Free money glitch: our winning Warrawong trivia residency

It all started when we couldn’t find a table at La La La’s. You see, we had been going to Tuesday trivia at the lively dive bar before The Trivia Tap took over. Because in a blink, a chill night at the local with a severely disorganised quizmaster (the bar manager who had more important things to do than research the capital cities of Europe) turned into a fistfight to sit down. These days La’s boasts well over 100 contestants every Tuesday across 20-odd teams. It’s simply too big of a battle.

Scrolling through The Trivia Tap’s other venues, we noticed there was a gaping exploit possible for a select group that dared. While there was often a four-team tiebreak at La’s, there were only five teams consistently taking on trivia at the Open Hearth Hotel in Warrawong. The best part was, the venue was boasting surprisingly high rewards for winners: $100 for first place, $50 for second, and hell, even a round of drinks for the best team name. With three valuable rewards going around to barely five teams each week, you’d be silly not to head down and give it a shot.

So we did, and on the first attempt, we picked a daring team name: ‘Free Money Glitch’. We were getting ahead of ourselves – we came third, and chalked up our middle-of-the-road performance to being rattled by the venue change. It was also a valuable experience to survey the regulars. One table, as we heard through the grape vine, was made up of professional quiz players. Another group, who went by the name ‘Irish Gits’, were our most formidable opponents, having won three weeks in a row, and scored second place twice before that. On the other hand, my friends and I hadn’t come close to the podium at our regular pub. We sat opposite them, staring down our rivals face to face, trying to get in their heads. Maybe we could telepathically communicate the wrong answers to them?

We came back the week after for a second shot at victory, and boy was it close – we were only three points behind the dominant side, slowly closing the gap after our six-point deficit the prior week. Second place this time, and scoring the $50 food and drink voucher was not something to scoff at, securing three pizzas and a round of drinks for the following week, where we needed to be at the absolute top of our game.

So this was it, the showdown. Wednesday the 18th of March, the night after Saint Patrick’s Day. Third time’s the charm, and perhaps this week we needed the luck of the Irish to finally claim victory at the Open Hearth. So when we walked in, imagine our surprise to see ‘Irish Gits’ were absent. For us, this was like entering the big arena on grand final night, and being told your opponents forgot about the match. But we couldn’t let our guard down yet, because a whopping ten teams showed up this week, far and away the biggest crowd they’ve seen on a Wednesday night at this place. We weren’t familiar with these contestants, so theoretically, without the commanding presence of ‘Irish Gits’, any one of us could Steven Bradbury our way across the finish line. And after a difficult round of identifying Samuel L. Jackson movies, we marched forward, recalling all six countries with names ending with ‘bia’, then naming all six of Ron Weasley’s siblings in what commentators called the Miracle at Warrawong. Dusting off our hands after a hard night’s work, we came away with a decisive victory at 47 points. Hear ye, hear ye, the Open Hearth is under new management. 

As of writing, we have won three weeks in a row at the old tavern, swindling $350 in less than a month, to be reinvested as a bar tab for the next outing. But as we walked away on the 1st of April, after another dominant win, we felt satisfied in our residency, and decided to hang up the baggy greens in search of a new venue: a new challenge, with new faces, and maybe new foes. Upon reflection, it is us who have become the ‘Irish Gits’ for a new generation of faces here. They never came back after hitting their third win, and it’s only right to continue that prophecy.

Our time at the Open Hearth taught us a few things. Firstly, never buy individual drinks for your group, opt for pitchers. Brush up on your geography knowledge, because the final round almost always relates to flags, countries or city names. And finally, hard work pays off, and consistency is key. But at the end of the day, win or lose, what’s not to love about a scheduled weekly hangout with your group?

Trivia at quiet Illawarra venues is a free money glitch just waiting to be patched, so gather a team and run in, before it’s too late.