The 1% Club: Rebecca Smith-Hughes turns down £96,000 gamble after fiendish final question

Rebecca Smith-Hughes had already secured £10,000 when she faced the biggest decision of her time on ITV’s The 1% Club.

The contestant was the only player to make it through to the show’s final 1% question, giving her the chance to walk away with the guaranteed £10,000 or risk the money in a bid to win the entire £96,000 prize pot.

In the end, Rebecca chose to take the cash. When she was shown the question she had avoided, however, she realised just how close she may have come to losing everything.

Rebecca faces a £96,000 decision

The episode, which aired as The 1% Club Valentine’s Special, saw Rebecca emerge as the final contestant after the 10% question.

Host Lee Mack then explained exactly what was at stake.

Rebecca had won £10,000, but she could either leave with that amount or gamble it all by attempting the notoriously difficult 1% question.

A correct answer would have given her the entire £96,000 prize fund.

Lee asked Rebecca what was going through her mind as she considered the decision.

She admitted that she might have carried on if another contestant had been standing beside her, but £10,000 was simply too much money to take lightly.

When Lee asked how often she managed to answer the 1% question correctly, Rebecca gave herself roughly a 50-50 chance.

She ultimately decided the safer option was the best one and took the £10,000.

The question Rebecca avoided

Under the rules of the show, Rebecca was still shown the 1% question so viewers could see whether she would have been able to solve it.

The puzzle centred on Noah and Evie, who met on their first date and discovered that they had both been born in 2001 and in the month of May.

Evie asked Noah which date in May he was born.

Noah told her that if the two digits in the date were added together, they would total 11.

Evie then said that, based on that information, she was exactly four weeks older than him.

The challenge was to work out Evie’s date of birth.

Rebecca had her answer ready when the clock ran out, but she was far from confident.

She said she had been considering May 30, although she did not think that was correct.

The answer was May 1

Lee then revealed the solution.

The correct answer was May 1, 2001.

According to the explanation given on the show, Noah was born on May 29, meaning Evie was born exactly 28 days earlier, on May 1.

That meant Rebecca’s instinct had been wrong.

But in this case, getting the question wrong was actually good news for her. Had she chosen to gamble her £10,000 and then given the same incorrect answer, she would have missed out on the guaranteed prize.

Lee told her she had made the right decision by walking away.

Rebecca could only breathe a sigh of relief after seeing the answer, knowing that her decision had protected the £10,000 she had already won.

A close call for the finalist

The 1% Club is built around logic and common sense rather than traditional general knowledge, with questions becoming progressively harder as contestants are eliminated.

That made Rebecca’s final decision particularly significant. She had reached the point where one answer could have transformed her £10,000 win into a £96,000 payday, but it could just as easily have left her with nothing.

Instead, she chose the guaranteed money.

The final question showed why that caution paid off. Rebecca’s suggested answer of May 30 was incorrect, while the solution was May 1.

She therefore left the show with £10,000, having made it all the way to the 1% question and avoided a potentially costly gamble.