6 Nations – Week 1

With the Six Nations beginning tomorrow, it seems an appropriate time to lose some money to Declan. Or someone else. But most likely Declan. Anyway, the rules of the game are simple:

Each person puts £10 in.
Winner takes all.

For each game pick a winner and by how many points.

+5 for the right winner
+10 for the exact right points difference
-1 for each points difference out

e.g. England vs Italy guess England win by 10 points.

If England win 23-13 – +15
If England win 23-12 – +4
If England win 23-15 – +4
If England lose 23-13 – -20

Winner is the one with the most overall points at the end.

Predictions for the first round are below:

Me Dec Alex Pease Dave England vs Italy England by 10 England by 15 England by 17 England by 15 England by 13 Ireland vs France Ireland by 7 France by 8 France by 5 France by 5 Ireland by 3 Scotland vs Wales Wales by 10 Wales by 12 Wales by 8 Wales by 10 Wales by 15

Important Questions

When travelling overland to Beijing, where do you start from?

London?
Lisbon?
Kaliningrad?
Paris?
Berlin?
Istanbul?
Helsinki?
St Petersburg?

While going through Siberia and then Ulaan Baatur would allow you to pick up Ural, Yakutsk, Irkutsk and Mongolia on the way – which is worth at least one extra army per turn, would it be more interesting to cut through Kazakhstan and visit Samarkand and Almaty?

If you were to visit every province on a Risk board and play Risk there, in the spirit of the game would you be honour-bound to start in Australia? (Or if you were a thinking man, in South America).

Is New Zealand the largest island not to feature on the Risk board?

Is my interest in travel being rapidly overtaken by my interest in Risk?