Northampton man becomes first winner of brand new BBC quiz show with whopping £76K

A Northampton man is the first ever person to win money on a brand new, prime time BBC quiz show.

The first episode of 'Michael McIntyre’s The Wheel', which sees a contestant spun on a wheel to find out which of the seven 'celebrity experts' will be able to help for one question, aired last night on BBC One at 8.30pm following Strictly Come Dancing.

Leome, from Northampton, was one of the first three contestants to play the game and was the first ever to take money away from the show, with a whopping £76,000.

To get to the prize fund, a contestant is chosen at random from the 'contestant wheel', to be brought up to the main wheel where the celebrities are located. The contestant can then choose which of the seven topics to answer a question on.

Each of the topics are associated with a 'celebrity expert', who is the 'gold player' if their topic is selected. If the wheel lands on them while they are gold, the question is worth £10,000.

The contestant also has to pick a celebrity to 'shut down' who may not know as much on the topic. If the wheel lands on that celebrity, the contestant loses their space on the wheel for the time being and is replaced by another from the contestant wheel. The same happens if the contestant answers a question wrong.

Throughout the games the celebrities play along with each question in order to be put into 'expert rankings' at the end of the show.

For Leome's first question, he chose the topic of 'words', which was Susie Dent's expert topic. Leome decided to freeze out Joey Essex whose topic was 'dating'.

As the wheel landed on Dermot O'Leary and not the allotted expert for 'words', the question was only worth £3,000.

With the help of the TV host, Leome correctly answered the question.

His next question was on the topic of 'Spice Girls' and the wheel landed on the expert, Mel B, meaning the right answer was worth £10,000.

The duo got the question about the song '2 become 1' correct, however Leome then answered his next question on dating incorrect so was sent back down to the contestant wheel having added £13,000 to the prize fund.

Another contestant then answered one question correctly before giving a wrong answer and being replaced by a third player.

This contestant then answered a further three questions successfully, including a £10,000 question, before being replaced by Leome.

When Leome was elevated back to the main wheel, the prize fund was at £32,000 with just one topic to play before answering the jackpot question.

The remaining topic to answer was 'World War Two' and if the wheel landed on the two celebrities who had not been spun in yet - Susie Dent and Joey Essex - the question was worth double - £6,000 instead of £3,000.

The wheel did land on Susie Dent who helped Leome to answer the question correctly, increasing the prize fund to £38,000.

Now all that stood between Leome and the cash was one final jackpot question, which the wheel would select from four random topics: 'movies', 'USA', 'dragons' and 'football'.

For the final question, Leome could choose the celebrity to help him, rather than the wheel choosing at random.

However, he could only choose between three celebrities; the one ranked the lowest, the one ranked in the middle and the one ranked the highest in the expert ratings.

If Leome, chose the middle ranking celebrity to help him in the final question who would play for the original £38,000 or he could choose the highest ranked player and the prize fund would be halved to £19,000.

Leome was also offered a gamble to pick the lowest ranked celebrity - Joey Essex - to play for double the prize fund of £76,000. This is the option Leome selected.

The wheel randomly picked USA as the topic.

The question was: 'Niagara Falls is located on the border between Ontario, Canada and which other USA state?'

Leome and Joey had 30 seconds to discuss the multiple choice answers, which were Pennsylvania, Michigan, New York and Ohio, but the half a minute and the celebrity expert were not needed as Leome knew the answer straight away.

After Joey spent a few seconds saying he was not sure, Leome said: "Joey don't worry I know the answer. I'm feeling very, very confident. I don't need the 20 seconds, I'm good."

Which promoted a response of 'Leome, you are the coolest person we will ever have on this show' from host Michael McIntyre.

The answer was, of course, correct and New York won Leome the £76,000 he opted to play for, leaving the contestant saying 'words can't explain how I feel'.

At the beginning of the show Leome told the host what he would spend the money on if he won big.

He said: "I would take my family over to Jamaica, where my family is from.

"I'd donate a bit to charity, but I would party too."

Catch up on 'Michael McIntyre’s The Wheel' on BBC iPlayer and the show will be back on BBC One for episode two next Saturday (November 5) at 8.30pm.