Hello, Point-dexters!

I’m your Quizmaster, Aimee Lucido, and this is Bonus Points: the newsletter that gives you a behind-the-scenes look at last week’s Pointed news quiz. Want to be the first to know when a new quiz goes live? Sign up for email alerts here. 

You just keep getting better and better at this game! The average score was up 5.5 points over last week, and only three questions had a get-rate of below 60%. Perfect scores were up too, with nearly 2% of you scoring the elusive 190. Very impressive!

Hardest Question of the Week

Which company sold “Flagg Day” apparel in anticipation of an event that took place on June 25? The company has been trying to break through to become a top-three brand in its market.

A) New Balance
B) Nike
C) Hoka
D) Converse

I never have any idea how hard sports questions are going to play because sports are my biggest knowledge blind spot. When I first wrote this question, I thought jumping from Flagg Day to Cooper Flagg to the NBA draft to New Balance was pretty dang hard, and so I made the answers New Balance, Gap, Victoria’s Secret, and Target. My testers, however, made the leap to basketball immediately, so I figured the question was too easy as written, and I changed it to what you see. 

I expected solvers to rule out Nike based off of it already being one of the top athletic shoe brands, and Hoka because their shoes are marketed for running and hiking more than basketball. I thought some of you may get tripped up because Converse recently launched a partnership with new NBA champion Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, but the most common wrong answer here was Hoka, with 41% of you guessing it. By comparison, only 39% guessed the correct answer, which was New Balance, the long-time sponsor of the first pick in the NBA draft, Cooper Flagg. Maybe there are more of us sports dunces taking this quiz than I thought! Finally I have found my people.

Deleted Scenes

Last week was a big news week. And in big news weeks, some of the smaller stories that are more human-interest-y get cut in favor of meatier news. Here’s one from this week: 

An aerospace company sent the first-ever astronauts from India, Hungary and Poland to the International Space Station. Which company is it? The company is named for a statement that is considered self-evidently true. 

A) Axiom
B) Theorem
C) Corollary
D) Lemma

Let’s start by ruling out answers: a theorem is defined as a proposition that can be proven with a chain of reasoning, but not something that is self-evidently true. Similarly, a corollary is a proposition that follows another proposition already proven true and a lemma is defined as a subsidiary theorem within the argument of a larger proof. But an axiom is something that is widely accepted as true without needing to be proven. For example, 2+2=4 is an axiom. And Axiom Space just launched an international crew to the ISS! I don’t *need* to prove that to you, but I figured I’d link to the article anyway.

Trivia From Outside the News Cycle

I recently learned something fascinating about a favorite song thanks to the trivia podcast Good Job Brain. The song, released by a now-famous duo in 1965, was apparently an electric remix of an earlier song by the same duo. The remix was made by the song’s producer, Tom Wilson, without the artists’ knowledge, but it launched the musicians into stardom. The song was later used as the opening track to a 1967 Oscar-winning film in which the duo’s music was featured prominently. What is the name of the song?

Oh, and here’s the answer to last week’s Trivia From Outside the News Cycle question! A reminder, the question was: “What is the name for the marinade used in Peruvian ceviche? The name contains the Spanish words for a dairy product and a wild cat.” 

The answer is… leche de tigre! I couldn’t find a definitive answer as to why that’s the name, but it may have something to do with the marinade having a milky white coloring, and being thought of as an aphrodisiac in Peruvian culture. Rawr. 

We’re already hard at work drafting this week’s Pointed, so if you’re looking for a hint to help you join that elusive 190 club, you’ve come to the right place. Your hint is to take a look at the uses of gypsum. It may help you in a question about acquisitions.  

Have thoughts on the quiz? Reach out! pointed@bloomberg.net. 

Aimee Lucido

Aka The Quizmaster