In a town that barely sees any rain, the 25th of October 2007 was certainly an exception. It had been raining for the last couple of days and the 25th was a crisp cool day – just the kind that makes you alert and sharp.

That, I guess, made the difference.

From the (approx) 4,000 teams that had participated in the preliminary rounds, 350  of the top teams were invited to represent their schools at the city finals. With 700 students from plus teachers, T.I.M.E. staff and visitors, the Chambers of Commerce auditorium was positively bursting at the seams even with more than 30 minutes to go for the start of the event.

After the 25 questions that would determine which six teams would make it to the on-stage rounds had been asked, evaluated and the ties broken, the teams that made it were:

1. TVS Matriculation Hr Sec School (A): K Keerthana and P Madhumitha

2. TVS Matriculation Hr Sec School (B): R Jeyaprabha  and R Krithika

3. Vikasaa School: M Suprabha and B Mrinalini

4. Mahatma School: R Srimukunda and S Siddharth

5. Kendriya Vidyalaya: S Srivatsan and M Sabari Raja

6. SBOA Matriculation Hr Sec School: Amudan and Vignesh Kumar

This was the first time in my entire experience with quizzing that not one, not two, but THREE all-girls teams made to the stage! This was certainly one town where the women went toe to toe with the men and came out on top. Yes! Believe it or not, for the first time in the history of Aqua Regia, an all-girls team came up trumps!

As always the first two rounds saw the teams warming up and getting used to the all new-bidding format but by round three, the gloves were off and all the teams were neck to neck, with the exception of TVA team A (one of the tree all girls teams on stage), who had managed to get a lead of 30 points over their nearest rivals – Mahatma School.

By the end of round six we had one clear winner, but the excitement was not done yet – we had two teams tied for second spot and one of these was again an all-girls team, this time from Vikasaa School.

The Tie-break format was sudden death, meaning that the same question would be asked to both the teams and they would have to write the answer down. The first team to get an answer wrong would lose. The deciding question was, "What are love apples  more commonly known as?” The team from SBOA Matric figured out the answer and grabbed the second place, while the team from Vikaasa, who really came from behind, had to settle for third.

TVS (A) won the quiz in style with score of 88 points at the end of round three, while prior to the tie-break, Vikaasa and SBOA were both tied at 65 points.

TVS (A) will now make their way to Chennai for the Group finals and if they win there, they will travel to Hyderabad for the National finals.

This is Quiz Master Jaideep Chowdhary Signing off…