5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Debate directly related to English Chess Federation matters.
Paul Habershon
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5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by Paul Habershon » Mon Apr 30, 2012 12:02 am

It seems that the ECF has yet to announce the date and venue for this year's English Seniors Championship.

The English Seniors began in 2008 and for three years was organised by Neil Graham at Dovedale. In 2011 Sean Hewitt generously rescued the event by hosting it at his e2e4 congress at Gatwick in October.

It is unfortunate that such a potentially popular tournament should suffer from a lack of forward planning. Our population demographic suggests that Seniors chess should be thriving, as I am told it does in Germany.

Let us hope that the 2012 tournament will actually be held. So far the format has always been just 5 rounds.

John McKenna

Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by John McKenna » Tue May 01, 2012 12:07 am

Previous Managers of Congress Chess appear to have supported past events.

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Adam Raoof
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Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by Adam Raoof » Thu May 03, 2012 12:13 pm

I can confirm that e2e4 won't be hosting the event for 2012, and that I am working on ensuring the event is held this year.

I can think of several alternatives that have good points and bad points. I can explore holding the event alongside the Classic, but that would definitely only be a five-day weekday schedule due to contraints on space at the weekend. Players could commute, but accommodation in London is expensive.

Or I could run the event at a hotel in a nice resort, say, Torquay, and perhaps make the event longer, with one game a day for seven to nine days. This would make the total for accommodation and board more expensive. What do you think?

In the past it has attracted 30-40 entrants. I agree that we should be attracting more players than this. When I was in Italy over the weekend I had a long conversation with local organisers, and we decided that we would put together a Seniors event in Bratto, as we felt it was the perfect environment!
Adam Raoof IA, IO
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Sean Hewitt
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Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by Sean Hewitt » Thu May 03, 2012 12:35 pm

Adam Raoof wrote:I can confirm that e2e4 won't be hosting the event for 2012
e2e4 Chess advised the ECF on 2nd March 2012 that we would not host the 2012 English Seniors following their confirmation that they would not be able to support the event financially. We ran the event at a loss in 2011 to ensure that it took place and understood that they would look at finance for 2012, having put circa £2000 per annum into the event previously. Unfortunately, they were not successful in sourcing that finance.

However, I am pleased to confirm that we will run a Senior Championships at our October International event at Gatwick which will be 5 rounds, 1 game per day.

John McKenna

Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by John McKenna » Thu May 03, 2012 1:14 pm

Thanks to Adam & Sean for clarifying the situation regarding this event. I'm still a bit too young to enter but I'm getting there.

John McKenna

Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by John McKenna » Thu May 03, 2012 1:18 pm

Also thanks to Paul H. for reminding us about it in the first place.

Ken Norman
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Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by Ken Norman » Thu May 03, 2012 2:16 pm

I would support the English Seniors Championship whether it is held in London or at a seaside resort.

As I could commute to Olympia from my home the London venue would be acceptable.
However I can see that accommodation could be a problem for those not living in the Home Counties.
Retired civil servants have the option of staying at the Civil Service Club near Northumberland Avenue but non Civil Servants could find it difficult to book inexpensive accommodation in London.

The idea of a seven round tournament in a seaside resort like Torquay is very attractive. A first class hotel, good restaurants nearby, one game a day and a sea view gets my vote.

I also look forward to hearing more about a Seniors Tournament in Bratto. Dinah and I played at Courmayeur last year. It was a very attractive location and the tournament was very well organised.

Mick Norris
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Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by Mick Norris » Thu May 03, 2012 7:21 pm

Would it be possible to designate an existing tournament as the English, maybe just for this year?
e.g.
http://www.chessdevon.co.uk/HTML/congre ... s/base.htm
Any postings on here represent my personal views

Ken Norman
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Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by Ken Norman » Fri May 04, 2012 11:25 am

You must ask Bob Jones if the Beacon Seniors could include the English Seniors Championship.

I have an objection to your idea. We only have three Seniors Tournaments in England. The British Seniors, the Beacon Seniors and the English Seniors. Your idea would reduce the number to two tournaments. We want more Seniors Tournaments in England not less. In Germany they run FORTY seniors events every year.

Sean Hewitt
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Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by Sean Hewitt » Fri May 04, 2012 12:22 pm

Ken Norman wrote:You must ask Bob Jones if the Beacon Seniors could include the English Seniors Championship.

I have an objection to your idea. We only have three Seniors Tournaments in England. The British Seniors, the Beacon Seniors and the English Seniors. Your idea would reduce the number to two tournaments. We want more Seniors Tournaments in England not less. In Germany they run FORTY seniors events every year.
That's not right Ken. Your forgot the e2e4 Seniors :D

Paul Habershon
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Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by Paul Habershon » Fri May 04, 2012 1:49 pm

Adam Raoof wrote:I can confirm that e2e4 won't be hosting the event for 2012, and that I am working on ensuring the event is held this year.

I can think of several alternatives that have good points and bad points. I can explore holding the event alongside the Classic, but that would definitely only be a five-day weekday schedule due to contraints on space at the weekend. Players could commute, but accommodation in London is expensive.

Or I could run the event at a hotel in a nice resort, say, Torquay, and perhaps make the event longer, with one game a day for seven to nine days. This would make the total for accommodation and board more expensive. What do you think?

In the past it has attracted 30-40 entrants. I agree that we should be attracting more players than this. When I was in Italy over the weekend I had a long conversation with local organisers, and we decided that we would put together a Seniors event in Bratto, as we felt it was the perfect environment!
Thanks to Adam and Sean for clarifying the current situation regarding the 2012 English Senior Championship. Although I would play in it at the Classic, I do prefer the idea of a resort venue. Also I agree with 7 rounds; 5 is rather short for a championship.

Most importantly I hope that in future the English Senior Championship dates will be publicised a year in advance. I very much hope to play in the 2012 event but I wait with trepidation to see if the dates are going to clash with things I have already fixed, many of them non-chess and involving other people. With a year's notice I can give priority to such a tournament, much as I do for the British Senior Championship.

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Adam Raoof
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Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by Adam Raoof » Fri May 04, 2012 2:55 pm

This is your chance to nominate a few good dates, avoiding the other Senior events and suggesting why those dates would be a good choice!
Adam Raoof IA, IO
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Paul Habershon
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Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by Paul Habershon » Sat May 05, 2012 8:07 am

Adam Raoof wrote:This is your chance to nominate a few good dates, avoiding the other Senior events and suggesting why those dates would be a good choice!
Thanks for the invitation, Adam.

At a resort venue we would want an off-peak time of year so 2012 presents a particular problem because of the short notice. My suggestion would be one of the last two weeks in September (17th-21st/23rd or 24th-28th/30th) - 5 or 7 rounds. This avoids 4 NCL and county matches. October has the e2e4 Seniors, November the Beacon Seniors, December the London Classic.

A possible emergency solution this year, giving more notice than September, would be for the Beacon Seniors to host the event, but I know neither the opinion of the organisers nor the available capacity.

From 2013 onwards it would be good to settle on a regular week/month. Probably late September would still be good for the above reasons, but perhaps cheaper hotel rates would be available in January/February/March.

On points of detail I am not aware of any regulations about entry qualification. Is it open to all/ strictly English only/open to all but only an English player can take the title? What about first place ties? That did not happen for the first three years, but I felt that the 2011 4-way tie was unsatisfactory. I think that a tie-break mechanism or a rapidplay play-off (as in the British proper) would be lesser evils. A championship should produce a champion. Imagine Wimbledon ending with a first equal!

We should not be dismayed if there is a low entry this year, but in future a regular place in the calendar and plenty of advance publicity from the ECF should establish an event of some prestige.

Roger de Coverly
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Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by Roger de Coverly » Sat May 05, 2012 10:19 am

Paul Habershon wrote: A possible emergency solution this year, giving more notice than September, would be for the Beacon Seniors to host the event, but I know neither the opinion of the organisers nor the available capacity.
plenty of advance publicity from the ECF should establish an event of some prestige.
Details of past Beacon events are here
http://www.chessdevon.co.uk/HTML/congre ... s/base.htm

It's held in a hotel function room, also used for the Easter WECU event. For the latter, the capacity limit is set at around 100.

Ian Thompson
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Re: 5th English Seniors Chess Championship 2012

Post by Ian Thompson » Sat May 05, 2012 10:58 am

Paul Habershon wrote:From 2013 onwards it would be good to settle on a regular week/month. Probably late September would still be good for the above reasons, but perhaps cheaper hotel rates would be available in January/February/March.
Its still a few years to go before I'll be eligible to play in this, but it seems to me that late September wouldn't fit in well with other tournaments. If players are attracted to 1 game a day tournaments over a week they've already got Paignton at the beginning of September and Guernsey in mid to late October. Its probably better to choose dates well away from these two tournaments rather between them.