World Quizzing Championships

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world quizzing championships

INTRODUCTION

This page looks at the World Quizzing Championships.

Charts

1. Medal Winners by Type

2. Number of Players to Finish in Top 10 by Country

3. Distribution of Top 100 at 2021 World Quizzing Championships

4. Distribution of Top 100 by Category

5. Top 20 Countries with Most Players in Top 1000 at WQC 2019 Adjusted for Population

Data Table

3. Top 50 Players in World Quizzing Championships by Region, Country and Performance by Category 2015 - 2019

Three quizzers have dominated the event since its inception - Kevin Ashman from England, Pat Gibson from Ireland and Olav Bjormont from England. They won 14 of the 20 events between them. All 3 players are based in England although Pat Gibson was born and grew up in Ireland. The two biggest nearly winners are, by far, Steve Perry from the USA and Tero Kalliolevo from Finland. While it is clearly a western dominated event, 2 non-western players have won - Vikram Joshi from Indian and Ravikant Awa from Indonesia.

The bar chart above shows the number from each country who have finished in the top 10 in any of the events from 2003 to 2022. England has the most players in to finish in the top 10. In terms of winners, England has been especially dominant. 4 of the 9 players to have won have been English and 12 of the 20 events have been won by an English player. Estonia also is notable because it is a very small country yet has had 4 players to finish in the top 10, more than all but 3 countries. This suggests it has a deeply rooted culture of quizzing. The presence of India and the absense of China at the elite level of quizzing is also noteworthy.

As expected, countries perform differently well in different categories. American quizzers tend to do much better on medicine than sport. This is likely due to the fact that Americans are less in tune with non-American sports. Belgian quizzers do much better on lifestyle than on Medicine. English players tend to have less variation in which fields they do well in although there were more English players in top 100 for lifestyle and Entertainment than other categories.

The chart above shows population adjusted representation in the top 1000 players at the 2019 championships. This shows which countries have more widespread quizzing cultures though not necessarily who is best at producing champions. Estonia appears to be have the highest per capita representation followed by Croatia. Lithuania, a Baltic country close to Estonia, is third. England is not as high in this chart as might be expected given it's dominance of the event. This suggests that while England is among the best at producing quizzers at the elite level and by far the best at this among the major nations, it's quizzing culture perhaps isn't as widespread in the general population compared to in the Baltic countries for example.

Given that it's a European dominated event, notable absences from this chart are France, Italy and Spain. Portugal is the only mediterranean country in the top 30. This could partly be explained by the fact that quizzing is generally an indoor pursuit and has less appeal in warmer climates. That may also partly explain the success of Baltic and British Isles countries.

3. Top 50 Players in World Quizzing Championships by Region, Country and Performance by Category 2015 - 2019

Year	Rank	Name	Country	Score	Culture	Entertainment	History	Medicine	Life	Science	Sport	World
2015	1	Olav Bjortomt	England	161	25	22	18	27	21	17	24	24
	2	Kevin Ashman	England	157	25	20	23	25	17	22	19	23
	3	Pat Gibson	England	156	24	20	17	21	20	24	18	29
	4	Tero Kalliolevo	Finland	151	26	19	16	23	15	20	22	25
	5	Holger Waldenberger	Germany	144	21	11	22	19	15	21	19	27
	6	Ove P�der	Estonia	144	20	21	20	20	9	20	20	23
	7	Tom Trogh	Belgium	142	25	17	16	20	15	21	23	20
	8	Ronny Swiggers	Belgium	142	21	13	17	19	17	23	19	26
	9	Thomas Kol�s�ter	Norway	141	23	19	22	19	16	21	15	21
	10	Nico Pattyn	Belgium	141	24	14	23	16	13	21	20	23
	11	Ian Bayley	England	139	21	15	24	18	16	24	10	21
	12	Didier Bruyere	France	136	22	18	15	16	17	21	18	24
	13	Igor Habal	Estonia	135	19	20	18	16	15	17	22	23
	14	Dorjana Sirola	Croatia	135	19	20	22	19	18	20	11	17
	15	Raj Dhuwalia	USA	134	21	18	17	20	16	20	16	22
	16	Andrei Baburin	Russia	134	16	16	22	12	18	21	19	22
	17	Paul Sinha	England	133	23	17	13	19	16	17	19	22
	18	Eric Smith	Canada	130	20	12	22	18	13	22	13	22
	19	Patrick Friel	USA	130	20	21	15	21	15	18	12	20
	20	S. Bhattacharya	India	130	20	7	20	13	18	18	19	22
	21	Tore Heliks Van Dahl	Norway	129	21	16	19	13	13	18	17	25
	22	David Beck	Belgium	129	19	12	21	18	14	12	20	25
	23	Mark Grant	Wales	128	20	15	18	20	17	17	14	21
	24	Lars Heggland	Norway	128	21	16	20	12	17	18	13	23
	25	Joshua Kreitzer	USA	127	20	17	19	22	16	13	16	17
	26	Mark Ryder	USA	126	21	17	16	17	16	20	13	19
	27	David Stainer	England	125	19	16	18	17	16	17	17	21
	28	Geir H. Kristiansen	Norway	125
	29	Rob Hannah	Scotland	124	21	15	16	17	17	19	13	19
	30	Joe Trela	USA	124	20	11	19	17	13	22	12	21
	31	Derk De Graaf	Belgium	124	22	10	16	15	14	18	18	21
	32	Bernard Kreps	Belgium	124	20	6	14	14	13	21	20	22
	33	Gerben Smit	Belgium	123	18	13	18	15	15	19	15	23
	34	Guy Jordan	USA	123	25	13	13	15	15	19	12	23
	35	Stuart Finlayson	Scotland	123	18	17	14	18	16	21	9	19
	36	Iain Thoms	Scotland	122	18	19	15	20	15	17	18	14
	37	Barry Simmons	Scotland	122	21	14	18	16	14	18	10	21
	38	Jussi Suvanto	Finland	122	19	22	19	20	13	7	15	14
	39	Lorcan Duff	Ireland	121	19	15	16	18	15	15	20	18
	40	Dave McBryan	Ireland	121	19	16	16	13	15	20	16	19
	41	Ole Martin Halck	Norway	121	19	18	14	15	12	20	13	22
	42	Vikram Joshi	India	121	20	13	19	16	20	8	10	23
	43	Yogesh Raut	USA	120	19	15	16	21	14	19	11	16
	44	Jerome Vered	USA	120	18	14	19	19	17	15	8	18
	45	Anne Hegerty	Scotland	120	18	14	16	19	17	17	8	19
	46	Bart Mari�n	Belgium	120	22	15	12	21	14	15	7	21
	47	David Hesp	England	119	18	18	17	17	18	13	18	13
	48	Scott Dawson	England	119	19	19	14	17	17	12	12	21
	49	Tim Polley	USA	118	20	12	16	16	18	14	15	19
	50	Adam Villani	USA	118	19	18	14	17	13	15	11	22
	0			0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
	0			0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
2016	1	Kevin Ashman	England	171	24	21	29	27	22	18	26	22
	2	Olav Bjortomt	England	167	24	21	25	30	23	21	23	20
	3	Pat Gibson	England	165	23	19	26	24	21	27	24	20
	4	Mark Grant	Wales	163	23	24	25	26	22	23	16	20
	5	Ronny Swiggers	Belgium	161	21	21	28	24	21	25	21	21
	6	Tom Trogh	Belgium	161	22	21	23	25	22	25	23	21
	7	Ian Bayley	England	160	24	22	28	24	21	22	19	19
	8	Didier Bruyere	France	160	22	22	26	28	18	20	22	20
	9	Tero Kalliolevo	Finland	159	24	21	26	23	21	21	22	22
	10	David Stainer	England	156	18	22	22	23	25	22	23	19
	11	Mark Ryder	USA	156	21	21	23	25	26	20	15	20
	12	Hugh Bennett	England	153	20	20	20	22	22	23	26	18
	13	Holger Waldenberger	Germany	153	19	17	23	22	21	25	21	22
	14	Paul Sinha	England	148	21	24	19	23	21	16	22	18
	15	Nico Pattyn	Belgium	148	24	15	26	18	21	19	19	21
	16	Thomas Kol�s�ter	Norway	147	20	20	23	24	20	20	20	18
	17	Eric Smith	Canada	147	18	22	24	20	22	21	16	20
	18	Shane Whitlock	USA	145	17	22	21	21	22	16	22	20
	19	Ove P�der	Estonia	145	20	15	26	23	17	19	21	19
	20	Igor Habal	Estonia	144	22	20	24	21	15	15	25	17
	21	Lars Heggland	Norway	143	19	20	24	20	17	20	19	21
	22	Raj Dhuwalia	USA	143	17	21	23	21	20	23	17	18
	23	Scott Dawson	England	143	17	21	22	22	20	20	20	18
	24	Jerome Vered	USA	143	22	19	23	21	23	16	15	19
	25	S. Bhattacharya	India	143	21	11	23	21	21	20	17	20
	26	Geir H. Kristiansen	Norway	142
	27	Rob Hannah	Scotland	142	22	18	22	19	19	22	20	18
	28	Ole Martin Halck	Norway	142	19	21	25	23	18	17	19	17
	29	Mark Henry	Ireland	142	18	19	24	20	20	17	21	20
	30	Tore Heliks Van Dahl	Norway	142	22	18	20	22	21	16	21	18
	31	Patrick Friel	USA	141	17	20	20	22	17	20	20	22
	32	Andrew Ullsperger	USA	141	20	20	21	24	20	20	16	14
	33	Dorjana Sirola	Croatia	139	19	16	21	25	24	16	17	17
	34	Nick Mills	England	139	16	15	25	19	22	20	16	21
	35	Andrew Whittingham	England	138	16	18	23	19	18	19	21	20
	36	Eivind Moskvil	Norway	138	18	19	23	21	15	17	21	19
	37	Andy Tucker	Scotland	138	17	20	21	21	22	15	18	19
	38	David Lea	Ireland	138	14	19	18	19	23	18	24	17
	39	Stuart Finlayson	Scotland	138	18	23	21	21	19	21	13	15
	40	Dave McBryan	Ireland	137	16	18	22	20	21	19	19	18
	41	Marnix Baes	Belgium	137	18	15	23	20	23	19	17	17
	42	Joshua Kreitzer	USA	137	16	21	21	24	20	14	19	16
	43	Tim Polley	USA	136	17	21	21	19	17	17	23	18
	44	Paul Arts	Belgium	136	16	16	25	21	16	18	21	19
	45	Greg Peterson	USA	136	20	17	23	19	18	22	17	14
	46	Chris Grubb	USA	136	18	19	23	18	21	23	7	14
	47	Daoud Jackson	England	135	16	21	23	18	18	19	17	19
	48	Guy Jordan	USA	135	19	18	19	21	21	18	15	19
	49	Gerben Smit	Belgium	134	19	18	17	23	18	20	16	19
	50	Yogesh Raut	USA	134	17	22	18	24	15	20	12	18
	0			0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
	0			0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
2017	1	Kevin Ashman	England	169	25	15	26	27	23	23	24	21
	2	Didier Bruyere	France	163	17	19	24	25	26	23	24	22
	3	Pat Gibson	England	160	23	20	21	20	26	27	23	20
	4	Tom Trogh	Belgium	159	23	19	18	21	26	26	24	20
	5	Ronny Swiggers	Belgium	156	24	21	19	22	26	22	22	18
	6	Tim Polley	USA	155	18	19	22	22	25	22	23	22
	7	Tero Kalliolevo	Finland	155	21	19	24	23	22	23	23	18
	8	Ian Bayley	England	154	23	17	25	22	23	23	15	21
	9	Ove P�der	Estonia	153	21	18	24	23	22	21	24	18
	10	Mark Grant	Wales	153	20	20	23	25	25	21	11	19
	11	Igor Habal	Estonia	152	23	19	21	21	21	22	25	13
	12	Holger Waldenberger	Germany	149	20	17	21	27	21	20	22	18
	13	Olav Bjortomt	England	149	20	23	20	28	24	19	15	14
	14	Steven Perry	USA	148	20	19	21	21	25	23	12	19
	15	Thomas Kol�s�ter	Norway	146	21	19	20	21	20	22	23	17
	16	Raj Dhuwalia	USA	143	16	20	22	20	24	22	17	18
	17	Mark Ryder	USA	143	20	16	19	25	22	23	11	18
	18	Dorjana Sirola	Croatia	143	22	18	20	22	25	18	11	18
	19	Jakob Myers	USA	142	21	18	23	20	20	22	13	18
	20	Mark Henry	Ireland	141	19	18	19	16	23	18	21	23
	21	Yogesh Raut	USA	141	17	18	19	27	24	16	13	20
	22	Lars Heggland	Norway	140	21	18	23	16	20	21	18	19
	23	Geir H. Kristiansen	Norway	140
	24	Paul Sinha	England	138	20	17	19	19	23	20	20	17
	25	Nico Pattyn	Belgium	138	21	15	21	16	20	19	18	23
	26	Tore Heliks Van Dahl	Norway	137	16	10	21	19	23	21	20	17
	27	Shane Whitlock	USA	136	19	15	17	19	22	21	19	19
	28	David Stainer	England	136	20	17	17	22	24	21	14	15
	29	Evan Lynch	England	135	22	16	19	21	18	20	17	18
	30	Andrew Ullsperger	USA	135	16	16	20	21	25	23	14	14
	31	Chris James	England	135	9	19	19	18	24	18	18	19
	32	Ivan Vlahek	Croatia	135	22	13	23	19	19	20	7	19
	33	Scott Dawson	England	134	19	18	17	20	21	18	20	18
	34	Ole Martin Halck	Norway	133	17	19	18	21	21	18	16	19
	35	Kaarel Silmato	Estonia	133	19	15	21	26	21	15	15	16
	36	Movin Miranda	Malaysia	133	20	12	21	18	21	23	9	18
	37	Patrick Friel	USA	132	19	16	14	23	22	20	14	18
	38	Victoria Groce	USA	132	12	21	20	20	23	19	13	16
	39	Gary Grant	Scotland	132	17	12	20	17	21	22	10	23
	40	Oliver Levy	England	132	15	18	18	23	22	21	9	15
	41	Stig Sanner	Norway	131
	42	Nick Mills	England	131	16	7	22	16	22	22	13	20
	43	Kre�imir �timac	Croatia	130	19	15	17	23	17	19	20	14
	44	Neven Milijic	Croatia	130	20	18	20	18	19	17	14	18
	45	Perica �ivanovic	Croatia	130	17	13	17	18	17	19	22	20
	46	Espen Kibsg�rd	Norway	130	25	18	17	12	18	18	15	19
	47	Alexander Liber	Russia	130	24	10	21	17	17	20	5	21
	48	Marnix Baes	Belgium	129	22	13	19	18	20	19	13	18
	49	Jack Bennett	England	129	19	20	20	18	21	14	17	13
	50	Illar T�nisson	Estonia	129	22	15	19	18	16	12	19	20
	0			0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
	0			0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
2018	Olav Bjortomt	Europe	164	25	25	17	23	26	20	24	21
	2	Steven Perry	USA	159	25	19	21	22	27	22	18	23
	3	Pat Gibson	England	159	24	21	19	15	24	27	21	23
	4	Igor Habal	Estonia	158	22	19	24	16	21	21	29	22
	5	Ronny Swiggers	Belgium	157	23	20	16	17	23	25	24	25
	6	Kevin Ashman	England	156	26	18	25	24	22	19	20	20
	7	Didier Bruyere	France	152	21	19	21	16	26	18	22	25
	8	Tom Trogh	Belgium	149	20	19	15	17	23	23	26	21
	9	Mark Grant	Wales	148	24	19	23	20	22	19	16	21
	10	Nico Pattyn	Belgium	146	23	16	21	14	22	21	21	22
	11	Paul Sinha	England	145	19	21	17	20	23	20	19	23
	12	Ian Bayley	England	145	23	19	20	18	16	25	17	23
	13	Tim Polley	USA	144	20	19	18	17	23	15	23	24
	14	Ove P�der	Estonia	143	25	15	20	17	20	20	23	18
	15	Thomas Kol�s�ter	Norway
	16	David Stainer	England	142	19	19	21	16	21	21	19	22
	17	Tero Kalliolevo	Finland	140	21	19	17	18	19	21	23	19
	18	David Beck	Belgium	140	17	17	19	12	22	17	23	25
	19	Kaarel Silmato	Estonia	138	22	16	17	15	24	18	21	20
	20	Patrick Friel	USA	137	18	17	16	19	22	21	18	22
	21	Mark Ryder	USA	137	20	20	19	15	25	20	15	18
	22	Holger Waldenberger	Germany	137	24	18	19	13	21	19	20	16
	23	Ole Martin Halck	Norway
	24	Scott Dawson	England	135	19	23	13	14	21	16	22	20
	25	Raj Dhuwalia	USA	134	16	15	19	15	25	21	18	20
	26	Mark Henry	Ireland	134	19	20	19	16	20	13	21	19
	27	Eric Smith	Canada	134	20	16	21	12	27	19	14	17
	28	Dorjana Sirola	Croatia	133	23	14	19	20	20	19	14	18
	29	Yogesh Raut	USA	132	20	19	12	23	20	19	16	15
	30	Hugh Bennett	England	130	19	20	12	13	19	18	19	22
	31	Perica �ivanovic	Croatia	130	21	15	13	11	19	22	23	17
	32	Ravikant Avva	Singapore	130	19	6	22	17	21	18	14	19
	33	Rob Hannah	Scotland	129	25	16	14	17	16	19	19	17
	34	Guy Jordan	USA	129	21	14	16	19	23	17	15	18
	35	Movin Miranda	Malaysia	129	23	11	14	15	21	21	16	19
	36	Jakob Myers	USA	128	20	14	25	16	20	16	16	15
	37	Tore Heliks Van Dahl	Norway	128	18	16	20	12	18	16	18	22
	38	Lars Heggland	Norway
	39	Geir H. Kristiansen	Norway	127	18	13	18	16	19	24	14	18
	40	Neven Milijic	Croatia	127	20	19	11	17	19	23	13	16
	41	Lorcan Duff	Ireland	126	21	19	16	17	19	16	17	17
	42	Jerome Vered	USA	126	19	18	16	14	27	14	13	18
	43	Andrew Ullsperger	USA	126	17	17	12	14	26	22	14	16
	44	Illar T�nisson	Estonia	126	22	12	17	14	19	15	23	16

Source:

http://www.worldquizzing.com/results/

Charts created using OpenOffice Calc.