1970 British Universities (BUCA) Individual & Team Championships, Manchester

[John Saunders]

I have made available at Britbase a PGN containing games from the 1970 British Universities (BUCA) Individual and Team Championships, played in Manchester in early April 1970. There are 72 games from the individual championship, kindly input and submitted to me by Andy Ansel, and 163 games from the team championship, input by me.

http://www.saund.co.uk/britbase/pgn/197 ... iewer.html

The games were input from a comprehensive bulletin prepared for the British Universities Chess Association by Martin Day, Jonathan Century, Les Tate, Jim O'Dell and others. The bulletin was lent to me by Richard James, for which many thanks.

The individual championship (6-11 April 1970, 35 competitors) was won by the late Simon Webb with 7½/9 ahead of Peter Markland 7, John Carleton and Alan Perkins, both 6½. The Team Event (the dates of which were not given but I'm guessing 12th to 14th or 15th; 31 teams of eight boards) was won by London University 1 ahead of Cambridge 1, second, and Glasgow and Leeds sharing third place.

This was before FIDE ratings had been introduced but I have substituted then current BCF grades (where known) converted to four-figure Elo using the time-honoured formula "times 8 plus 600" to give an indication of playing strength.

Though quite voluminous, at 100+ pages, the bulletin did not contain all of the games from these events. Nevertheless, it is a very useful document and quite an unusual bulletin for its time in recording a broad cross-section of games from all levels of the team tournament (which was played over four rounds, with two rounds played in preliminary sections on a jamboree basis to determine the composition of the final sections, and then two more rounds to determine final places, again using the jamboree formula). In conjunction with the converted grades it gives some idea of the playing strength of a broad cross-section of British players in the 18-25 age category in 1970. As I was inputting the games, conflicting thoughts struck me; in no particular order... the general lack of sophistication in the opening (though in itself this is an unreliable indicator of overall playing strength - it is probably more indicative of the paucity of study material at the time); the number of strong (let's say 2000+) players whose names are unknown to me, whom I suspect may have been lost to chess after university - some of these unknowns defeated other much better known strong players; the handful of poor or naive games (again, not necessarily an indicator of a generally lower standard of play, since they may have been included by mischievous editors for fun).

[Roger de Coverly]

Nevertheless, it is a very useful document and quite an unusual bulletin for its time in recording a broad cross-section of games from all levels of the team tournament (which was played over four rounds, with two rounds played in preliminary sections on a jamboree basis to determine the composition of the final sections, and then two more rounds to determine final places, again using the jamboree formula).

Although the BCF was not involved in the organisation of the event, it can take credit for enabling third party organisers, in this case BUCA, to be able to run a 4NCL sized event based purely on the University students and post graduates of the era. It was almost 32 teams of 8 boards each.

This is 1970, so before the Fischer boom.

[Brian Denman]

One small point. I have seen this bulletin before and, if I remember rightly, the only initial given for the Southampton University player, Collins, was 'P'. I notice for the Thornton v Collins game, the Black player is listed as P H V Collins. I no longer have the bulletin to hand, but in the past I assumed that this was Peter M Collins, now of Lichfield, but once, I believe, a Hampshire player. Is there any indication elsewhere in the bulletin that the initials were 'PHV'?

[John Townsend]

Brian, in case it helps any, I played a county game against P.H. Collins of Hampshire, 7 March 1970. The match was played in Southampton.

[John Townsend]

Brian, I have looked at my old score-books again. In the 1966 B.U.C. event in Oxford, I played a game against P.M. Collins of Southampton University. (Sorry if that muddies the waters!)

[Roger de Coverly]

I no longer have the bulletin to hand, but in the past I assumed that this was Peter M Collins, now of Lichfield, but once, I believe, a Hampshire player. Is there any indication elsewhere in the bulletin that the initials were 'PHV'?

The 1970 grading list might help.

PHV is 171, down from 180
PM is 196 unchanged.

[Brian Denman]

Thanks for this, John and Roger. Sorry for the query - I think now that PHV is correct. In 1974 I played P M Collins of Berkshire in a county match and in recent years he has taken part in British Seniors events. I have a record of a D H Collins playing for Southampton Stoics against Hastings in a National Club Championship match in 1966 and I now believe that the newspaper should have written P H Collins.

[Richard James]

The bulletin was lent to me by Richard James, for which many thanks.

I don't think it was lent by me, John. I suspect City of Leicester Polytechnic wasn't allowed to take part.

[John Saunders]

A number of matters arising: firstly, apologies to Richard James for accusing him of owning the 1970 BUCA bulletin from which the games were input. He's quite right, of course; as a useful rule of thumb, when Richard writes x about something and you notice that I have written y about the same subject in one of my own outpourings, you can probably take it as read that x is correct and y is a figment of my overly vivid imagination (or a typo). The confusion arose because I have three massive piles of bulletins in my tiny study awaiting processing, one pile of which belongs to Richard, but this particular bulletin comes from one of the other two piles, with most of the literature therein belonging to me.

Secondly, the Collins question: the bulletin is not entirely clear when it comes to names. I hesitate to criticise anyone who has gone to the considerable trouble of producing such a useful document but it did contain a number of errors, some of which took a bit of sorting out. I addressed the Collins conundrum whilst I was inputting games and came down on the side of PHV rather than PM.

This small matter has been useful in spurring me on to make a new facility available at Britbase, which I have thinking about for some time: PDF files. When I am lent bulletins these days, I usually scan them and create a PDF file, so as to be able to check for errors that are reported at a later date, after I have returned the bulletin to its owner. It occurs to me that it would be useful to make these available for end users of Britbase to examine. Although, strictly speaking, this becomes a copyright issue, I am supposing that whoever holds the copyright for ancient bulletins and similar documents will be fairly relaxed about the infringement of their copyright, since any stream of income from their sale will have long since dried up, and I am not seeking to make any money out of them myself. If I am wrong about that, or treading on anyone's toes, please let me know.

Hopefully some of the PDFs I make available will be of interest and use to forum members and chess researchers. I've added a menu item 'PDFs' to each page of the site, which leads to the following page...

http://www.saund.co.uk/britbase/britbasedocuments.html

The 1970 BUCA bulletin is one of the files I've uploaded, so readers can perhaps resolve the Collins question for themselves. I have also put up a couple of (partial) grading lists from the 1960s, one of which (1961) I announced here some time ago but the other (1969) is new.

Finally, I was wondering if Roger could help me with the dates for the 1970 BUCA Team Tournament, about which the bulletin is silent. It's possible that he has recorded the dates of the four rounds of the team event in his scorebook. I've guessed at 12-14 April 1970, based on two rounds a day for one day and one round a day for the final two rounds (based on my recollection of a later BUCA event I played in) but this may well be wrong.

[Roger de Coverly]

Finally, I was wondering if Roger could help me with the dates for the 1970 BUCA Team Tournament, about which the bulletin is silent. It's possible that he has recorded the dates of the four rounds of the team event in his scorebook. I've guessed at 12-14 April 1970, based on two rounds a day for one day and one round a day for the final two rounds (based on my recollection of a later BUCA event I played in) but this may well be wrong.

I have it recorded as two rounds on Monday, April 13th, one each on Tuesday, April 14th and Wednesday April, 15th. That makes a certain amount of sense, giving the players in the Individual a day's break on a Sunday before the team tournament started. Easter that year would have been 27 March to 30 March, so participants would have been close to immediately needing to return for the start of the summer University term.

I think it would have been morning and afternoon sessions on the 13th, with adjournments that evening and the following morning. Then an afternoon session, with adjournments or play through in the evening. A morning session for the final round and play to a finish on the final day.

[John Saunders]

Yes, that makes sense. It means the dates I have guessed at and included in the Britbase file are all out by one day as I didn't think to factor in a free day between competitions. I'll have to amend the file (not something that can be done with a single global edit, unfortunately, though it may be possible with as few as three). Many thanks for looking up the info.

[John Clarke]

Not that it's necessary, but I can confirm that Roger is spot-on about the dates and schedule. I played at board 7 for Sussex, and can testify that two rounds in one day was pretty exhausting for some, especially when adjournments were involved as well! Cases in point: Jeff Webb's hyper-complicated tussle with Carleton (Game 66), and Jeff Coombes' splendid win over Keely (Game 73), which denied London I a "picket fence" in the first round of the prelims. Good to be able to see those games again; they're well worth a look. Alas, both our lads lost tamely in the afternoon games, clearly wrung-out after their morning's exertions.

One feature of the event that struck me at the time was the unbalanced colour distribution. With a small number of rounds overall, there would obviously have to be quite a few examples of people getting, say, three whites and one black. But four blacks, as our board 5 did??! He complained to the controllers, who insisted there was nothing to be done about it. (Is this an inherent flaw in the jamboree format? Discuss .... )

[Roger de Coverly]

can testify that two rounds in one day was pretty exhausting for some, especially when adjournments were involved as well!

According to my notes for the 1969 BUCA, the move rate had been 35 in 105 minutes with 20 per hour recurring thereafter. I didn't record the 1970 move rate, but I suspect the same.

[Neil Graham]

In respect of the "Collins" question, I can confirm it was P.H.Collins.

I have a press cuttings book from the time and included is a Hampshire League match between Southampton University and Portsmouth where P.H.Collins drew his game against M.J.Pryce. There may be some other references but I hope that clears up the matter.

[Tim Harding]

Any chance of finding bulletins from BUCA teams at York 1967 or London 1972 which were the only two I played in?