Neildubya/Neil Wellard

Age 35. I’ve been solving crosswords for about 14 years. Started with Guardian and stayed there until Aug 2006. Now a regular Independent and Times solver with occasional Guardians thrown in for good measure. Over the years I have occasional stabs at the Listener but these never last long. I also do the Cyclops puzzle in Private Eye and I have a long-standing ambition to compile a crossword using words and phrases only found in the Viz publication “Roger’s Profanisaurus”.

petebiddlecombe/Peter Biddlecombe
Age: 47. Crossword Achievements: Times Championship Winner, 2000, 2007. In the final 6 other times in a total of 14 attempts. Daily Guardian solver from 1978 to about 2003, then gradual reduction to favourite setters only until autumn 2006. Now do Guardian on Saturdays and occasional other days. Indie solved on Saturdays since about 1998, daily since autumn 2006, though sometimes a few days behind if busy. Times solver for a brief optimistic spell at school, then from about 1983 as part of two-puzzle daily routine. Regular Azed solver, occasional clue comp entrant - best effort is a VHC for a Printers Devilry clue. Very patchy Listener record at present - got about 25-30 puzzles right in each of 3 years, early to mid-1990s. Occasional setter of puzzles but for tiny audiences so far. Occasional solver of US-style non-cryptic puzzles, currently daily solver of Times Two non-cryptic puzzle.

Ilancaron/Ilan Caron
Age: old enough to remember the 1966 world cup.
Level: journeyman (Guardian dailies, Times dailies, occasional Azed and the rarer Listener).
Times speed: best 15 minutes, average: 45?-1 hour.
Born in London but have lived abroad since age 11. Cryptics in “The New Yorker” (97-99) were what got me going. Left Microsoft recently for the greener pastures of Google.

linxit /Andy Wallace
Age 43, been solving cryptics since I was about 12 helping my Dad with the Telegraph, moved on to the Times when I was in my mid twenties. Entered Times Championships a couple of times in the nineties, best effort joint 66th in the Bristol regional final, 1992 I think. In 2006 I came 21st in Preliminary B. I do the Guardian most days too, the Spectator every week, and started doing the Listener every week at the beginning of the year; so far I’ve sent in 13 correct entries (approx 33% strike rate). I also do Azed and/or EV if I’m finished early with the Listener. Average time for the Times is around 15-16 minutes, best ever around 5 minutes (started at Southampton station, finished by the time it got to Southampton Parkway, the next stop).

Colinblackburn/Colin Blackburn
Age: 45
I’ve been attempting to solve cryptic crosswords since some time in the late seventies when I was attracted to that strange pattern on the back of the Huddersfield Daily Examiner. I taught myself badly and then discovered Alec Robins’ book and got a bit better.At university in the early eighties I somehow discovered the Listener and Azed. This spelled the end to any hopes I had of getting a first as I wasted weeks on single puzzles. I graduated, at least in the Listener, to having my only puzzle published in 1988. I used to set basic cryptic puzzles for Manchester’s listing magazine, City Life. For this I got third pick of the freebies in the review-bin. When the magazine was taken over by the Guardian (through the Manchester Evening News) I became an official, paid, Guardian setter (well, I can dream!) After a crossword hiatus through most of the nineties I am now back solving regularly. I do the Independent puzzle most days and try to have a go at the Times and Guardian puzzles online if I get a chance. My main passion is, once again, the Listener. While I don’t manage to complete every puzzle, this has been my best year ever for submissions (if not correct submissions.) I also try some of the puzzles in Magpie and Crossword, though I rarely find enough time to complete them through to submission.

Nmsindy
60, (crossword age about 30). An interest in crosswords dating back to teens lay dormant and was revived when the Indy was launched in 1986. Spent many hours battling with setters such as Lucifer, Portia, Mass, eventually being able to finish usually in less than half an hour. Began to note solving times in the mid-1990s, mainly to compare the setters, but regard enjoyment, entertainment, clue appreciation and understanding as much more important than speed. Apart from the Indy, main crossword interest is the Listener which I tackle every week - personal annual solving record in the 30s usually. Was very pleased have my first Listener puzzle published (pseudonym: Raich) in July 2007. Also tackles Times and competition Azeds in the Observer insofar as time allows.

Rightback
Rightback is one of the younger members of the blogging team, and as such fights a constant battle against the twin demons of youthful impetuosity and chronic lack of general knowledge. In other words, he registers the odd quick time but makes plenty of mistakes. He is a regular solver of the daily crosswords and also tackles some of the harder puzzles available, like Azed and the Listener, but tends to get beaten by the cleaning lady on Times 2. He prefers round balls to oval, brass to strings, Suzie Dent to Carol Vorderman, Blur to Oasis and maroon to green.

michod/Mick Hodgkin

Started on Observer Everyman and Sunday Times, hand-delivering competition puzzles as a teenager to save the price of a stamp. Azed since late teens, picked up at my grandparents’ knees - which were usually to be found under the pub table of a Sunday lunchtime. After the dizzy heights of the Azed Superbrain finals age 21, the rest of life intervened for a few years. Now things are back in perspective, I do the Guardian/Indy regularly, Times occasionally, Azed and since 2005 the Listener (hoping for 75 per cent correct this year). I get an occasional mention in the Azed clue-writing competition and do the clue comps and puzzles on the Crossword Centre website and Crossword Club magazine. Entered Times comp for the first time 2007, somehow came through the first round and finished 18th. First published puzzle in the Church Times Sep 06, roughly monthly in the Independent since February 2007 as Morph.

Tilsit
I started solving at a very young age and when other young men were discovering different magazines, I was discovering the joys of Quiz Digest and Tough Puzzles, although didn’t fully understand things except Printers’ Devilry puzzles. Cut teeth on Altair in the Guardian and wenton to discover the joys of Araucaria and Bunthorne, the latter becoming a personal friend. With the advent of the Internet, I rekindled my joy of solving and with encouragement got into the murky world of Azeds, Listeners and such-like. Became a moderator on Derek Harrison’s excellent site and finally got into compiling, having had puzzles published in the Indy Mag, The Magpie and others. Ambition is to be good enough to be published regularly and to see in print his idea of a Listener puzzle on the works of Barry Manilow. However, success at one may prevent the other from materialising. Other recent highlights include not making a fool of himself on Mastermind and am shortly to have an audition for Countdown, where I hope to avoid the shame of being beaten by an 18 month old Cambridge graduate.

Bensand (Ben Sandford Smith)
Age 41. Been doing cryptic crosswords for 20-something years. I entered the Times Championship once and ran into one of my old teachers the only time I got out of the hall ahead of the pack. My crossword activity tends to go in surges depending on how much I’m trying to avoid the things I ought to be doing (I did a lot of crosswords when I was a student) I worked for a couple of years in the nineties at the crossword haven of OUP. In my first week I was accosted in the coffee room by someone asking how I was enjoying the crossword I was doing … he turned out to be the compiler so it’s a good thing I was complimentary about it! Generally I do several Guardians and/or Independents a week and I’m planning to try a few more Azeds now that I’ve got a subscription to the Guardian crossword online.

Jetdoc/Jane Teather
Age irrelevant, but I’m old enough to remember the crossword in the Correspondent on Sundays. Crosswords, of one sort or another, were always part of life in my family. My mother, in her 90s, still has a go at The Times non-cryptic every day. I graduated from just doing daily cryptics (Guardian for as long as I’ve been buying my own) to Azed. I also do the Cyclops puzzle in Private Eye. Since January 2006 I have been doing the Listener (apart from the mathematical ones), with reasonable but not spectacular success; I hope to improve over time. I subscribe to Magpie but seldom find time for more than one or two of the less impenetrable puzzles. I am too short of free time (actually, way too cowardly!) to attempt any setting. When not doing crosswords (or,actually, often while ‘multitasking’), I am a self-employed information design consultant. I tend a large and mostly impressive garden, and I like art a lot. Oh yes, and I’m an obsessive cricket fan — member of MCC and Middlesex, and present at every day of international cricket in London for over 20 years.

Pete Maclean
I am a British expat living in California. I’ve been doing crosswords for 35 years and, while I have tackled a great variety over that period, in recent years I have done few except those in the Financial Times. I am not a fast solver and it is rare that I complete a puzzle in one sitting; occasionally I will work on one over a whole week. I have fantasies of becoming a compiler although my one and only submission to date was rejected by The New Yorker. I work in IT and am curious about whether there is a connection; I encounter a good number of other ardent solvers who are in the same business. When I am not working or solving puzzles, I like to travel, meditate and go to movies.

smiffy/Andy Smith
Born the same month that Cum on Feel the Noize by Slade sat atop the charts. First started toying with the Telegraph cryptic puzzle as a sixth-former, and then jumped onto the steeper learning curve of the Times while at university. Have stayed pretty faithful to the Thunderer ever since, albeit in online form since moving to the US several years ago, but I also have access to the FT puzzle most days (its relatively “user-friendly” status being more amenable to time-constrained solving intraday). I’m also a longstanding Listener dilettante, and retain a soft spot for Cyclops’ scatological gems in Private Eye. My latest obsession is coining a word that eventually becomes popular enough to become immortalized into future editions of Chambers. Between times, to pay the bills, I gamble with other people’s money on the stock market.
John/Wil Ransome
Born 1946. Since retiring (maths teacher) have spent an increasing amount of time on crosswords, something that was impossible before - am not in the sub-ten minutes league and probably never will be. Do The Times every day (more often than not in over half an hour), also The Independent when I can get a copy (usually do Virgilius and Phi in about 25 minutes, but the less said about some of the others the better). Also an assortment of other crosswords, including The Listener from time to time. Have been doing Azed monthly for about five years and entering his clue-setting competitions, with some moderate success but never enough - at least not at the time of writing. Also play a lot of chess and golf.

Stan
Born 1966 in Blackpool. Did a Maths Degree, qualified as an Accountant and then ran off to join the circus that is I.T Consultancy. Currently living in Wilmslow, Cheshire but working mostly in London. I’m not as hard-core as many of the bloggers here; to me solving is a pleasurable mental excursion. Except when I can’t get started, or can’t get the last few clues. Which is why I’m delighted that fifteensquared exists, and why I’m willing to risk public humiliation to help solvers-in-distress. My all-time favourite clue is from Bunthorne : “Well done, the solver ! That was Erin’s stout assertion! (4,3,3)”
My spare-time is spent at home with Mrs. Stan and Stanetta, supporting Bolton Wanderers or writing my blog http://radiofreestan.blogspot.com

Hihoba
Hihoba is a combination of the names of three retired men who spend (waste?) more time than they should solving crosswords. We hope that it is helping us to fight off incipient Alzheimers. We operate separately, and then combine resources if (usually when) we get stuck. It’s all done by email now, but I have records to show that we’ve been doing the Inquisitor and its predecessor the Weekend Crossword back into the days when you had to ring people up and actually talk to them!

Duncan Shiell
Age 59. Retired in May 2007, after 37 years in government land survey and now has time to devote to crosswords, something not available for many years. Product of 17 years in the Scottish education system. Currently living in Southampton but pining for the hills of Scotland. Regular road runner and recently returned to orienteering after a 35 year gap. Developed interested in cryptic crosswords in the mid 1960s (Scotsman, Sunday Express skeleton), but working overseas and then raising a family, meant dropping out of crossword solving for about 30 years. Now a regular starter of Times, Azed, Inquisitor and Listener crosswords. Reasonably regular finisher of the first three. Any solving ability far outweighs any clueing ability. Krypton Factor contestant 1983; eliminated in the first round, but the obstacle course finish made good television!

Nealh
I’ve been doing crosswords off and on since university back in the 1980s. I used to do the Guardian, but defected to the Independent a year ago. My solving standard is still not what I’d like. I’d love to be able to knock off a crossword in 10 minutes, but find I’m still getting stuck for long periods when the inspiration doesn’t quite arrive. I once had a go at compiling crosswords but, after a very rude rejection for the editor of the Telegraph, I didn’t bother any further.

adamzapple

I’m an expat living in California in the IT business (sounds a lot like blogger Pete McClean, doesn’t it?). When I’m not travelling across the country from my home in Beverly Hills, I enjoy playing music. I used to be a professional guitar player and still play for fun. I’ve been doing the Guardian crossword for over 30 years. I was introduced to the addiction by my dad. We’d discuss the fine points of the more abstruse clues over the phone right up until he died five years ago. Although I will occasionally do the Independent, Times andFT puzzles, I like the Guardian the most. At their best, the puzzles combine wit, sophistication and an assumption of a broad range of knowledge and culture. I download the puzzles daily from the Guardian’s website and finish them 95% of the time.

Diagacht

Having started my crossword journey with Crosaire, the cryptic puzzle that appears daily in The Irish Times, I was somewhat challenged when I first came across the subtleties of The Guardian ‘monsters’. Crosaire (the Irish word for crossword) is a rather different beast; you might even say that Ximenean standards are the stuff of another universe. So when I first met Araucaria, Shed, Paul etc I was completely out of my depth. I had never encountered a flower that was anything other than a flower, now I am all too well aware of the allusion to a river. Nonetheless, I am a learner in this most enjoyable activity. I do not solve puzzles at speed and sometimes I can’t solve them at all. Certainly, unlike many of the distinguished bloggers, I have no cruciverbalist trophies in the closet. I did, however, once have dinner with the mighty Araucaria. He is a most delightful man and we both share the fact that we wear our collars the same and the wrong way around.

manehi/Minh Nguyen

Born 1988, have been solving the Guardian crossword since the early 2000s. I can now solve most of them on the half-hour bus trip to campus each morning, but harder puzzles are a welcome distraction from Econometrics seminars. I have a crack at the Times and Le Monde every now and then, and am slowly improving at Azed. My spare time is spent painting oranges blue, playing with computers and appearing on University Challenge.