An author and quiz fan came home with thousands of pounds after an appearance on an ITV game show.

The Comet: Dom Walker won thousands on an ITV quiz showDom Walker won thousands on an ITV quiz show (Image: Archant)

Dominic Walker won £4,000 as a contestant on The Chase, which is fronted by actor and presenter Bradley Walsh, best known for his roles as Danny Baldwin in the Weatherfield soap opera, and the lead role of Det Sup Ronnie Brooks in Law and Order: UK.

Dom, who lives on Hitchin’s Poets Estate in Hitchin and is a former pupil of Letchworth’s Highfield School, said: “It was an amazing experience.

“I’ve always been a fan of pub quizzes and I thought: ‘Why don’t I try and enter The Chase as it looks like good fun?

“Luckily I got accepted which I was very happy about as it’s quite a unique show, so I went down to Elstree Studios for filming.”

The show – regularly watched by more than 2.5 million people – sees a group of contestants individually attempt to amass as much money as possible, which is then added to a prize fund if the contestant survives their individual chase.

The job of the resident ‘chasers’ – all egghead quiz experts renowned for their amazing general knowledge – is to catch each contestant and eliminate them from the game, preventing the money they have won from being added to the collective prize fund.

Any contestants who survive their individual chase later play collectively as a team for an equal share of the prize fund.

Website content manager Dom, 31, explained: “I met the other three members of my team in the green room and we then went on stage to start filming,

“Bradley came over to us and shook our hands and wished us well. He seemed a very nice person, a very positive character.

“We then met our ‘chaser’, Anne Hegerty, who went head-to-head with us in answering questions.

“Thankfully I got five out of five. The easiest was: ‘The Ant and Dec song is called Let’s Get Ready To...?’

“The answer was ‘rumble’ of course.

“Our team then had to answer as many questions as possible in two minutes. I managed to answer 13 out of our team total of 21, and we won £16,000 which was split four ways. I said I was going to spend my winnings on some clothes and on a holiday to America.”

Busy Dom is also the author of a fast-paced book called Cryptids, about a man who finds himself searching for legendary animals similar to the Loch Ness Monster, and plans to release another book, dealing with crime and betrayal, next year.