A teacher from Stafford has walked away with a life-changing £100,000 after winning ITV's The 1% Club, but she insists her victory had little to do with sheer intelligence.
The Winning Moment
Maccisha Medford triumphed in the final of the hit quiz show, which aired on Saturday, 10 January 2026. She faced the ultimate 1% question alongside fellow finalists Isabella Basson and Oliver Howard, with the entire prize pot hanging in the balance.
Host Lee Mack presented the trio with a dilemma: leave with a guaranteed share of £3,333 each or risk it all to answer one final, incredibly difficult puzzle. All three chose to play on.
The Puzzling Final Question
The contestants had just 30 seconds to study a cryptic sequence: '1 + 2 = one, 2 + 2 = four, 3 + 2 = three, 3 + 3 = eleven, 4 + 3 = ?'. Oliver guessed eight, Isabella said 13, but Maccisha correctly answered 15.
Lee Mack explained the logic: the first number in each sum represents the count of consonants in the word answer, and the second number represents the vowels. 'Fifteen' has four consonants and three vowels, making it the lowest number that fits the pattern for '4 + 3'.
The Real Secret to Getting on the Show
In a revealing interview with the BBC, Maccisha explained that her path to the show was not based on a gruelling general knowledge test. Unlike other quizzes, The 1% Club producers were more interested in her personality and ability to banter with host Lee Mack.
"During the application, they were very keen to find out more about me as a person," she said. The process involved sharing amusing personal anecdotes. Maccisha's chosen facts were that she has broken the same foot seven times and was once mistaken for a child by a bike instructor.
The focus was clearly on finding engaging contestants, not just quiz geniuses.
A History of Tricky Sequences
The show is famed for its logic-based brainteasers. In a previous episode, which originally launched the series in 2022, contestant Tamzin Brown won £96,000 by solving a letters sequence.
The final three were shown 'T N E C R E P E' and asked for the next two letters. The correct answer was 'N-O', forming the word 'percent' backwards. Tamzin secured the jackpot by locking in her answer just ten seconds after seeing the puzzle.
The 1% Club continues to challenge the nation's logic, not just its memory. It airs on ITV1 and is available to stream on ITVX.
