Memory memories

For want of anything better to talk about, I was just thinking about the world memory championship in 2003. I still think that was the greatest championship in history, although there are plenty of other contenders for that title. I’m sure the Dominic O’Brien years produced plenty of thrilling contests, but I wasn’t around for most of them, and looking at the results they did tend to be a bit one-sided at least some of the time. 2002 was the most crushing victory anyone’s ever achieved – Andi was clearly light-years ahead of the field, Dominic included, right from the start. 2004 was nice because I won it, and this year was a close-run thing until Clemens ran away with it right at the end.

But 2003 was a notch above any of those years because we had six people fighting for first place that year – Andi not quite in the same kind of form as 2002 but still the man to beat, Dominic still never one to be written off, Gunther as determined as ever to improve on all those 2nd and 3rd places, Jan the often-overlooked dark horse who’s the best in the world when it comes to numbers, me having surprised everyone at the MSO six weeks previously and made it clear I could be among the top competitors, and Astrid making it clear in the first few disciplines that she had improved hugely since the last year’s event too.

And it went toing and froing between the six of us all the way through three days of heated competition. The mix between all the star names of the years gone by and the hot newcomers was something we haven’t really seen since then. And the setting was great too – the Prince hotel, Kuala Lumpur. Nicely air-conditioned, modern place in a swelteringly hot and humid, fantastic foreign city. It was a great holiday even without the championship. The Malaysian competitors were of a surprisingly low standard, with no sign of the really good ones who’d come to previous championships in England, but the mix of nationalities was the most varied we’d ever had, and the sheer volume of Malaysians and Indonesians made it still the biggest WMC ever. There was also a sketch artist who drew pencil portraits of everyone and pinned them up on the wall. Made me look much balder than I am, I’m sure.

Another thing we haven’t really had in another WMC – the competiton going right down to the crucial speed cards event. It was pretty much between Andi and Astrid by that point, unless they both failed to record a half-decent time, but nobody could predict a winner. It’s Andi’s specialist subject, but he also had a history of making mistakes under pressure. I wasn’t all that good at the cards in those days, and I was relieved to manage a 53-second pack to grab third place ahead of Gunther. Meanwhile, Andi held his nerve and just managed to win the championship by the narrowest of margins. Just to be there was fantastic.

Back to work tomorrow! Yay!