Time: slower than Magoo, of course, but very crucially just a few seconds faster than David Howell
Well I can definitely tell you that I am not going to podium in any speed blogging championships any time soon – this is being finished in haste from Boston Logan’s Terminal A, while I have a few spare minutes awaiting boarding for a flight to Jacksonville FLA.
Some would say I got very lucky to reach the finals – although I submitted in second place after Mark time-wise, I had no fewer than two errors in my first paper! One of them was a biff committed by many of the great and good, but another was me inventing an answer fitting the wordplay that clearly could not exist, shades of my infamous DEVONPORT for DAVENPORT first round error a number of years ago. In a normal year such slapdashery would have meant swift and ignominious ejection from the running, but as it turned out 2025’s gentle introductory round was hard enough that there were only 10 all-corrects and people with as few as 80 correct entries out of 90 were going through to the semis. Phew!
Because terrifyingly fast up-and-comer Liam Hughes had managed to get an answer wrong in one of puzzles 4-6 by like one-half of a pen stroke, the finalists would be four former winners of the championship along with future winner Chloe Hutton. We sat down in order of finish time, so myself between Mark and Chloe and turned over our papers.
David Howell professed afterwards to having the same agonizing experience as me – a minute, two minutes, maybe even three? without anything at all going in. It probably wasn’t three minutes but it certainly felt like it. Eventually something went in, THEREUPON perhaps, and obviously once you have a toehold everything starts to coalesce into a fully solved grid, but not easily in this case, I can tell you.
According to Mark there was a point at which I started to enter things at great speed and he felt pressurized to submit! But I can promise you all I wasn’t coming up behind him with great confident strides, just playing frantic catch-up after my slow start. There was definitely a lot still to enter as I noticed him submit from the corner of my eye, and plenty of things went in less than fully parsed, ADDLE for instance which doesn’t seem so baffling with hindsight but we all found tricky under the insane pressure of competition. I was just delighted to have found HERESIARCH and SYLLABI looking like convincing candidates to fit their crossers, and even more delighted that David held up his paper a few seconds after me and Chloe at least seemed to still be working on hers. I would not have put money on me having gotten everything right, but it appeared that I had at least a shot of recouping some of my plane fare this time round.
After Chloe finally threw in the towel, she turned to me and asked “what was 1ac?” “HERESIARCH, maybe?” I replied. “What the heck is one of those when it’s at home?” was the gist of her riposte. “Er… someone in charge of a heresy? You know what I’m not really sure,” I confidently rejoined. She had also been heavily thwarted by S_____I for “courses” and ended up on a completely wrong (foody?) track. I’d just slammed in SYLLABI the minute I thought of a suitable Latin plural. Better well-versed in classical word forms than good, I often say – and who can deny that it was a bit mean of the setter to have a hard antiquarian word like 1ac clued with a difficult &lit.
The Times championship is a pretty grueling event these days – after last year’s fairly gentle puzzles in which me and others were caught napping by a whole new generation of speedsters, I would say there is no time for luxuries like “checking your work”, you’ve just got to be very fast and a little bit lucky, especially when literally everyone else is panicking at least two or three times harder than cucumber-cool Mark Goodliffe. The pendulum swung in the direction of harder puzzles too after last year’s final, which I for one approve greatly of, although those still licking their wounds from the opening round may beg to differ. What we do know is that there are going to be a lot of great solvers converging in October 2026 and who knows, maybe it will be the year that Magoo makes his twice-decadely mistake. Where there’s lights there’s hope!
Definitions underlined in bold italics, (Abc)* indicating anagram of Abc, deletions and [] other indicators.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Person giving rise to what’s rebuffed by church (10) |
| HERESIARCH – RAISER [person giving rise] to EH [what?], reversed (“is rebuffed”) by CH(urch), &lit | |
| 6 | What’s potted before black, one of two in frame (4) |
| JAMB – JAM [found in pots] before B(lack). Two jambs to every doorframe | |
| 10 | Cutting resistance apart from fringes (7) |
| EXCERPT – R(esistance), “fringed” by EXCEPT [apart from] | |
| 11 | Creep along with moderate cramps (2-3-2) |
| SO-AND-SO – AND [along with], “cramped” by SO-SO [moderate] | |
| 12 | Alhambra’s facade ornately bears what in Granada? (9) |
| ARABESQUE – A{lhambra} + (BEARS*) + QUE [what?, in Spanish] | |
| 13 | Let unoccupied kitchen cooks set joints down (5) |
| KNELT – (LET + K{itche}N*) | |
| 14 | Northern nan’s avoided turning on gas (5) |
| ARGON – GRA{n} [nan, avoiding N(orthern)] reversed + ON | |
| 15 | Utter bores dash around in this? (6,3) |
| ESTATE CAR – STATE [utter] “boring” reversed RACE [dash] | |
| 17 | Immediately after get-together, EU pondered borders (9) |
| THEREUPON – hidden in {get-toge}THER EU PON{dered} | |
| 20 | Male policeman gets into lying about age (5) |
| EPOCH – HE [male] “gotten into” by COP [policeman], all reversed | |
| 21 | Premium parking by hotel saving time and energy (5) |
| PRIZE – P(arking) by RI{t}Z + E(nergy) | |
| 23 | Endless rubbish bagged by scouts periodically coming together (9) |
| CONSENSUS – {n}ONSENS{e} “bagged by” {s}C{o}U{t}S | |
| 25 | Programmes succeeded by screening everything about India (7) |
| SYLLABI – S(ucceeded) + BY “screening” ALL, reversed + I(ndia) | |
| 26 | Cook briefly flipped pan with smallest amount of bacon grease (7) |
| PARBOIL – reversed RAP [pan] + B{acon} + OIL [grease] | |
| 27 | Binding profession unwilling to spend pounds (4) |
| OATH – {l}OATH | |
| 28 | In the act of playing chess move (10) |
| FIANCHETTO – (IN THE ACT OF*) | |
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Bird seen around yard area and one spotted in bush (5) |
| HYENA – HEN [bird] around Y(ard) + A(rea) | |
| 2 | Square stretched from city to halfway below river bend (9) |
| RECTANGLE – EC [city] + T{o}, below R(iver), plus ANGLE [bend] | |
| 3 | Sea swell usually sees duck expelling one big quack (7,7) |
| SURGEON GENERAL -SURGE [sea swell] + {I->O}N GENERAL [usually]… the “one” being expelled by 0 [duck]. I don’t know if a Surgeon General should be referred to as a quack in normal times, but we are living in the age of DJT so all bets are off really | |
| 4 | Elderly opposed to line bypassing Brussels (7) |
| ANTIQUE – ANTI [opposed to] + QU{eu}E – line, “bypassing” EU [Brussels] | |
| 5 | Extremely snug bed curtailed short nap (7) |
| COSIEST – CO{t} [bed “curtailed”] + SIEST{a} [“short” nap] | |
| 7 | Large majority of summer crowds become confused (5) |
| ADDLE – ADDE{r} [“majority of” summer] “crowding” L(arge) | |
| 8 | Lifted two pound sea creature over hot burner (9) |
| BLOWTORCH – reversed TWO LB + ORC [sea creature] over H(ot) | |
| 9 | Features about French to be run in every survey? (6,8) |
| MARKET RESEARCH – MARKS [features] about ETRE [French for “to be”] + R(un) in EACH [every] | |
| 14 | Article regarding northbound pit stops in Monza course (9) |
| ANTIPASTO – AN [article] + AS TO [regarding], “stopped” by reversed PIT. Monza could be replaced by anywhere Italian-speaking | |
| 16 | Line, small and fine, cracking mug? (5,4) |
| CROWS FOOT – ROW [line] + S(mall) + F(ine), “cracking” COOT [mug], &lit | |
| 18 | Scorer’s shown up clubs in current cup ties (7) |
| PUCCINI – IN + I [electric current] + CUP “ties” C(lubs), the whole reversed | |
| 19 | Could be this ball’s knocked over square leg (7) |
| NINEPIN – NINE [square, as in 3×3] + PIN [leg] | |
| 22 | Key hole that is reinforced on escaping from trap (5) |
| ISLET – homophone [“on escaping from trap”, where trap means mouth] of EYELET [hole that is reinforced] | |
| 24 | Large drops in circuits elevated battery discharge (5) |
| SALVO – OVALS are circuits, elevate them to give SLAVO, then drop the L(arge) to come up with a cannonade | |
I would first like to thank Matthew for being able to fit blogging the Championship puzzle into his busy travel schedule. I always like to get a blogger from among the finalists if possible for this puzzle.
My own experience was much different. I went to the Crossword Club, got a 404 when I tried to print the puzzle, so I tried the newspaper web site, and got it. I was able to work most of the clues in my first stab on Sunday night. I was helped by remembering Stephen Dedalus’ monologue in the Telemachus episode of Ulysses, where he recalls Sabellius, the subtlest heresiarch. That’s just the sort of word that would appeal to Joyce. Unfortunately, I had biffed kneel, and ended the evening with two unsolved.
Monday morning I had to take my car in for the Connecticut emissions test, so I packed some puzzles in my bag. Looking what I had done, I realized kneel must be wrong, and tried knelt. I found blowtorch pretty quickly, and then jamb was obvious. My total time was around two hours or so all told – but all correct and parsed.
Done and dusted in God only knows how long, doing it desultorily. But I finished it, which I couldn’t do Wednesday, and parsed all but HERESIARCH & ISLET.Actually enjoyed this; but then, I was doing it at home. Good to hear from you, Verlaine.
Great blog. Thanks for doing this. Watching the live screen, as I did, was more exciting than you might think.
I agree but didn’t dare say!
Thanks, Verlaine for the insights. The perfect level of crossword for the Final.
67:02
I had hoped to be in London for the finals having booked my place (not that I would have been anywhere near the finishing post), but circumstances unfortunately left me high and dry, and I never made it to London. As for the puzzle itself, nearly came a cropper on FIANCHETTO, HERESIARCH and ARABESQUE, but pieced each together painstakingly. Given that it took me nearly fourteen minutes to ink any answer at all in (COSIEST), it makes me feel so much better that V also found it tricky to get going.
Thanks V and setter
Thanks for the blog, its nice to feel part of the pyramid even for those of us who will never reach the Premier League.
I really enjoyed this one which is reflected in a completion in 62 mins, better than some Friday toughies.
Despite reading HERESIARCH in the article earlier that day it was still LOI and needed all the crossers and parsing until the result looked familiar.
39.07
I found this quite a lot easier than the first qualifier which to be fair wouldn’t be difficult. A superb puzzle – FIANCHETTO was quite simply exquisite (particularly as a chess player) with many other fine clues including – yes – my LOI HERESIARCH. I got the “what” thing but could I think of a synonym for someone who gives a rise? Nope until the obvious hit me between the eyes.
Great to hear from Verlaine.
Enjoyed that. Started well, JAMB, BLOWTORCH and ADDLE went straight in, but then slowed considerably. All solved and parsed in 45 minutes, including last one in NHO 1ac which sounded like what it is, but took a while to see the wordplay to confirm. 8 minutes under pressure is ridiculous.
Liked CROW’S FOOT, FIANCHETTO, ANTIPASTO and SURGEON GENERAL. While solving there seemed to be a lot of NOUN NOUN VERB clues e.g. Male policeman gets into.
Thanks to Matthew for the first-person description of the competition, and for the blog.
I’m glad I didn’t give up on this. Didn’t do it in one go, but got there.
Nice to see Verlaine writing here again!
Fascinating, thanks Verlaine .. much appreciated. Having heresiarch as 1ac seemed like deliberate torture to me. Just putting the boot in..
And I agree with all you say about 3dn 🙂
Amazingly I did this in 34’33”. Now I have to admit that before I started I had glanced at something or other someone had blogged where the word HERESIARCH was mentioned in reference to how hard the puzzle had been. And straightaway of course I saw where it had to go in. So a bit of an unintentional cheat. However, I must add that I did not actually enter the answer until I had solved all the down checkers independently. And I dare to think that I would have got HERESIARCH with my own meninges once those checkers were in. Probably would have added a few minutes though. It was a splended puzzle.
Struggled mightily and got most of the way there but was punched in the face by 1ac…
I used to think Fianchetto was included in the lyrics of Bohemian Rhapsody ; somehow in my head it was a convolution of little silhouetto and fandango. I get a lot of that
Good to see Verlaime again and a fascinating insight to to the competion. Much obliged
Excellent blog from Verlaine. I did finish the puzzle, but it took me 27:14 so I wasn’t in the territory. I’m curious enough to have kept copies of the full results. However, 3 omissions and 1 incorrect answer on Wednesday’s first qualifier wasn’t encouraging.
It was good to get Matthew’s perspective on the harder puzzles we see these days. It’s 27 years since I was Northern Champion under the old regime, and so much has changed. Back then it was all about the speed, and the puzzles were quite a bit gentler – I’d stop short of easier though! A good indicator was the Manchester final where I correctly completed all 4 puzzles in a combined time of 29 minutes – but still only finished second behind my good friend Neil Robinson.
I struggled mightily with this, but was defeated in the end, mostly by HERESIARCH and FIANCHETTO, neither of which I’d heard of, although subsequently I realised I’d seen the former referred to by Mark Goodliffe himself when remarking on the final. I made the same mistake as Vinyl in putting in KNEEL – the past tense never occurred to me – which made BLOWTORCH impossible. I like to think that if I’d got the one, I would have got the other, but I threw in the towel, pleased to get all but five, CROWSFOOT being my other non-solve. But what on earth is a ‘coot’ anyway – what kind of mug are we talking about? The online meanings given don’t seem to cover the word in terms of a mug.
Congratulations and thank you for first-rate reporting Matthew. The tension was palpable even to those of us sitting at home in our sleepwear several times zones away.
I very much enjoyed this once I realized that the chief heretic or whoever-it-was in 1A would just have to wait. The nod to the Moorish architecture of the Alhambra was especially neat.