The 1% Club viewers baffled by £94,000 question after contestant plays it safe
A The 1% Club contestant missed out on the chance to win £94,000 on Saturday night after choosing to take the safer option, only to discover moments later that she had worked out the correct answer.
Sara was one of two finalists on the ITV quiz show’s episode on Saturday, 29 March. With £94,000 at stake, she and fellow finalist Rhia had to decide whether to gamble their guaranteed share of the money on the notoriously difficult final question.
The pair ultimately chose to split £10,000 rather than risk leaving with nothing.
But when they were given 30 seconds to work out the final question anyway, Sara produced the correct answer, leaving viewers at home wondering whether she should have taken the gamble.
Sara chose the safer £10,000 option
Hosted by Lee Mack, The 1% Club is built around logic, reasoning and common sense rather than traditional general-knowledge questions. The show begins with 100 contestants, who face increasingly difficult challenges as the game progresses.
Those who make it through to the final stages have the opportunity to compete for a jackpot of up to £100,000 by answering the question that only 1 per cent of the general public is expected to solve.
For Sara and Rhia, that jackpot stood at £94,000.
However, they had another option. Rather than attempt the final question, they could switch off their lights and take an equal share of £10,000.
Both contestants decided that guaranteed money was preferable to risking everything on a question that could prove almost impossible to solve in just 30 seconds.
When Lee asked Sara why she had chosen not to gamble, she explained that she did not want to leave the show empty-handed.
It was a decision that quickly became more difficult to accept.
The final question left viewers scratching their heads
For the sake of seeing whether they had made the right decision, Sara and Rhia were still allowed to attempt the final challenge.
The question asked:
“Yolande takes one tablet on every day of the week that has three vowels in total in it. She starts this pack on 2nd March. What date will she need to start a new pack?”
With only 30 seconds to figure it out, the two finalists went in different directions.
Rhia eventually admitted that she was taking a guess and chose 23rd March.
Sara, meanwhile, said she would have gone with Tuesday, 26th March.
And she was right.
The correct answer was 26th March, meaning Sara had successfully solved the £94,000 question after deciding not to risk her guaranteed prize.
The calculation hinged on identifying the days of the week containing three vowels: Saturday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Yolande had ten tablets in the pack, meaning the tablets would be taken on those days until the supply ran out.
Even Lee Mack understood why she played it safe
The revelation prompted an understandably awkward moment for Sara.
Lee Mack himself acknowledged how difficult the question was and admitted that it had left him confused too.
He reassured Sara that, despite the fact she had reached the correct answer, he still believed she had made the sensible decision by taking the guaranteed money.
The host pointed out that contestants can never know what the final question will involve, particularly when they have only 30 seconds to solve it.
For Sara, however, knowing that she had the right answer was likely to make the £94,000 she left on the table feel particularly painful.
Viewers struggled with the question too
Many viewers watching at home appeared to understand Sara’s decision.
Social media was quickly filled with reactions from people who found the puzzle far too complicated to solve within the time limit.
One viewer jokingly asked who had come up with the “mind-bending” questions on the show that evening.
Another admitted they had started by looking at the days and the number of vowels, only to become distracted once the tablets were introduced into the puzzle.
A third viewer said they had correctly worked out that the relevant days were Saturday, Tuesday and Wednesday, but then mistakenly counted 12 tablets and arrived at 30th March.
Others simply admitted they had failed to reach an answer before the 30 seconds were up.
One viewer, however, did manage to get 26th March, while still describing the amount of information contestants had to process in 30 seconds as considerable.
The reaction highlighted exactly why Sara’s decision was understandable. Although she ultimately had the answer, she had no way of knowing that when she was faced with the choice between a guaranteed £5,000 share and a potentially life-changing £94,000 jackpot.
For viewers, the frustrating part was knowing that she had solved the puzzle correctly all along.
