World Quizzing Championship

The World Quizzing Championship is an individual quiz contest organised by the International Quizzing Association (an umbrella organisation of various quizzing organisations from different countries around the world). The competition has been staged annually since 2003 (since 2004 in more than one country simultaneously) with an increasing number of contestants from an increasing number of nations. The reigning champion is Mark Bytheway of England, who won the competition in 2008, taking the title from Pat Gibson of Ireland.

Competition history

2003

A fledgling event was first staged by Quizzing.co.uk in 2003 at Villa Park football stadium, Birmingham, England. This saw 50 quizzers representing a handful of nations compete in a written test of quiz knowledge. The winner on that day being Olav Bjortomt.

2004

In 2004, following the foundation of the International Quizzing Association (IQA), the event was held simultaneously in 5 countries: the United Kingdom (joined by quizzers from elsewhere, including Ireland), Belgium (joined by quizzers from The Netherlands), Estonia, India and Malaysia. Over 300 quizzers took part. The UK leg was staged at Manchester United's Old Trafford football stadium.

2005

The 2005 championship on July 2, saw further significant growth with the event benefiting from the sponsorship of MSN Search. Countries joining the original five competing nations included Australia, Finland, Indonesia, Norway and Singapore. Quizzers sat eight papers of 30 questions each, covering different subject matters: 'Culture', 'Entertainment', 'History', 'Lifestyle', 'Media', 'Sciences', 'Sport and Games', and 'World', with the lowest score from the eight genres being dropped - although these did come into play to settle tie-break situations. The eight genres were won outright or shared by quizzers from seven different countries (Belgium, England, Estonia, Finland, India, Ireland, and Norway) reflecting that the questions were of a truly international flavour.

Efforts to encourage the participation of women in the contest (competitive quizzing has hitherto been something of a male-dominated pastime) were rewarded in 2005 with a win for Trine Aalborg of Norway in the 'Lifestyle' category and a sixth place overall for Dorjana Širola of Croatia (who also finished 3rd among those competitors who had gathered at Silverstone motor racing circuit for the UK leg of the competition). In India, another woman, Debashree Mitra of Bangalore took 3rd place overall also.

#Kevin Ashman (England)
#Pat Gibson (Ireland)
#Nico Pattyn (Belgium)
#Mark Van Springel (Belgium)
#Arul Mani (India)
#Dorjana Širola (Croatia)
#Ove Põder (Estonia)
#Lauri Naber (Estonia)
#Erik Derycke (Belgium)
#Ian Bayley (England)

2006

On June 3, 2006 the World Quizzing Championships were held at more than 15 locations around the globe. First time organisers were Lithuania, Germany, Switzerland, Liberia and Sri Lanka. People of a multitude of nationalities took part, including representatives from the USA, Australia, Russia, Singapore, Hungary and France. The title was, for the 3rd year running, won by Kevin Ashman.

#Kevin Ashman (UK)
#Pat Gibson (Ireland)
#Nico Pattyn (Belgium)
#Marc Van Springel (Belgium)
#Olav Bjortomt (UK)
#Ronny Swiggers (Belgium)
#Dorjana Širola (Croatia, and the world's highest placed woman)
#Mark Bytheway (UK)
#Erik Derycke (Belgium)
#Ian Bayley (UK)

2007

On June 2, 2007 the World Quizzing Championships was held at many locations around the globe, adding The Netherlands, the USA and Hungary for the first time. Pat Gibson took the crown from three-time winner Kevin Ashman.

#Pat Gibson (Ireland)
#Kevin Ashman (UK)
#Mark Bytheway (UK)
#Olav Bjortomt (UK)
#Jesse Honey (UK)
#Ronny Swiggers (Belgium)
#Ian Bayley (UK)
#Mark Grant (UK)
#Nico Pattyn (Belgium)
#Arul Mani (India)Dorjana Širola of Croatia was the highest placed woman in 12th position. Paul Paquet from the Canada placed highest in the New York City leg, the first time WQC was held in North America.

2008

The 2008 World Quizzing Championships were held on June 7, 2008 at more than 30 locations around the globe, including for the first time Australia, the Philippines, Canada, China, Bangladesh and Latvia.Mark Bytheway took the world title in a close race with Belgium's Ronny Swiggers and Finland's Tero Kalliolevo.

#Mark Bytheway (UK) 173
#Ronny Swiggers (Belgium) 172
#Tero Kalliolevo (Finland) 170
#Kevin Ashman (UK) 167
#Pat Gibson (Ireland) 165
#Nico Pattyn (Belgium) 163
#Olav Bjortomt (UK) 155
#Ian Bayley (UK) 154
#Jesse Honey (UK) 152
#Dorjana Sirola (Croatia) 150 (best woman)

List of winners

The World Championship winners to date are:
*2003 Olav Bjortomt of England
*2004 Kevin Ashman of England
*2005 Kevin Ashman of England
*2006 Kevin Ashman of England
*2007 Pat Gibson of Ireland
*2008 Mark Bytheway of England

External links

* [http://www.iqa.quizzing.co.uk International Quizzing Association - Official Site] (under construction, containing contact information)
* [http://www.wqc2008.com/ World Quizzing Championships 2008]
* [http://www.norgesquizforbund.no/tabeller/wqc.html World Quizzing Championships 2007: Results]
* [http://www.iqa.be/Points%20WQC%20international%20100.xls World Quizzing Championships 2006: Results]
* [http://www.iqa.be/Points%20International.xls World Quizzing Championships 2005: Results]
* [http://www.iqa.be/iqa_wqc_uk2004.htm World Quizzing Championships 2004: Results]
* [http://www.iqa.be IQA Belgium with full results previous World and European Championships]
* [http://www.iqagb.co.uk IQA Great Britain]
* [http://iqausa.googlepages.com IQA United States]
* [http://www.sqon.nl SQON/IQA Netherlands]