Suffolk Chess

The only Suffolk player in the nine-round FIDE Open is Silas Peck (pictured left).   He lost in the first two rounds on Monday and Tuesday, to a 2278 and a 2048.   But today he beat a lower-rated Italian to get his score off the ground.

The Classic 'Super Six' started today, with England's Mickey Adams winning an amazing Q & 3P v Q & 2P ending against one of the favourites, Fabiano Caruana.   The other two games were drawn, so Mickey heads the table.   Adams handled the endgame immaculately, not rushing his moves.   Just before Caruana resigned in a lost position, one of the commentators said, "Sit on your hands when a win is in sight."   How true, and how often have we all failed to heed that maxim?

You can view the Super Six games here.

Get your diaries and calendars out.   Here are three dates in March 2015:

On 1 March, thge EACU Team Championships take place at Moreton Hall Community Centre, Bury St Edmunds.   This event is usually held at Whittlesford, but this year should attract more Suffolk teams.   More details later.

On 8 March, the Bury St Edmunds Junior Congress will be held at the same venue.   This year, the event incorporates the EACU Junior Championship.

Then on 15 March, the Suffolk Junior Open takes place at Woodbridge School.

More information about each of these events will be published later.

The eight-board Suffolk Under 100 team played a double-header against Cambridgeshire yesterday - and came out on top, winning overall by 9 points to 7.

In the morning, Suffolk won convincingly by 5½ points to 2½, with wins from captain Daniel Yarnton on Board 2, Trevor Webster (Board 3), Rob Scott (Board 4), Alan John (Board 5) and Tom Roy (Board 8).   In the afternoon, with colours reversed (and a different set of opponents as Cambridgeshire decided to change their board order), Suffolk went down 3½ - 4½.   There were wins from Dave Wild on top board, Trevor Webster (again) and Ralph Martin.

One pleasing aspect of this result was that four of the team were juniors from the Bury Knights.   All scored one win, except eight-year old Adam John, whose turn will surely come soon as he shows great potential.

The Under 100s next play on 22 February, when they will face Norfolk.

Suffolk Under 160s recorded two match draws today (8 - 8), against Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire.

In the morning match, against Cambridgeshire, ten of the sixteen boards were drawn, with wins for Kevin Greenacre, Bob Jones and Laureano Garcia.   In the afternoon, against Hertfordshire, Suffolk needed just half a point from the last two games to finish, but sadly lost both.   Kevin and Laureano both won again.   Other winners in the afternoon were Ed Kirkham, Mike Taylor and Anita Somton.

In the other morning match, Norfolk beat Herts 9½ - 6½ and in the afternoon, Cambridgeshire beat Norfolk 9 - 7.

So after the first rounds of matches, Cambridgeshire lead the league table with three points, closely followed by Suffolk and Norfolk on two points, with Hertfordshire on one point.

The next Under 160 matches take place on Sunday 1 February.

The top boards of the Suffolk team: Malcolm Lightfoot, Ed Kirkham and Martin Fogg - all unbeaten today (five draws!)

The 6th London Chess Classic got underway today.   It started with a ten-round 'Super Rapidplay', with some 300 entrants.   After five rounds, six players share the lead with a maximum score.   It appears that no Suffolk players have entered.   You can follow the live games on the Congress website.   In the fifth round today, Nakamura won a 15-move miniature against Jonathan Hawkins, whose queen became trapped after taking the a1 rook.

The main 'Super Six' event starts on Wednesday, with Fabiano Caruana, Vishy Anand, Anish Giri, Hikaru Nakamura, Vladimir Kramnik and Mickey Adams competing in a round-robin.   A nine-round FIDE Open starts on Monday and various other events are scheduled during the week..

It's ages since we managed to display a game on this website, mainly because no one has submitted one for publication.

With dozens of games being played in the Suffolk League this season, there must be some interesting enough to appear here.   Please send me any games that you would like to see published, preferably annotated.

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On Sunday, the county Under 160 and Under 100 teams will be in action at the Turner Hall in Newmarket.   The u160s play Hertfordshire and Cambridgeshire, whilst the u100s face Norfolk in a double-header.   Half the eight-board Under 100 team consists of juniors from the Bury Knights, with a fifth (Anita Somton), playing for the Under 160s.

Last Sunday the Woodbridge Junior Open tournament welcomed 79 players of varying ages between 6 and 18.
The results were as follows (Suffolk players are in bold):

Under 8 Section:

1st: Bhramav Rajesh (Essex) 6/6
2nd: Yucheng Bian (Norwich) 5/6
3rd: Arthur Nath 4/6
Woodbridge Winner: Charlotte Ciuksyte 2½/6
(8 Players)

Under 10 Section:

1st: Panagiotis Klotsas (Cambridge) 5½/6
2nd: Zahra Jaufarally (Colchester) 4½/6
3rd=: Aaron Saenz de Villaverde (Bury Knights), Luca Sangiovanni-Vicintelli (Cambridge), Ciaran Brightley Davies (London), Eden Coles 4/6
Woodbridge Winner: George Na Nakhorn (The Abbey) 4/6
(22 Players)

Under 12 Section:

1st: Charlie Pickering (Norwich) 5½/6
2nd: William Bradley (Wymondham) 5/6
3rd: Sarah Weersing (Essex) 4½/6
Woodbridge Winner: Zoe Newman (Woodbridge School) 4/6
(28 Players)

Under 14 Section:

1st: Karthik Saravananan (Lowestoft) 6/6
2nd: Anita Somton (Bury Knights) 5/6
3rd: Campion Mitchell-Cotts (Saxmundham) 3½/6
Woodbridge Winner: Cavan Fawcett (Woodbridge School) 2½/6
(12 Players)

Under 16/18 Section:

1st: William Sait (Bury Knights) 5½/6
2nd and Woodbridge U18 Winner: Jacob Elman (Woodbridge School) 5/6
3rd: Ben Schreiber (Woodbridge School) 4/6
(9 Players)

The planned Open section, which includes adults, as well as the Parents' section, were cancelled due to lack of entrants.

The December 2014 rating list has been published by FIDE.   The 'England' list contains four Suffolk-based players in the top 60:

IM Adam Hunt     2437    #29
GM Jon Levitt     2415    #36
FM Alan Merry     2347    #54
IM Dagne Ciuksyte     2340    #57

FM Justin Tan is of course Australian, but at 2366 would feature at #49 in the ENG list.

Former Suffolk players Nick (2562) and Richard Pert (2443) are at #8 and #26 respectively.

Dagne is #3 ENG woman, with Anita Somton (1464) at #55.

The new Cup and Plate competition has reached the first round proper (the quarter-finals), with seven teams competing in the Cup and six teams in the Plate.

One match in the Cup was played last evening, with Sudbury going down ½ - 3½ to Ipswich C.   The other two matches, between Ipswich D and Manningtree, and Ipswich E and Ipswich A, will be played on Tuesday 6 January.   The seventh team, Ipswich B, has a bye to the semi-finals.

In the Plate, Saxmundham will play Stowmarket on 6 January, whilst the two Bury St Edmunds teams, E and D, face each other on Thursday 29 January.   Two teams have byes: Felixstowe and Ipswich F.

The success or otherwise of this event can be judged by its 13 entries, considerably more than the nine teams that played last season in the Under 125 and Under 145 Cups combined.   However, eight teams declined to participate in the Cup and Plate, mostly on account of fixture congestion and the consequent difficulty in finding sufficient players. These were three teams from Bury St Edmunds (A, B & C), Adastral Park, Clacton, as well as the 'B' teams from Stowmarket, Saxmundham and Manningtree.   Both Bury and Clacton have considerable commitments in other leagues (Bury Area and North Essex respectively).

Playing alongside the First Team on Sunday, the eight-board Suffolk Under 120 team managed to draw 8 - 8 with Norfolk in their double-header.

In the morning, the team went down 3 - 5 to Norfolk, with wins for Chas Szentmihaly and Andrew Paige.   But playing in the afternoon with colours reversed, Suffolk won 5 - 3.   This time there were wins from Dave Robertson, Roger Smith, Andrew Paige and Mark Nevison.   Congratulations to Andrew for winning both games, and to Chas and Roger for scoring 1½ points each.

The second set of matches, against Cambridgeshire, is scheduled for 8 February.