Shropshire Chess Congress 4-5 January 2014

Details of upcoming UK events, please provide working links if possible.
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Steve Rooney
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Shropshire Chess Congress 4-5 January 2014

Post by Steve Rooney » Tue Oct 15, 2013 10:36 am

We are now open for entries for the Shropshire Chess Congress which takes place on Sat 4 and Sun 5 January 2014 at The Wrekin Housing Trust, Colliers Way, Old Park, Telford TF3 4AW.

We had a record entry last year with three fiercely-contested sections and some great chess. We look forward to extending a warm Shropshire welcome to players from near and far. Some of the enhancements planned for this year’s congress include live transmission of some of the top boards and increased prize money.

And you won’t go hungry as we will once again have some great food from Jacob and his team to keep you nourished over the weekend.

Hope to see lots of forum members in Shropshire in January.

http://shropshirechess.org/Tournaments/ ... gress.html

Steve Rooney
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Re: Shropshire Chess Congress 4-5 January 2014

Post by Steve Rooney » Mon Dec 16, 2013 12:22 pm

Only three weeks to go until the Shropshire Chess Congress ...

We are currently running ahead of last year's entries to date, and look forward to see many more of you there in January. All the details are online here - http://shropshirechess.org/Tournaments/ ... gress.html - but happy to answer any queries direct if necessary.

We are very grateful to Chess & Bridge who are hot-footing it from Hastings to run a great book and equipment stall on the Sunday and supplying complimentary copies of Chess magazine to entrants.

David Blower
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Re: Shropshire Chess Congress 4-5 January 2014

Post by David Blower » Tue Dec 31, 2013 4:05 am

This may seem obvious, but if you are a bronze member of the ECF, do you automatically get upgraded to silver membership if you enter the tournament.

3 members of my club are entering, so hopefully they will give some thoughts about the congress on the clubs website.

Sean Hewitt
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Re: Shropshire Chess Congress 4-5 January 2014

Post by Sean Hewitt » Tue Dec 31, 2013 9:18 am

David Blower wrote:This may seem obvious, but if you are a bronze member of the ECF, do you automatically get upgraded to silver membership if you enter the tournament.
Yes, as soon as the organisers send the details (and the money) onto the ECF. Some are quicker than others at doing this.

The best thing to do is upgrade yourself before the tournament via the ECF website.

Steve Rooney
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Re: Shropshire Chess Congress 4-5 January 2014

Post by Steve Rooney » Tue Dec 31, 2013 4:41 pm

Sean Hewitt wrote:
David Blower wrote:This may seem obvious, but if you are a bronze member of the ECF, do you automatically get upgraded to silver membership if you enter the tournament.
Yes, as soon as the organisers send the details (and the money) onto the ECF. Some are quicker than others at doing this.

The best thing to do is upgrade yourself before the tournament via the ECF website.
David, thanks for your question which managed to put the congress thread to the top briefly this morning! And thanks to Sean for responding.

A few people are choosing to pay the £6 fee to upgrade, but it is fewer than last year as one might expect. We will endeavour to get the monies to ECF promptly, :oops: and have advised those that are planning another congress soon after ours to upgrade direct.

Entries for the Shropshire congress currently stand at 126; still anticipating a bit of a late rush if previous years are anything to go by, and heading for a new record for us.

What better way is there to start the year? A warm Shropshire welcome, great food, excellent venue and facilities, live boards, Chess & Bridge bookstall, prize fund over £2,000. Oh, and some great chess.

Keith Arkell
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Re: Shropshire Chess Congress 4-5 January 2014

Post by Keith Arkell » Wed Jan 01, 2014 4:51 am

All the best with the congress Steve. I'm sure it will, as usual, be a success.

David Blower
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Re: Shropshire Chess Congress 4-5 January 2014

Post by David Blower » Thu Jan 02, 2014 1:56 am

Unfortately Steve I'm at work and can't get the time off, I am webmaster of my chess clubs website and will be doing a feature on our clubs website which should appear later today (Thursday.) Hence the question as I need to be pretty certain at what I'm writing.

Keith, I played Daniel Arkell for my club Brewood earlier on this season when we played against Stourbridge in the Dudley League. Hes very good, and gave me a tough match. He actually had a slight advantage over me after the opening. I certainly enjoyed my match against him. Only after the match did I find out he was related to you, a GM!

Charlie-Ann Arkell also played in Brewood, and gave Daniel Binfield (another junior) a tough match, but despite a huge material advantage blundered and allowed a mate in one. Ouch! Nevertheless she played very well and if both your nethew and niece play as well as they did in Brewood, I'm sure they will win some games of chess.

A word about my 3 club mates. John Fenby is experienced at entering chess congresses, and this is Mark Binfield and Daniel Binfields first ever one. As said Daniel Binfield is another junior who is a member of Brewood Chess Club and I'm glad hes playing for us. Meanwhile Mark Binfield has beaten me, so I have to assume he is good.

For anyone who has entered who happens to be reading, do not be fooled by the grades of the juniors. I have seen all 3 of the juniors play that I have mentioned and they are all very good. If anyone thinks they have an easy match against any of them (an unwise assumption to make with a junior anyway) I'll be blunt with the truth. You haven't.

All of this makes me wish I'd booked a different weekend of work, but I'll see about entering next year!

Steve Rooney
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Re: Shropshire Chess Congress 4-5 January 2014

Post by Steve Rooney » Sat Jan 04, 2014 10:28 am

A record number taking part this weekend in Shropshire.

Live games (technology willing!) here
http://www.shrewsburychessclub.org/shro ... gress-2014

Results and pairings here
http://results.tournamentdirector.co.uk ... p?Service=

Steve Rooney
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Re: Shropshire Chess Congress 4-5 January 2014

Post by Steve Rooney » Sun Jan 05, 2014 7:38 am

Great first day in Shropshire.

In the Open, John Cox and Mike Surtees both on 3/3, followed by James Cobb, Mark Page and Roger de Coverley on 2.5, with the latter getting a well earned draw against Cobb in round 2. The Major has eight players tied on 2.5, with two on 3/3 in the Minor; Shropshire players still well in contention in both.

The Live Games seem to be working reasonably well, with outstanding support from the tech staff at Wrekin Housing Trust. We retired one board which was playing up, but the remaining four have been transmitting ok.

Moment of the congress so far: young Daniel Arkell running up to the desk bursting with pride to record his win in round 3.

David Blower
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Re: Shropshire Chess Congress 4-5 January 2014

Post by David Blower » Mon Jan 06, 2014 5:47 pm

Oh yes! Daniel Binfield got 2 wins out of 4! I hate to say I told you so, but actually what am I talking about! I told you so!

I knew he would do well!
Last edited by David Blower on Mon Jan 06, 2014 5:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.

David Blower
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Re: Shropshire Chess Congress 4-5 January 2014

Post by David Blower » Mon Jan 06, 2014 5:49 pm

Steve Rooney wrote:
Moment of the congress so far: young Daniel Arkell running up to the desk bursting with pride to record his win in round 3.
As I said hes very good! A very hard fought game when I played against him for Brewood.

David Blower
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Re: Shropshire Chess Congress 4-5 January 2014

Post by David Blower » Sat Feb 08, 2014 5:14 am

A report on my local chess clubs website reporting on how the 5 members from my club who took part got on in the congress is on my local chess clubs website. The link is here: http://brewoodchess.webs.com/apps/blog/ ... gress-2014

Of course at the moment that is just a list of stats, which only tells part of the story. I hope to get some reaction from some of the players involved. I wish I could have got the report up a bit sooner than now though.

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