NEW ZEALAND'S SMARTEST PUB QUIZ TEAM SET TO BE FOUND AND CROWNED THIS WEEKEND

That stand out team who seem to consistently nab the top spot at your local pub quiz may finally meet their match this weekend, as top pub quizzers from around New Zealand battle it out for the national title. 

The 18th annual SKY TV Pub Quiz Championship will be held in Auckland on Saturday night, with 60 teams of eight looking to topple last year’s winners Fifty Shades of Freeman from Ponsonby’s Freeman + Gray.

Teams will be tested across a range of genres by host and SKY TV commentator Scotty Sumo Stevenson, with questions spanning history, science, geography, TV and cinema, music, food and drink, sport and the ever-popular and mysterious taste test.  

They stand to win a slew of prizes, but most importantly bragging rights and the coveted New Zealand Pub Quiz Championship Trophy. 

The Pub Quiz Championship is organised by Believe It Or Not, which has been in a joint venture with SKY since mid-2014. Believe It Or Not delivers multiple quizzes every week to more than 280 venues in New Zealand, 120 in Australia and 25 in North America, and also devises the questions for Air New Zealand’s inflight quiz and University Challenge. 

Believe It Or Not General Manager Brendan Lochead says this is the pinnacle event of the year for hundreds of pub quizzers from around the country, as well as his company. “Tickets sold out a while back,” he says. 

And when asked who his pick was on the team to take out the top spot? 

“It’s anyone’s guess – there’s often only a point or two in it. It’s fiercely competitive, which makes for a hugely entertaining night all round.”