| Medal record | ||
|---|---|---|
| Quizzing | ||
| Competitor for England | ||
| IQA European Championships | ||
| Gold | 2004 Ghent | Team |
| Gold | 2007 Blackpool | Team |
| Gold | 2007 Blackpool | Club |
| Gold | 2008 Oslo | Club |
| Gold | 2009 Dordrecht | Club |
| Gold | 2009 Dordrecht | Pairs |
| Bronze | 2010 Derby | Pairs |
| Bronze | 2011 Bruges | Pairs |
David Stainer (born 4 May 1978 in Exeter [1]) is an English quizzer best known for outstanding team playing skills. After studying Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Oriel College, Oxford [2] he works as a solicitor in the City of London.
In 1999 he reached the final of the University Challenge as Oriel captain but was beaten there. He won the BBC Radio 4 series of Masterteam in 2001 with Ian Bayley and David Brewis. Bayley is also one of his teammates in the QLL club "Broken Hearts", they have won three European Quizzing Championships in a row (2007–2009), the other two are former world champion Olav Bjortomt and Welsh-Australian Mark Grant. Bjortomt and Stainer were also victorious at the European Doubles competition in 2009. On TV he won the Only Connect final 2008 as part of the Crossworders team with the other two of his "Broken Hearts" teammates Grant and Bayley. The Crossworders added a Champions of Champions play-off in 2009 and also beat Alexander Guttenplan's University Challengers (3 of the UC-winning Emmanuel College, Cambridge team) in 2011.
As an individual player he was not as dominant and as of 2010 is a fringe contender at world level ( 20th at the World Quizzing Championships 2010), a 7th place in 2004 was his best result. On the strength of this result he could play for the English national team at that time and immediately won the 2004 European Nation Championships, later he was only able to participate as an alternate, coming from the bench to win another title in 2007. (As of 2009 all four of the national team members are professionals while he remains an amateur).
In 2001 he made £64,000 on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? and won four shows of Countdown in 2002. He also won Beadle's Money, a UK version of Win Ben Stein's Money.
He met his wife, Katie Bramall-Stainer, a GP, on the student quizzing circuit after both had captained their University Challenge teams.