Friday, 10 April 2015

The health benefits of chess?

Thanks to Somton Ukken for this link.

Do you agree?   Let's hear your comments!
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Last Friday, reporting on the Division 1 end-of-season table, Adam Taylor (Manningtree A) was shown as winning the Player of the Year award.   In fact, this was incorrect.   The winner was Stephen Gregory (Ipswich A).   The error occurred because the winner is the person who scores most points for a team, rather than the one who records the highest percentage.   Adam scored 7½/8, whilst Stephen scored 9½/12.



Thursday, 9 April 2015

Ipswich Club Championship

Many congratulations to Mike Cook on regaining the title of Champion of Ipswich Chess Club for 2015!

Mike reaches the age of eighty next year and once again proves the point that age is no barrier in chess.

He played very solidly throughout the Ipswich Club Championship which is played over six rounds during the course of the season.   He was unbeaten in the competition and along the way attained admirable victories against former Club Champions Steve Gregory and Ted Matthewson whilst dropping only one half-point against Tim Lunn (also a former Club Champion).

Well done Mike!

(Thanks to Les Jones for this report)


Wednesday, 8 April 2015

US Chess Championships

The US Championships are well underway, with Round 7 (of 11) being played today.

The latest sensation, Sam Sevian, a Grandmaster at the tender age of 14, beat Wesley So (with Black) in Round 3 and is currently in =3rd place (out of 12).

In today's match, he faces tournament leader (and favourite) Hikaru Nakamura.   The game can be viewed live in a number of places, including Chessbomb.


Tuesday, 7 April 2015

Find the move

The position below is from Tom Villiers v Ian Wallis, Southend 2015, with White to play.

Black has sacrificed a pawn and has swapped off White's fianchetto (light-squared) bishop, so has hopes of a mating attack.

With accurate defence White can probably defend.   However he decided to make a few threats himself and opened the long diagonal, attacking g7 with 20. dxc5?

This was his last mistake, as Black forces resignation in two moves.

Can you find the moves that Ian played?   The answer is several lines down the page...



























20... Ne5 blocks the mate and threatens mate himself (21. ... Nf3+ and 22. ... Qxh2#), which can only be prevented by serious material losses.   White thought 21. Ne1 defends but resigned after 21... Qh3 due to 22. Ng2,   Nf3+;   23. Qxf3 (the only move to stop mate on h2)   23... Bxf3 and whichever square the knight moves to the rook captures it.   21. h4 also fails to save the game as Black has 21... Rxh4!;   22. gxh4,   Nf3+ etc.



Monday, 6 April 2015

Southend results

Five Suffolk players finished unbeaten on 4½ points (out of 7), for equal 9th place.   Dagne Ciuksyte picked up the £500 prize for the best female performance.   Others on 4½ points included Alan Merry (who drew with IM Richard Pert today), Ian Wallis (who beat Ed Player today), Andrew Lewis and David Spence.   Ian continued his recent run of good form and will amass an extra 46 rating points from the tournament, taking him back over 2000.   Ian and David both won grading prizes.

Other Suffolk scores were: Graham Moore - 4; Silas Peck and Ed Player - 3; Steve Gregory - 2½; Keith Woodcock - 1½.

Even after this tournament, where he improved his rating by 20 points, Alan Merry still needs another 60 rating points to get his rating up to 2400, which he needs for his IM title.


Sunday, 5 April 2015

Southend Easter Congress

A large contingent of Suffolk players has travelled to Southend for the 59th Easter Congress.   No fewer than ten of the 70 entrants in the Premier Open are from Suffolk.

The final round will be played tomorrow (Monday) morning, but after six rounds, the Suffolk players are doing well.

Alan Merry has played three Grandmasters and has drawn against all of them.   He stands unbeaten on four points and plays IM Richard Pert in the last round.

Dagne Ciuksyte is guaranteed at least a share of the £500 prize for best female player; she has 3½ points and one other female has 2½ points.

Ian Wallis is also doing well on 3½ points, and faces Ed Player (3 points) in Round 7.

Running alongside the Open are three weekend tournaments, over five rounds.   13-year old Alex Sheerin came equal second, unbeaten on 3½ points, in the Under 150 Intermediate section, with a grading performance of 160.   In the Minor (Under 120) section, Roger Smith scored 3 points.

The full results will be published here tomorrow.


Saturday, 4 April 2015

Division 3 final table

Suffolk League Division 3 has now been completed.   Congratulations to Manningtree B who are promoted to Division 2.   They only used six players during the season, their main team being Carl Phillips (12 games unbeaten); Adrian Sanderson (11 games); John Price (9) and John McAllister (9).

Here is the final table:

Division 3

Team Played Won Drawn Lost Points
Manningtree B 12 10 0 2 33
Ipswich F 12 7 2 3 30
Ipswich E 12 7 1 4 24½
Felixstowe 12 4 3 5 22½
Stowmarket Rooks 12 4 2 6 21
Saxmundham B 12 1 7 4 20½
Bury St Edmunds E 12 0 3 9 14½

Top player was Felixstowe's Phil Hopkins, who won all but one of his 12 games.   Congratulations to 13-year old Alex Sheerin who was the only player to beat Phil!

Other scorers with 70% of more were Carl Phillips (Manningtree) - 10/12; Andrew Molloy (Ipswich) - 10/12; John Price (Manningtree) - 7½/9; and Adam Wilson (Ipswich) - 7/10.


Friday, 3 April 2015

Divisions 1 and 3 completed

Last night's matches at Bury St Edmunds saw two of the three divisions complete their schedule.   Only Division 2 is still to finish, with more matches scheduled for 14 and 21 April.

After Ipswich A's 3 - 1 win yesterday, the final Division 1 table looks like this:

Division 1

Team Played Won Drawn Lost Points
Ipswich C 12 9 1 2 31½
Ipswich A 12 8 1 3 30½
Manningtree A 12 6 3 3 27½
Ipswich B 12 4 3 5 25
Bury St Edmunds B 12 4 4 4 21½
Bury St Edmunds C 12 3 0 9 16½
Bury St Edmunds A 12 1 2 9 13½

So Ipswich A just failed to equal the total points achieved by Ipswich C, although having won fewer matches, they would still have been runners-up even if they had won 4 - 0.

The three Bury St Edmunds teams prop up the table, with the 'A' team surprisingly relegated.

The Player of the Year is Manningtree's Adam Taylor.   Although unavailable to play in the final four matches, he scored 7 out of 8 (six wins and two draws) for 87.5%.   Runner-up, with 9½/12 (79.2%) is Steve Gregory (Ipswich A).   Others over 70% include Ted Matthewson (Ipswich C) - 72.7%; Andrew Lewis (Manningtree A) - 72.2%; Mike Cook (Ipswich C) - 70.8%; and Michael Clapham (Ipswich A) - 70.8%.

Division 3 will feature tomorrow.


Thursday, 2 April 2015

Ipswich C are League Champions

Last evening, Ipswich C beat Manningtree A 3 - 1 in their final match of the season.   Although their total of 31½ points can be equalled this evening, when Ipswich A play their last match, Ipswich C will have won more matches and are therefore League Champions.

Pictured above are their team (front to back): Ted Matthewson, Silas Peck, Ian Wallis, Mike Cook.   Thanks to Jim Buis for the photo, taken before last night's match.

As Jim points out, like the Dutch football teams of the 1970s, Ipswich C are the equivalent of ‘total’ chess.   With grades less than 10 points apart they have been playing random board order all season, making it impossible for teams to guess their opponents!

Of the 48 individual games, the four mentioned above played in 44.   Mike Cook played in all 12 matches; Ian Wallis and Ted Matthewson played in 11; and Silas Peck played in 10 matches.



Wednesday, 1 April 2015

A game from Richard Doyle

Many thanks to Adastral Park's Richard Doyle for sending in this annotated game from a recent Division 2 match:



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