Vaguely Yorkshire themed chess calendar

[MartinCarpenter]

Not official this but partially for my amusement, and partially in case someone might find it useful. iirc we never did put the Yorkshire league dates up online last season, and I'm not sure if all these congresses will drop into the - seemingly rather good nowadays - ECF calendar.

No doubt missed the odd thing of course, and they're not all in Yorkshire, just relevant. The Yorkshire leagues dates seem firm, the congresses not all but on the Yorkshire chess websites report on the AGM/elsewhere. The most marked thing is the quite impressive shortage of free weekends. I seem to remember there being more than this previously but a few new things like the (very welcome!) 4NCL congresses have eaten into things and I don't think there's a truly free weekend between September and the end of March.

September:
11-13 4NCL Congress (Bolton), 18-20 Bradford Congress, 25-7 Hull congress
October:
3rd Yorkshire league, 9-11 Castle chess Harrogate, 17 Yorkshire league, 23-25 Scarborough, 31/1 British Rapidplay
November:
7th Yorkshire League, 14/15 4NCL, 21st Yorkshire league, 27-29th Preston,
December:
5th Yorkshire League, 12th Yorkshire league
January:
9/10th: Nothing firm yet, 16/17 4NCL (Div3), 23/24 4NCL (1,2), 30th ?York/Jorvik Rapidplay?,
February:
6th Yorkshire League, 13/14 4NCL, 20th Yorkshire league, 26-28th Doncaster Congress(?)
March:
5th Yorkshire League, 11-13th Blackpool, 19/20 4NCL

then it seems to finally thin out a bit with the Yorkshire league finishing in April (9th and 23rd) and the 4NCL the weekend after that. The (few ) NCCU county matches have to fit into Sundays subsequent to Yorkshire league matches. Not ideal that but its been that way for a bit.

[Mike Truran]

New 4NCL FIDE rated congress planned at Wetherby for 8-10 Jan 2016. Just waiting to finalise contracts before publicising anything more official.

[John Hickman]

Will the film version be called Calendar Guys?

[Paul Bielby]

No mention of the 5th Annual Harrogate Congress on the 4th-6th September.
See the ECF Congress calendar. Entry forms, written in Noel Boustred's inimitable style, available.
Odd that Castle Chess are running another congress, also in Harrogate, just a week later. No wonder Mike Truran was confused when trying to organise a 4NCL congress in Yorkshire

[Mike Truran]

Outstanding entry form. Must have needed a lot of hard work to achieve that level of inimitability (if that's a word).

[MartinCarpenter]

The Castle chess one is in October, so 5 weeks I cut things off at the 12th of September, which I guess is unfair but have to somewhere. I tend to think of it starting with Bradford, but seemingly its a tiny bit earlier now. There's even a few things in August.

Jorvik congress from the 1st to 3rd of September too I guess. Not sure why that is organised midweek - a bit odd.

The tricky thing with trying to fit a congress in is that a good chunk of this calendar is invisible. Esp the Yorkshire league of course. Also of course just now there's basically no space left.....

[Mike Truran]

The tricky thing with trying to fit a congress in is that a good chunk of this calendar is invisible. Esp the Yorkshire league of course. Also of course just now there's basically no space left.....

Indeed. I couldn't have put the Yorkshire problem better myself.

[Andrew Zigmond]

I believe Hull have a simultaneous display booked for the 7th with a strong GM guest. I've had an email over the weekend complaining about the eight week break over Christmas that follows two matches on successive weekends. I'm not sure what the alternative is.

I think the Jorvik Congresses are organised midweek because Peter Cloudsdale has twigged that a lot of congress regulars are retired and thus aren't tied to weekends.

[Jon Mahony]

New 4NCL FIDE rated congress planned at Wetherby for 8-10 Jan 2016. Just waiting to finalise contracts before publicising anything more official.

Hope that one goes ahead, practically on my doorstep

[Brendan O'Gorman]

-- text omitted --

I think the Jorvik Congresses are organised midweek because Peter Cloudsdale has twigged that a lot of congress regulars are retired and thus aren't tied to weekends.

Andrew, I'm sure you're right. This is a market that few chess organisers seem to have spotted. A variant is afternoon games played once a week as in Coulsdon http://www.ccfworld.com/Chess/ChessClub ... sIndex.htm. So much better than evening games.

[MartinCarpenter]

Suppose York is an attractive place for a short break too

The calendar being so full is of course rather a first world problem. Unless we get some major postponements due to snow!

Does explain why I'm a bit wary of the chances of say the Cleveland congress restarting, or even York actually - when on earth would we hold it? Even the summer schedule is moderately busy.

A more even schedule for the Yorkshire league would be nice, but we'd have to reserve the dates rather earlier/much more firmly which would obviously have its own difficulties. Especially since we do realistically have much more flexibility in terms of dates for venue bookings than the other events. We'll cope

[Mike Truran]

The proposed 4NCL rated congress in Wetherby is intended as a replacement for the York congress which used to take place over the same weekend at the start of January. Had we been able to find a venue in York itself on 4NCL terms we would have done so (and we will continue to look). If the former York organisers decided to start up their congress again I imagine we would come to an agreement with them whereby either they would take over the Wetherby congress or we would stop running the Wetherby congress on that particular weekend if they found their own venue in York.

[MartinCarpenter]

Fair enough The 4NCL congresses are definitely very welcome.

There have been mutterings about restarting York but nothing definite I've seen. Venues not easy for anyone in York! The University was brilliant but turned rather too expensive a bit back.

[Andrew Zigmond]

At the YCA AGM we agreed that we couldn't avoid clashes with everything. With the exception of Blackpool we generally only avoid Yorkshire based congresses. Last year we clashed with Preston and it's only luck that we haven't this year. If a Cleveland congress started during the Yorkshire League months we would probably need to clash with that.

The one thing Yorkshire doesn't have at the moment is an Easter event so there is a gap in the market there.

To be fair those players within Yorkshire League teams who play in congresses regularly are very much a minority and the number who play in the 4NCL is smaller still. The majority of players enjoy a club environment and a Saturday game every other weekend or so and express frustration at the long gaps caused by avoiding clashes. It doesn't help that those players who do play in other events tend to be clustered within the same clubs rather than split across the board. At the same time from a Yorkshire committee point of view we need to give our players the opportunity to engage with the wider chess community and we should be pleased organisers are seeking to bring prestige events to our county.

[MartinCarpenter]

You're rather underestimating the 4NCL/Yorkshire league overlap. Historically maybe just a few players in White Rose 1/2 but with 3N picking up it has got rather larger. A clash would be very problematic for all of York/Sheffield/Bradford A, Calderdale and Leeds CCCC. Well and/or the relevant 4NCL teams of course With 3N being all northern now that should probably be due to increase a bit further over time.

Some of the congresses might be much more possible.

I do think it'd be worth being a bit firmer about the Yorkshire league dates though - maybe try and reserve one date/month in advance somehow, then fit the other ~3 around things. It is our biggest competition after all.