Jack Heal has been crowned Britain’s funniest student of 2008.

The 21-year-old, who has just completed a three-year maths degree at Warwick university, took the Chortle Student Comedy Award at the Edinburgh Fringe last night.

He said: ‘It was a real surprise to win, it hasn't properly sunk in yet.’

Heal impressed the panel of comedy industry judges with his monologue about a romance, filled with wordplay and dry one-liners – and takes home the £1,000 first prize to Pawlett in Somerset

Chortle editor Steve Bennett, who chaired the judges, said: ‘He’s a maths graduate, and his gags were constructed as intricately and rigorously as any complex equation, but a hell of a lot funnier. Every one was a winner, drawing huge, well-deserved laugh.’

Here is Heal’s winning set:

Simon Bird, who has already starred in the E4 comedy The Inbetweeners, came a close second, after jokingly trying to emotionally blackmail the judges during his audacious set, by promising his winnings to domestic violence charity Refuge.

Here is Bird’s set:

The other finalists were Jez Scharf Ian Smith, Danny McLoughlin, Gareth Morinan, Richard Stainbank, Pau Longley, Joseph Wilson, Jon Brittain and Chris Ramsay.

Previous winners of the competition, now in its fifth year, include Lloyd Langford, who is making his solo Edinburgh debut this year, and Nathan Caton, who recently landed his own TV sketch show on Paramount Comedy.