There is nothing trivial about Twin City Trivia, an annual competition that challenges trivia teams across central Illinois to match their wits and collective wisdom for prizes and a coveted trophy. The big event was held Saturday, Nov. 7, at Smash House Bar and Restaurant on Normal’s east side, where 25 teams — including two Springfield teams — gathered to face off.
John Mark Woelfel, president of Twin City Trivia and host of the event, says the competition is now in its 11th year, taking time off only in 2020 because of the COVID pandemic. The teams start competing in January, wracking up points every time they play in their home towns, and the cumulative totals help them earn a seat at the “Trivia Bowl.”
“This is my favorite event of the year,” says Woelfel, who manages the annual competition from his Bloomington-Normal homebase, hence the Twin City destination. Each team is allowed up to eight players, which this year filled the venue up to near capacity.
Team names were edgy, ironic, absurd and tongue-in-cheek — but all wonderfully nerdy. “That’s What She Said,” “Dumb-Dumbs,” “Turd Ferguson,” “Killer Queen,” “You’re Telling Me,” “Here for the Beer” and “Fifth Force” were some of the teams who traveled from Lincoln, Decatur, Colfax and Springfield to battle for bragging rights and a trophy in McLean County.
Fifth Force is a team made up of Springfield trivia hosts and regulars (there are several weekly matches in town at various venues). Wikipedia defines Fifth Force as a “hypothetical fundamental interaction beyond the four known interactions in nature: gravitational, electromagnetic, strong nuclear, and weak nuclear forces. Some speculative theories have proposed a fifth force to explain various anomalous observations that do not fit existing theories.”
Another Springfield team that has excelled at the regional level is “Bulging Disks.”
There were six categories of 10 questions each. The music category (“Spin Cycle”) asked contestants to name theme songs from TV shows and identify the series they spun off from. Another category, “So Sue Me,” played up the theme of ” Sues and Susans” in popular culture. The final category, “This One’s For You,” had teams fumbling over their own names for points.
At the end of the two-hour Trivia Bowl match, the Springfield team Fifth Force captured the title and trophy, besting their nearest competitor, Just Here for the Beer, by 11 points, 138 to 127. Congratulations, Fifth Force!
