Friday, 10 February 2017

UK Chess Challenge underway

Every year the UK Schools Chess Challenge, sponsored by Delancey, attracts some 50,000 children across the UK.   Most play the initial round within their school, but a few junior clubs also take part.   The Bury Knights Junior Chess Club has participated in this competition ever since it started over 20 years ago.   Last year two Bury Knights' members managed to qualify for the final round, the Terafinal.   Only 100 or so children manage to reach this stage.

The photo below shows some of the 30 Bury Knights' members who are taking part this year:

After four rounds (out of seven), the sole leader is 10-year old Adam John on 12 points (three points for a win, two for a draw and one for a loss).   Close behind on 10 points are seven other members.

To qualify for the next level, the Megafinal, players must either score 17 points (equivalent to five wins and two losses), or be the highest scorer in their age-group (boys/girls).   The Megafinal is held at Woodbridge School, in May.


Thursday, 9 February 2017

New members at Bury

Many chess clubs find it difficult to recruit new members, but the Bury St Edmunds Chess Club has been fortunate this season in welcoming eight new members!   One of these is Stephen Lewis, who wanted to be able to play in higher divisions than he can at Stowmarket.   He will still be playing for his original club, but will also be able to play for Bury in the BACL Division 2 as well as the Suffolk League Division 1.

Others include Sean Wickrama, Anthony Taylor and 9-year old Milan Biju.

This evening, four other new members came together to form a team in Division 2 of the Roger Goldsmith Trophy.   They are pictured below:

Left to right:   James Pack (e140), Rene Martinez (e130), Sean Ramsey (e70) and Greg Hart (e60).

Of these, the first three have all joined this year (2017), whilst Greg joined the club in November.   For the record, the team beat Bury's 'Juniors' 3½ - ½.



Wednesday, 8 February 2017

The Roger Goldsmith Memorial Trophy

In 1990 the then Secretary of the Bury Area Chess League, Roger Goldsmith, suddenly died of a heart attack at the age of only 42.   Of course, this was a tremendous shock to everyone in the League, but especially to his Ely Club members.

The League President, Jim Page of Stowmarket, proposed that a trophy should be awarded in his name.   A Cup competition was devised, open to all clubs in the League, with a maximum grading limit of 550 per team.   Initially it was entitled the Roger Goldsmith Champagne Memorial Trophy, because Jim wanted the winners to receive a bottle of champagne, in addition to an engraved wooden chess board.

The competition has now been running successfully for 25 years.   The trophy has been won by Linton on seven occasions, with Bury St Edmunds/Bury Cannons six times.   Cambridge and Woolpack have won three times each, whilst Sudbury and Ely have won twice.   One win has been recorded for Soham and Stowmarket.   Indeed, the only club in the League not to record a win is Newmarket (who have recently dropped out of the BACL).

The only changes in the format is that a bottle of champagne is no longer awarded, and the maximum grade is 580.   There is also a Division 2, for teams not exceeding 450.

The only game score I have against Roger is dated 21 February 1989, a year or so before he died.   He was a reasonable chess player; his grade for this match was 101.   In the following position, I (White) had wrongly sacrificed a knight for a pawn, hoping to win his knight on c6.   The game continued:   12. Bxe7   Bxe7?   If Roger had taken back with his King, he would have escaped the pin and would have been heading for a win.   He was probably deterred from playing 12... Kxe7 because of the fork on g6, losing his rook.   But the knight can easily be rounded up and I would still have been losing.

For the record, after 13. Bb5, I ended up after the exchanges on c6 a pawn ahead and went on to win!



Tuesday, 7 February 2017

Woodbridge Chess Club inaugural meeting

(Blake Gifford reports):

Last evening saw the inaugural meeting of the Woodbridge Chess Club (see here for earlier article).   Many thanks to everyone who were able to come!

Lots of friendly games were played and some strong visiting players from other Suffolk clubs including Saxmundham, Felixstowe and Ipswich attended, as well as four newcomers.

The Club will continue to meet on a weekly basis and we strongly encourage anyone who wants to learn and improve to come along.   Our next meeting will be on Monday 13 February, from 19.30 to 21.30.



Also a special thank you to Ed Kirkham (Felixstowe Chess Club) who kindly came with donations of chess sets and clocks.

WCC now has equipment and players.   The world is our oyster!   See here for the Club's website.


Monday, 6 February 2017

Incremental timings

The use of incremental (Fischer) timings is increasing.   If you play in the 4NCL, then you will be familiar with the 30 second increment that is added from the first move.   It makes for a better standard of chess, because even if you run out of your initial stock of time, you know you still have 30 seconds to make your next move.

The other local league, the Bury Area Chess League, first provided the opportunity in the 2007/08 season to use Fischer timings, provided both players agreed.   A few players did try it out, and in 2014/15 it became the default option in the League's Division 1.   'Traditional' timings would only be used if both players agreed.   This was immediately successful and in the current season (2016/17) Fischer timing was extended to Division 2.   At the League's next AGM it is likely that all three divisions will have Fischer timing as the default.

But in the Suffolk League, where traditional timings are still the default option, Fischer timing is rarely used.   Most clubs now have the DGT clocks which make the setting of Fischer timing straightforward.

My suggestion, which will be taken to the next Committee Meeting of the League, is to follow the BACL route and make incremental timing the default option in Division 1.   If this is accepted, we can extend this to Divisions 2 and 3 in due course, subject to AGM approval of course.

There are a number of objections to incremental timings,, foremost of which is the worry that games may continue long after the three-hour limit set by many venues.   However, to the best of my knowledge there has not been a single instance in the Bury League of a game continuing longer than three hours.   The BACL uses 70 minutes plus 15 seconds per move.   This means that a game of 60 moves would take 2 hours 50 minutes.   A game would have to extend beyond 80 moves if it is to take longer than three hours, which is very rare in league chess.   Some other leagues around the country use different timings - 75 + 10 seconds is popular.   However there is some objection to such a small increment.   The extra five seconds in the Bury League system permits a better standard of chess.

Watching a game where a player has exhausted his initial stock of time can be very exciting.   We all know players who regularly get into 'time trouble'.   But they are well-adapted to handling this situation, often pressing the clock with only a second or two remaining, and seeing the clock reverting to 16 or 17 seconds!

There's another important benefit of using incremental timings.   The old '10.2' rule, whereby a player may claim a draw in the last two minutes, does not apply.   This avoids the situation where captains (if available) have to make an often difficult decision.

I would like to hear your opinion on the introduction of increments in the Suffolk League.   Please comment using the link below.


Sunday, 5 February 2017

Suffolk u160s win bigly

(With apologies to Donald Trump)

Suffolk Under 160s enjoyed two good wins today at Newmarket in the EACU Under 160 County Championships.   In the morning Suffolk convincingly beat league leaders Hertfordshire by 11 points to five.   There were wins for the top six boards, as well as the bottom four boards.   But the middle six boards could only manage two draws between them!

In the afternoon Suffolk beat Cambridgeshire by 9½ points to 6½.   Cambridgeshire had a slightly higher average grade, so this was a particularly pleasing result, especially as they had beaten Norfolk in the morning match.

Four Suffolk players won both games: Phil Hutchings (Board 1), Laurie Pott (4), Andrew Shephard (5) and Keith Woodcock (14).   On 1½ points were Stephen Lewis (Board 2), Alex Sheerin (3) and David Green (16).   Two youngsters played on Board 15: 10-year old Adam John won in the morning and 12-year old Jaden Jermy won in the afternoon.   So the three juniors in the team (including Alex Sheerin) scored 3½ out of four.

The final u160 matches are on 12 March.   If we can field a strong team again we will stand a good chance of winning the EACU Championship.

UPDATE

Herts lost to Norfolk today, so Suffolk head the League table on 6 match points, with Herts and Cambs on 4, and Norfolk on 2 points.


Saturday, 4 February 2017

Rowan conquers the South of England

Following on his excellent performance in the Junior 4NCL (see earlier report here), 7-year old Rowan Kent from Woodbridge School and the Bury Knights Junior Chess Club travelled to Yateley Manor in Hampshire last Sunday to play in the Under 8 section of the South of England Championships.

He could not have played better, winning all six games.   Although Rowan was the highest-graded player in the event, he beat both the second and third seeds on his way to the title.

Rowan's new Rapidplay grade is 97 - not bad for a seven-year old!


Friday, 3 February 2017

Full house at Bury

There were four matches taking place last evening at the Bury St Edmunds Chess Club.   Two of these were in the Bury Area Chess League, where the Club has seven teams.   Another was in Division 1 of the Suffolk League, whilst the fourth match (the nearest row of players in the photo above), was in the Suffolk u125 Cup.   This match featured one of the youngest members of the Bury St Edmunds club, 8-year old Amy John, who managed to beat her adult opponent!   Amy is on the extreme right of the photo and was playing on Board 4 for the Bury St Edmunds 'Juniors' team.


Thursday, 2 February 2017

Gibraltar Masters results

The ten-round Gibraltar Masters ended today, with three GMs tied on 8 points: Hikaru Nakamura (USA), Anton Guijarro (Spain) and Yangii You (China).   They will now face tie-breaks to determine the prize money.   In 4th place, together with five other GMs, was England's Michael Adams.   He drew his final round game, but if he had won, he would have shared first place.

The two other English GMs, Nigel Short and David Howell, both did well, scoring seven points to finish 10th=.

View the games and final standing here.

It's worth having a look at Women's World Champion Yifan Hou's final round game.   With the White pieces, she played the most incomprehensible opening moves, was almost 'foolsmated' and resigned after Black's fifth move!   It appears from the interview that followed, that she played like this in order to demonstrate dissatisfaction with her pairings across the whole event.   With some justification perhaps, as she faced seven female opponents, whilst Nakamura played none!

The tie-breaks rules can be viewed here.

LATE UPDATE:

The Tie-break was won by Hikaru Nakamura (third year in a row!).


Wednesday, 1 February 2017

A new Chess Club in Woodbridge

Starting next Monday, 6 February, a new adult Chess Club will be starting up in Woodbridge!   The brainchild of Blake Gifford, its first meeting will be held at Woodbridge Methodist Church Hall, St John's Street, Woodbridge, IP12 1ED, from 19.30 to 21.30.

There's even a website for the new club.   Blake can be contacted by email .

Blake is a teacher at Whitehouse Primary School in Ipswich, where he set up a chess club a year ago.   If any local chess player would like to offer any support at the school, however occasional, Blake would be delighted.

Blake says, "I am a chess player from childhood but never to a very impressive standard and have played a lot on line for the past year or so.   I wanted to play more in real life and found that there wasn't a club in Woodbridge.   So I thought I would start one.   I'm sure there will be some keen players in town.   I have access to 12 or so sets and clocks which initially will be borrowed from school.   I am hoping I will be able to eventually raise money to get equipment for the club.   I have some interest for the opening night, but would guess numbers will start at around 10 people."

Hopefully there will be a report and photos from the new club's opening night.


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