Trivia is a Sport, Right?

Before we decided to impart our genius to the world via weblog, Pink Hat Nation was a bar trivia team, and a pretty damn good one, too. We've been playing at Winston's in Ocean Beach for the past few months and have developed a strategy for winning. In an effort to make bar trivia the fifth US sport (screw you, soccer!), here are PHN's top 3 tips for winning at trivia:

1. Be Selective with your Team Members
When selecting your trivia team, choose people you know are smart and have a wealth of random, general knowledge. Our team members have specialties, if you will - I'm pretty good with film and awards, the fellas know their sports factoids and history, Liz kills with the "how the hell does anyone know that" category - but in general, we all know a little about everything and can use our knowledge to make educated guesses when we don't know the answer. However, more than 6 people on your team creates too many opinions and educated guesses. Bigger is not always better when it comes to trivia. If Hell's Kitchen has taught us anything, it's too many cooks spoil the dinner service (and Beef Wellington and Risotto are really popular...and Gordon Ramsey is smokin' hot). Keep your team to the select few you know will perform for you.

2. Confidence does not Equal Correct-ness
This is where your team recorder becomes important. Many times, people give an answer they seem really confident about and turn out to be completely wrong. Learn to recognize who's "hot" that night and who to listen to with certain categories. For example, I'm not gonna listen to the guy who never reads or watches TV when I get a question about Lindsay Lohan, even if he seems absolutely positive about his answer...I'm gonna go to the chick who reads In Touch and frequents tmz.com...that's just common sense.

3. Drink
I don't know why this works, but our team always does better as the night goes on and we drink more. Maybe our brain neurons loosen up and we are able to tap into our information pockets (a real, scientific part of your brain, I swear) where we access knowledge not readily available without alcohol. I can't really explain it. Just do it...it helps...and you know you want to anyway.

So there you have it. PHN's strategy for winning bar trivia. If you live in SD, come by Winston's on a Tuesday night and play some trivia. You can't be on our team, but you can definitely buy us a drink.