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A tricky but enjoyable offering from Brendan, with a theme which rapidly became obvious but which didn’t make the solve appreciably easier for me.
FOI 4dn, LOI 19dn, which could also be COD, but there’s a lot of competition.

Thanks to Brendan.
Agreed on the theme.
FOI 9, LOI 26.
Strange, I found many clues tricky and felt I was struggling, but when the clock stopped it read a few minutes less than median Prize solving time. So slightly on the gentle side with some challenges.

Three co-CODs: 6 and 13 (both guaranteed to appeal to me) plus 26. A handful of other standouts.

I searched for a Nina, found a few words spelled out by unchecked letters but nothing conclusive.

I like Brendan. Always a fair challenge.

I have answers to 6d and 11a but

I don't get the 'in an unusual way' part of 11 and I can't really parse 6d. I seem to have an extra letter not accounted for. Any non spoiler help would be appreciated.

6 parses as 1, 1, 6, 1, 1.
I think 11 is a double definition, the phrase you quoted being one of the defn's.

11a is a double definition, the first being by example.

On first pass I entered a perfectly viable (but ultimately wrong) answer to 22a which really held things up for me. I wonder if anyone else did this?

Thanks all. I overlooked that other def in 11.

I haven't finished more than half, but bravo Brendan for 11a which tickled my funny bone.

Tough going but fun so far. Any hints for 16d or 18d please?

I'm finding this difficult. In particular I'm stuck in the NW, perhaps because I have 8a wrong. My answer fits perfectly with the first definition, but I can't see how it relates to the second one.

From this I have an answer for 1d that fits the definition, but I don't see the parsing.

I'm suspecting that 10a is a slang term that I simply don't know.

A bit of a mess! Any pointers, please?

Most of the bottom is still empty, too!

Chrise 1d is a word meaning 'in the course of' with a word meaning "clip" inside. It