An Ottawa teen narrowly clinched the title of National Champion of the 2019 Canadian Geographic Challenge after a nailbiter of a final Monday in Ottawa. 

David Landry, a 10th-grader at Lisgar Collegiate Institute, won the competition by a single point following eight rounds of tough questions on everything from landforms visible from space to Canadian inventions to Indigenous languages and cultures around the world.

This was actually Landry’s second crack at the top prize; he came in second behind last year’s champion, William Chapman. This year, he formulated a new strategy for the final, which was held for the first time in the new Alex Trebek Theatre at 50 Sussex Drive, the headquarters of The Royal Canadian Geographical Society. 

“I really focused on visual aids more this year,” says Landry. “I focused a lot more on the video questions because you can’t repeat them and last year, I missed one word in the question that cost me the point.”

Landry took a commanding lead early in the competition, but by the penultimate round, fellow finalist Ryan Sharpe had crept to within four points of Landry. It all hung on the last round, a Dutch auction question worth up to four points for the competitor who could correctly guess the answer based on the first clue. 

“I was up by four going into the last question and you can get up to four points in the last question,” says Landry. “So, all I needed to do was get one point to win.”

Sharpe, a 10th-grader from Oakville, Ont. and also a returning finalist who placed third last year, took the risk of locking in his answer on the first clue and proved correct, but it wasn’t quite enough to knock Landry out of the top spot. 

Rounding out the top five finalists this year were newcomers Micah Colman of Ottawa, who finished in third place, Xavier Spano of Burlington, Ont. and Timothy Tao of Ottawa, who tied for fourth place.