The 1% Club Players Lose £95,000 After Brutal Triangle Puzzle Leaves Them One Answer Away From Victory
Two The 1% Club contestants saw their hopes of winning £95,000 disappear after a deceptively simple triangle puzzle proved too difficult to crack.
Christopher and Scott had successfully worked their way through the ITV competition until host Lee Mack presented them with a question that sounded straightforward: “How many triangles are in this picture?”
What followed was a tense counting exercise in which one contestant dramatically underestimated the answer while the other came agonisingly close.
Christopher and Scott Face the Triangle Challenge
Unlike traditional quiz shows, The 1% Club focuses on logic and common sense rather than general knowledge, with questions becoming progressively more challenging as contestants move through the competition.
Christopher and Scott had survived the earlier rounds through a combination of correct answers and some fortunate guesses. But the triangle puzzle presented an entirely different problem.
The image displayed on screen featured one large triangular shape divided into numerous smaller sections.
Contestants couldn’t simply count the most obvious individual triangles. Some adjoining shapes could also be combined to create larger triangles, making it increasingly difficult to keep track.
As the clock ran down, both men appeared to struggle with the diagram.
Christopher eventually settled on eight.
Scott counted considerably more and submitted 19.
Only one triangle separated Scott from the correct answer — and the £95,000 prize.
The Correct Answer Was 18
After allowing the suspense to build, Lee revealed that neither contestant had solved the puzzle.
The picture contained 18 triangles.
The key was recognising all the different combinations within the diagram, including smaller shapes that could be joined together to form additional triangles.
Christopher immediately acknowledged where things had gone wrong.
“I clearly didn’t count all the triangles,” he joked after learning the answer.
Scott’s mistake was very different. His guess of 19 suggested he had almost solved the puzzle, but when Lee asked how he arrived at the number, Scott admitted that the pressure had caused him to lose track.
“I started counting, and then I just kept counting the same triangles over and over and over again,” he explained.
“And then I just panicked and put 19.”
Scott Came Agonisingly Close
Scott’s mistake made the result particularly painful because his final answer was just one away from the required 18.
Rather than overlooking several hidden triangles, he had apparently counted at least one of them more than once.
Christopher, meanwhile, had gone in the opposite direction. His answer of eight showed just how deceptive the puzzle could be when the larger triangles created by combining sections were taken into account.
Lee apologised to the pair after revealing the result, bringing their run on the programme — and their chance of taking home the £95,000 — to a disappointing end.
It was another example of what can make The 1% Club so unforgiving: the question required no specialist knowledge, only careful observation and the ability to remain methodical while the clock was ticking.
For Scott in particular, the difference between a huge payday and elimination came down to a single triangle.