Brandon Blackwell was born in Queens, New York, where he goofed off in
school for most of his childhood and early teen years yet spent all
his spare time reading and learning anyway. He also grew up watching
game shows, so it wasn’t long before he decided to have a crack at
it himself, culminating with a win on “Million Second Quiz” worth
more than a third of $1 million. Blackwell had appeared on three
different quiz shows and won almost $400,000 by the time he turned 20.

In 2014, Blackwell decided to start quizzing seriously and joined the
American circuit. In 2016, he made his debut internationally at the
Quiz Olympiad in Athens and won two medals, including a gold in the
world speedquizzing discipline.

In 2017, Blackwell left the American trivia scene for good to train in
the UK, where he played for some of the top quiz clubs in the world.
In addition to two fourth-place finishes in the British Quizzing
Championship pairs competition, he has won multiple London Open medals
and a President’s Cup in the Quiz League of London. Perhaps most
notoriously, Blackwell was a champion on and is one of the
highest-scoring players of all-time on “University Challenge,” a
well-known British quiz show that many say “makes ‘Jeopardy!’
look like a walk in the park.”

Blackwell is still a regular in high-level quiz competitions outside
the U.S., finishing second overall in the Under-30 World Quizzing
Championships in 2020 and 38th overall in the World Quizzing
Championships in 2021. He currently plays for one of the
highest-ranked quiz teams in the world – a team whose star player is
none other than fellow Chaser Victoria Groce.
