BUCA Championships

[Justin Hadi]

Definately something dubious there, I think cause enough for an investigation.
I will be interested to see their games when you post them, Ill run them through fritz and see if there is any evidence of foul play.

Sour grapes... You sound like a total lunatic. The top board of Imperial 2 is massively undergraded and the other grades are estimated so why couldn't they beat Warwick?

[Eoin Devane]

Imperial 2 were really impressive. At the end of the Saturday they were alone in the lead. Sadly for them, that meant they then had to play Bath 1 and Edinburgh in the last two rounds. Even then they put up a decent fight, though. Alan Luo in particular did really well, scoring 50% on board 1 against an average opponent around 50 grading points above him. For this I'd say well done, rather than accuse him of cheating.

[Joey Stewart]

How do we know that they were not copying the moves between the top board opponents (to guarantee 1 point on those boards) and put their best ungraded players on the bottom boards where they were more likely to win??

Why am I the only one who seems to feel that Warwick deserved a better placement in this tournament, is there nobody else here with a bit of pride in this fine upstanding establishment?

[Rob Thompson]

Without trying to be unduly rude - Shut up. Your accusations are ridiculous to say the least, and totally unwarranted and unhelpful. You could do everyone a favour by stopping them. Now.

[Joey Stewart]

Who are you to dare to tell me what sort of accusations I can and cannot make?!
Ok, so there is no actual evidence that Imperial 2 were up to any mischeif, but it does not change the fact that Warwick were put in a situation that made it uneccesarily difficult for them to win throughout the tournament and this should not have been allowed to happen.

[Matt Mackenzie]

Without trying to be unduly rude - Shut up. Your accusations are ridiculous to say the least, and totally unwarranted and unhelpful. You could do everyone a favour by stopping them. Now.

I am just starting to develop a hunch that Mr Cage might not be entirely serious

[IM Jack Rudd]

[Alex Holowczak]

I have received an e-mail from a Warwick University member apologising for Joey's comments. I won't disclose the contents of the e-mail, but I am assured that his comments do not reflect those of the Warwick University players. I think we should leave it at that.

[John Saunders]

Whilst musing on the Varsity match (see thread elsewhere), I had a stray thought about BUCA and was about to lecture you young 'uns (in that annoying way that we old 'uns tend to do) as regards its placement in the calendar. "Why don't you play it in the summer after finals like we did in the olden days?", I was about to say. But I then discovered that my memory was greatly at fault - in the mid-1970s the BUCA tournament was held in March/April, during the Easter vacation. And yet, when I checked further back, I discovered that in the 1950s they played it during the Long Vac - which, on the face of it, seems more logical. I would have thought you would get more players if you held it immediately after the end of the academic year but this may simply be naivety on my part. Can anyone explain to me the reasoning behind the timing of the tournament? Just curious...

[Alex Holowczak]

Holding it in the summer would not be good, due to the number of foreign players who would play. Most will have gone home for the summer. For the same reason, holding it in a holiday such as Easter wouldn't work. I think most Universities have something like two to three weeks between Easter and their end of year exams, which they would no doubt rather spend revising for said exams. It could not be in March due to the Varsity game, and I wanted to avoid a clash for obvious reasons. A lot of Universities have examinations in January, too.

Given that I only thought about having a Universities tournament in November - let alone reforming BUCA - this didn't leave much time left in the calendar. February was the only candidate month. It couldn't be on the 4NCL weekend, February 20/21. I was involved in the Warwickshire Championship on February 13/14. This left us with two February dates, and the later one was chosen, as it gave everyone involved a bit more time to sort it out.

[James Pratt]

I would appreciate some games from the event and the individual scores.

Any sign yet? The site promises; and yet ...

[Alex Holowczak]

I would appreciate some games from the event and the individual scores.

Any sign yet? The site promises; and yet ...

Unfortunately, the person maintaining the site (yours truly) has had two pieces of coursework recently, and an exam this morning, as well as other chess-related commitments. Priorities lay elsewhere.

I was looking for some software to make inputting team results easier, but can find none. So I have had to do it manually. I will continue that tonight when I get home.

The games will be done on Saturday, 20th March, I hope. The plan is for a few friends of mine to meet up at a yet-to-be-arranged place, and do 1 round each on Fritz, get the PGN files, send them to the webmaster (who has the advantage of knowing what he's actually doing), and he can put them in some game viewer or something. That way, the five of us have to do 28 games each, so we should be done by the end of the day. Alas, I am not Jack Rudd, so I don't have his ability of putting games in a PGN before anyone realises they were missing.

[Adam Raoof]

Alas, I am not Jack Rudd, so I don't have his ability of putting games in a PGN before anyone realises they were missing.

Or Jack's knack of inputting games before they have even finished

[James Pratt]

Alex, can you tell me what Paul Griffiths scored? Writing about him in Cavendish Chess #33.

Thanks

[Alex Holowczak]

Alex, can you tell me what Paul Griffiths scored? Writing about him in Cavendish Chess #33.

Thanks

He scored 5/5 on board 3 for Bath 1 - I think he was the only player to score 100%!