Saturday, January 28th, 2012
The Austin Music Hall
Austin, TX

The theme of Geek Bowl VI was change.

For five years, the nation’s greatest annual pub quiz was proudly hosted in Denver, the hometown of Geeks Who Drink. But this time we needed a new city, and the bright lights and winter warmth of Austin welcomed Quizmasters and players from all over the country. With all the new cities that joined the empire in 2011, this Bowl was truly a universal convention of geeks.

So the venue moved some 750 miles. But little did we suspect that our championship trophy would wind up traveling even farther than that.

With 150 teams prepared to quiz their hearts out, some felt that preparation was in order. San Antonio’s Sharkbait was among several teams proudly wearing matching t-shirts. Austin's Minoriteam pushed the boundaries of the six-person limit by having an extra member in utero – though they were pretty sure that the extra half-member only served to suck away valuable brain power (or at least amniotic fluid).

The nerd-friendly, over-the-top pageantry of geek bowl still managed to have the intimate feel of your normal neighborhood quiz. -Carter of team Thesaurus Rex

 

Denver's Unicorn Bukkake put together a veritable nerd super-team, including a Jeopardy! champion, someone who won Ben Stein's money, and several players who had placed high in previous Geek Bowls. Despite all this clout, they were just happy to see how long one of their members managed to go without knowing what bukkake means.

There are few opportunities for a geek to feel as cool as I did after finishing our opening number and seeing a crowd of quizzers go crazy. The energy in the room was electric--and the love that the quizzers have for their QM and their venue and their city/state was overwhelming, humbling, and extremely exciting to a QM that is 3 weeks into her new venue. -Samantha Perry, Quizmaster, Austin

Many teams participated in the event just to have a great time, winning be damned. Albuquerque’s My Favorite Flavor of KoolAid is Donkey Punch said their lofty goal was finish somewhere in the top 45 percent. They didn’t make it, but their table had enough drinks, fun and laughs to make up for the disappointment.

Even last year's Geek Bowl champions, The Anti-Social Network, had no big words to say about possibly taking it for the second year in row. They were there just there to play quiz the way it was meant to played: by having a good time and, with a bit of luck, winning in the process.

But sooner or later it’s time to wrap up the schmoozing, posturing and ice-sculpture admiration. At 7 p.m., shit got real.

The Austin Music Hall was filled with excitement as the lights dimmed and the marching band entered the hall, followed by a procession of Quizmasters representing all the states lucky enough to have quiz. Each lovingly QM-crafted banner was an awe to behold. As the parade ended, spirits stayed high as more hosts took the stage for an epic step-dance number and a more-or-less authentic haka. The tribal dancing and shouts set the tone for the biggest quiz ever produced by man, while thanking the quiz gods above... and hopefully not offending anyone too badly.

Geek Bowl VI allowed me to finally put a face to the many people I had spent months telelectronically communicating with.  I made dozens of new friends and finally had the proper platform to let the cat out of the bag: I'm just a struggling black man trying to keep my dick hard in a cruel and harsh world. -Chris O'Clair, Quizmaster, Boston

The actual quiz started with Austin-tatious, a round about other Austins, and flamboyance. That warmup was followed by the annual highlight, the live music round. This year it was exactly eight times bigger than ever before; in a stunning example of real-life ostentation, the round featured a separate band for each musical question.

• Metal band Crotch Rock It covering Katy Perry
• Latin group Cienfuegos covering George Michael
• Rockabilly star Johnny Hootrock covering Johnny Cash
• Air band Electric Ch-Air... air banding to Van Halen
• Classical Quartet covering the Foo Fighters
• Theater troupe Weird City Theater performing a number from Avenue Q
• The World Gone Mad Drum & Bugle Corp covering Ozzy Osbourne
• And the University of Texas Glee Club, Ransom Notes, recreating some Eminem

Having 8 different musical acts perform the audio round was a very risky endeavor for the Geek Overlords.  It had high potential for clusterfuck and failure yet was executed flawlessly.  Songs choice had moderate difficulty and players seemed to do rather well while also being entertained. -Jeff "Ozzy Zion" Nelson, Crotch Rock It guitarist, and Quizmaster, Austin

The third round of the night was a 50/50 round on sex, with a speed round on Sex and the City thrown in for good measure. The fourth round, Pork Sword of Damocles, continued the classiness. Before & After rounds are relatively new to the Geeks Who Drink repertoire, but have quickly become a crowd favorite. With answers like “Venus De Milo and Otis” and “Two Girls, One Cupola,” this one offered teams a real chance to show off their real quiz skills and bask in the glory of the some of the best that Geeks Who Drink's writers have to offer.

While the scoring team feverishly worked to score 150 answer sheets per round, the breaks were filled with sketches by the Austin troupe Stag Comedy, and two dance-offs – one just for fun, the other for prizes. In the latter, one of Philadelphia's teams offered their own boot-scootin’ tribute to Texas. But even in the weirdness of Austin, no one wanted to see their state mocked. The overwhelming winners were The Wet Spot, performing a very well-choreographed number to universal favorites ABBA. Their preparation paid off, since they completely recouped their entry fees. Good show!

Geek Bowl VI: The line for the men's room was 4x as long as the one for the women's, there was a drag queen on stage, I was given condoms upon arrival and left with quizmaster jizz all over my hotel room. That was one hell of a gay bar! -Brendon Weitzman, Quizmaster, Seattle

Back to the quiz: After a visual round on Hips and Hops, our sixth round, “No Straight White Males Were Harmed in the Making of This Round,” really culled the herd. It was eight questions on women, gays, and people of color – not exactly your standard pub-quiz fare. Andrea Dworkin FTW!

The ever-popular Video Round was a big hit. Everyone loves pizza, and this round asked quizzers to identify eight movies from scenes featuring everyone's favorite Italian food. Being that it was the biggest event of the year, though, this was a Double or Nothing round – one of a record four 16-point rounds on the evening. Naming the film wasn’t always that tricky, but the two-point questions proved more of a chore for some teams.

I think the most bitter sweet part of Geek Bowl for me was finally getting to meet this bizarre and twisted group of characters that are the Geeks Who Drink Quizmasters.  It's amazing to see how everyone connected so easily and powerfully in such a brief amount of time.  It's just sad that many of these people I won't be able to see again for a year.  How amazing was Geek Bowl?  So amazing that there are a great many of us left with a profound emptiness now it is all over. -Shane Fordyce, Quizmaster, San Antonio

After some extra-tough Random Knowledge, the year's biggest quiz was drawing to a close. Fourth-place Oklahoma: Colorado’s Dental Dam (Denver’s Unholy Voltron in disguise) got a nice parting gift of supplies to ease their pain – booze, Kleenex, grief-counseling books and the like. Third-place Five Geniuses and a Fall Guy got $1,000 to ease their troubles.

But Geek Bowl VI wasn't over yet! For the second time in Geek Bowl history, we had to resort to Sudden Death to determine who got the big $5,000 check, and who got the medium-size $2,000 check (yes, the novelty checks were actually different sizes). The two teams – Independence Hall & Oates of Philadelphia, and hometown favorites Team Dong – had to answer four questions, from identifying the daughter of Marian and Fraser Robinson to locating Mount Mansfield.*

Sadly, after all that build-up and suspense, it wasn’t even close. The Philly barbarians put the Austin weirdos down 4-1 in extra time, and took home the grand prize – presumably to buy D-cell batteries they can whip at visiting sports teams.

Third Place
5 Geniuses & A Fall Guy


Second Place
Team Dong


First Place
Independence Hall & Oates

Despite the unfortunate outcome, Geek Bowl VI was a rousing success. My Jewish Viking ass would like to thank all those who made it possible: All the quizmasters who flew in to work the event, our production crew, the fine city of Austin and, of course, all the players from all over the country. Special thanks to Stacey Hafner and Matt Angell for coordinating the event; Kent Wilhelmi, Sean McNeil and Andrew Hutchison for all their behind-the-scenes work, our scoring department of 40+, chief editor Christopher Short and his team of crackhead writers, C.M. Wright for the photography, and Quizmaster-in-Chief John Dicker for making all of this possible. Cheers, and we'll see you in 2013 at Geek Bowl VII!

* Michelle Obama and Vermont, in case you’re too lazy to Google it.

The Final Scores

Score-O-Matt-Ic 9001 Series' Geek Bowl Stat Breakdown:

Greetings Humans!

Lest ye not forget that which was Geek Bowl VI, I finally received the scoring data from Geek Bowl VI from our mainframe server room in Iowa City, IA.  They were backed up with ScanTron tests this time of year.  With my perfectly adaptable life bot, Lesbot 0069, we went through each answer sheet with fine detail.  And, as promised, here is some beautiful, wonderful, and informative data from the scoring patterns, broken down on the Round, Question, and even Molecular level.  

Round 1 - Austin-Tacious!
Average - 5 pts.  

Only ONE Team, "The Ayn Rand Suicide Hotline, aced Round 1.  Most of you that got 7 pts. on the round didn't know how to spell "Austan" in Question 7.

Round 2 - Local Bands
Average - 11 pts. (Pre-Joker)

Thirty teams used their Joker on this round.  We had THREE teams score 15 pts., and NOT Joker.  Four teams scored 14 pts. and did Joker.  Only seven teams teams knew the title of the song from Avenue Q.  The best wrong answer in Round 2 was "Benny & The Jets" by Elton John for the Eminem song.  No one aced Round 2.

Round 3 - Geek Me Baby - A 50/50 Round on Sex
Average - 12 pts. (Pre-Joker)

Ten teams used their Joker on this round.  We had eight teams score 15 pts., and NOT Joker. This included "Oklahoma: Colorado's Dental Dam (Unholy Voltron)" who would have placed 3rd overall had they Jokered this round instead.  No one aced Round 3.  Of the nine teams that scored 15 pts., almost all missed the last point on the "Sex and the City" characters.  

Round 4 - Pork Sword of Damocles: Highbrow/Lowbrow Before and After
Average - 5.5 pts.  

Thirteen teams aced Round 4.  This had the most perfect scores of all of the rounds.  Of the thirty teams that missed 1 pt., almost all never played Metroid before, because they didn't remember the Screw Attack!

Round 5 - Visual Round 
Average - 4 pts.

Only THREE teams aced Round 5.  In no particular order, they are "Unicorn Bukkake", "The Anti-Social Network: Nerds with Friends". and "Thesaurus Rex".  Five teams missed 1 pt. on this round, and most of them thought Afrika Bumbattaa was Flava Flav.  

Round 6 - No Straight White Males Were Harmed In The Making Of This Round
Average - 2 PTS.!

Round 6 was by far the hardest round at Geek Bowl VI.  It was the lowest averaging round with 2 pts. As you can imagine, no one aced it.  EIGHTEENteams put a big ZERO in the scoring column.  Every one of their answer sheets had an answer for each question, too.   

Round 7 - Video Round
Average - 10 pts. (Pre-Joker)

TWO teams aced this round: "Five Geniuses and a Fall Guy" and "Costa Concordia Olympic Dive Team". Sixty teams used their Joker on this round, making this the most Jokered round at Geek Bowl VI.  Of those teams that went Double-or-Nothing and scored 15 pts., most missed the 2 pt. question on the movie Monster Squad.  

Round 8 - Random Knowledge
Average - 9 pts. (Pre-Joker)

Only one team, "Team Dong" aced Round 8.  Forty-two teams used their Joker on this round. The hardest question seemed to be the one about HDMI, for some reason.   

Other Nuggets (Or "Trivia", as the layman says)

Favorite answer sheet comment on Round 8: "And if this is Quincy Jones again, I will kill someone" written by "Interruping Starfish"  
Favorite answer sheet stain: Looked like Kool-Aid
Hardest Round: Round 6