English Chess Forum

Provisional Tournament, subject to confirmation around Easter, provided enough support can be found.

Tournament would start at 2pm on Saturday and finish at around 3pm on the Sunday. 5 Rounds, long play.

Helpers Required to assist on the day * 2 paid at 5% of entry fees

1 Arbiter required on the day to assist setup, assist running of tournament, etc. paid at 8% of entry fees

1 Assistant Organiser required to collate entries, etc. paid at 10% of entry fees

All those interested should e-mail Andrew Moore p.andrew.moore@gmail.com as soon as possible for more details

Prize money estimated at 40% of enrty fees divided equally between three sections

Regards

Could you explain your thinking on round times and move rates?

Last weekend's Kidlington tournament is fairly typical of established practice for the timings of a two day event

Move rate - all in 105 minutes (3 1/2 hour sessions)

Round times

Saturday 9:30 2:00 6:30
Sunday 9:30 2:00

So normally you would expect to start a five round tournament to start Saturday morning and finish Sunday early evening.

I can just about make your start and end times work as 5 rounds at G/75 (or 30/60 + G/15)


2:00 - 4:30 5:00 - 7:30 8:00 - 10:30
9:30 - 12:00 12:30 - 3:00

It would feel like a rapidplay tournament at that sort of pace.

The main reason for the time controls, is to allow for publicity of the event to be an 'almost pre-british' or in case you dont have the time, an 'instead of the british'. It allows those that are involved to get some practise on the Saturday / Sunday without needing to travel late on the Sunday to play in the British and, they can wake up in a relaxed manner on the Saturday to play during the afternoon and evening.

I am open to a change on the Saturday morning, but very much wish to end the tournament mid afternoon on the Sunday to allow many more competitiors the chance for some practise or so they are not taking up all of the weekend - due to family circumstances.

Having saturday afternoon, evening, sunday morning and lunchtime off from the family can be an ordeal in itself, but it creates opprtunity to tap into a market, similar to rapdiplays but giving these players long play tournaments instead.

It may also be appealing to juniors - see West of England Junior Champs

Your thoughts?

Details of this event have been confirmed: 5-round Swiss starting at 1 p.m. on Saturday, 25 July. Venue: Catshill Village Hall, Woodrow Lane, Bromsgrove, B61 0LP.

There will be 3 sections: Open, Major (U155) and Minor (U105). The time control is a relatively brisk 65 minutes for 30 moves, followed by an additional 10 minutes to finish. This is to allow a playing schedule that will finish by 3.15 on Sunday afternoon, for any competitors wishing to use this as a warm-up for the British Championships and therefore needing to travel to Torquay that afternoon.

Timetable Saturday Round 1: 13.00 - 15.30; Round 2: 15.50 - 18.20; Round 3: 19.00 - 21.30
Sunday Round 4: 9.30 - 12.00; Round 5: 12.30 - 15.00. Prize-giving: 15.15

Full details, including a downloadable entry form, are accessible via the ECF website.

Entry costs £15 for adults, £10 for juniors. ECF members may take a £1 discount. There is a £2 late fee for entries received after Monday, 20 July or £5 for entry on the day (no later than half an hour before the start). If you notify me by Monday, 20 July that you wish to enter (i.e. the entry form is en route), the late fee is not payable.

Any profits made by the congress will be donated to the PAR (Plica Awareness and Research) Charity, so please support the event!

Andrew Farthing

There was a query on another thread (on the 'Grading Debate' forum) asking whether games for this event will be graded. The answer is yes!

Andrew Farthing

I notice it hasn't appeared on the list of graded events for 2009/10. It doesn't appear in the 2008/09 list, either.

Presumably the results were sent to graders months ago. Has something happened to them, or has the event not been graded at all?

Alex,

Sorry it's taken a few days to respond. I didn't spot your post until yesterday, and I've been checking with the main congress organiser what's happened re grading.

The answer is that he is "about halfway through" the process of compiling the results. They will definitely be submitted within the current grading season, but the ECF haven't received them yet, which is why the event doesn't yet appear on the 2009/10 list. (Since the congress took place in July 2009, it fell outside the 2008/09 grading season.)

By the way, I can confirm that there will be a Worcestershire congress again this year, on 24-25 July. We've secured a bigger venue this time around, with better facilities and a location 15 minutes' walk from the centre of Worcester. See the ECF Tournament Calendar for details (also available via the Worcestershire Chess Association and MCCU sites).

Andrew

Thanks.

I might be tempted out of chess retirement for that one being so close to me

I would Carl. It was an excellent tournament when it was held at Bromsgrove last year. The 2 Andrews ( Andrew Moore and Andrew Farthing) are good organisers and the venue at Worcester University is very good. Ray Collett always arranges for the Schools Chess Challenge regional finals to be held there. We have already pencilled it in to our diary.

My middle of the road grade always means I get the superstar in the first round - the last Worcester one I played in (might have been a Spectrum one...) gets me stuck with Hodgson

So it's been a while

The highest rated player there last year was Loz Cooper. There were also some good juniors like Brandon Clarke. It was interesting to see bits of some of the top games. I really enjoyed it apart from going into the first game half asleep on the sunday morning and generously giving my queen away to Alex H!

Ah, I can actually beat Lawrence

Fifth time lucky maybe

I don't recall winning as many as four times!