returned for the quarter-finals as the number 1 seed, he unfortunately lost 88 - 99 against fellow Apterite Ronan Higginson, the number 8 seed.

Episodes

#	Date	Type	Contestant 1	Score	Contestant 2	Presenters				Guest	Lex	Max
6969	7/12/2018	P	Mark Jeary	85 – 110	Brendan Whitehurst	Nick Hewer	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Nicki Chapman	Susie Dent	126
6970	10/12/2018	P	Brendan Whitehurst	96 – 59	James Fenn	Nick Hewer	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Dan Walker	Susie Dent	133
6971	11/12/2018	P	Brendan Whitehurst	104 – 50	Sam Reilly	Nick Hewer	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Dan Walker	Susie Dent	117
6972	12/12/2018	P	Brendan Whitehurst	92 – 83	David Rutherford	Nick Hewer	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Dan Walker	Susie Dent	124
6995	23/01/2019	P	Brendan Whitehurst	104 – 62	Linda Nowotarski	Nick Hewer	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Suzannah Lipscomb	Susie Dent	127
6996	24/01/2019	P	Brendan Whitehurst	107 – 52	Laurence Dunkling	Nick Hewer	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Suzannah Lipscomb	Susie Dent	137
6997	25/01/2019	P	Brendan Whitehurst	112 – 62	Charlotte Aldworth	Nick Hewer	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Suzannah Lipscomb	Susie Dent	125
6998	28/01/2019	P	Brendan Whitehurst	96 – 44	Vittorio Angelone	Nick Hewer	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Suzannah Lipscomb	Susie Dent	126
7103	24/06/2019	QF	Brendan Whitehurst	58 – 57	Steven Turnbull	Nick Hewer	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Rufus Hound	Susie Dent	146
7106	27/06/2019	SF	Dinos Sfyris	103 – 78	Brendan Whitehurst	Nick Hewer	Rachel Riley				Lucy Summers	Richard Arnold	Susie Dent	123