English Chess Forum

Took place yesterday in Dukinfield Town Hall. Less said about the venue the better.

However, took 9 of my school chess players (school record) and 3 of them have qualified for the Challengers' finals in Warwick - another record. One is an under 7 girl so our future looks solid for a few years at least.

It's a great tournament spoiled only by the excessively high (in my opinion) entry fees, especially at the second stage.

Spoke to several of the parents of my players yesterday and they support our entry in to the 4NCL Junior next year so here we come. Chess in North Wales is definiitely on the up.

Andrew Camp wrote:Took place yesterday in Dukinfield Town Hall. Less said about the venue the better.

However, took 9 of my school chess players (school record) and 3 of them have qualified for the Challengers' finals in Warwick - another record. One is an under 7 girl so our future looks solid for a few years at least.

It's a great tournament spoiled only by the excessively high (in my opinion) entry fees, especially at the second stage.

Spoke to several of the parents of my players yesterday and they support our entry in to the 4NCL Junior next year so here we come. Chess in North Wales is definiitely on the up.

Well done Andrew!

Out of interest, what are the entry fees? As an organiser, I'm always trying to strike a balance between entry fees, prizes and costs so it's interesting to know what level of fee is "excessively high".

Ok, there is an initial entry fee of, I think £35 for your first 30 kids. Extra kids have to be paid for in blocks of 15 so if you have 31 enter, you're playing for 45.

If they qualify for the Mega-Final, there have to pay £12! I think this is too high and is a 33% increase on last year's fee.

Those that qualify for the Gigas pay an extra £9 and it another £9 for those that make it to Warwick. Warwick is a two day event.

Maybe some will think this is fair and as a teacher of kids in a private school, it's unlikely I'm ever going to face parental opposition to paying these fees but what about other families who are not as priveleged. The trophies at the Mega-Finals are very poor quality and yesterday, kids were told that if they got 4.5 points, they would get prizes. These prizes turned out to be Mike Basman's souvenir UKCC chess challenge brochures from........2008!!!

I don't want to be too negative - the kids to get a lot out of it and it's fabulous that a tournament like this exists. I sure couldn't do it so fair play to Mr Basman for doing so.

The rise to £12 was because some Megafinal organisers complained they were making a loss due to the room charges being too high. So the fee went up from £9 to £12. Mike still keeps £6 of the fee, but now the organiser gets £6 from the Megafinal, not £3. All prices I just mentioned are per entrant.

A student making the Terafinal would have to pay £1 + £12 + £9 + £9 (for a two-day event). I think the price of that is fair enough, but I don't like the price rise at the Megafinal stage.

The Megafinals featured prizes such as CHESS magazine from 1997(?). I read an article in one of them from Stuart Conquest, pointing out how little media coverage there was of England winning the Somethingorother Team Championship.

My old school, who I still remain chess-playing ties with, had seven qualifiers for the Gigafinal (playing today), two of which were female. Last I heard, it was looking like we could be getting three players in the various events at the Terafinal, which again would be a school record. At present, the best anyone has done at my school is finished 5th in the Challengers (13/18), set by... me. Given there are now at least four players at my school who are better than me, this is a worrying statistic!

We actually got 4 players through to the Challengers! Two boys and two girls. Chuffed.

Did my clubmate Nial Garner Qualify

No idea, I'm afraid. I wasn't there, I was just getting text updates... They'll probably put the results online over the next few days. You'll probably ask him in person before then...

Knowing my opinions of the man, some may be surprised at my comments in defending Basman over a £12 entry fee, but I am of the opinion that this is cheap if you actually accept the need to pay staff, venue, etc. A lot of voluntary organisations work on a lower entry fee for their events because everyone works for nothing. Fair enough, but people have to be realistic. Basman, at the end of the day, has to make a living (albeit probably a very good one from the UKCC) as he is a professional and does this for his living.

We have similar complaints at CCF as we are "professional" although I suspect that I earn a lot less than Basman! Most of our one day tournament fees for both juniors and adults are £15. But for that, in junior events, everyone gets some sort of medal (as long as they stay to prize giving) plus all of the games are graded with the ECF - in addition to all the arbiting team and helpers being properly paid for their day's work. So probably when you add it all up, it equates roughly the same as Basman charges, as he doesn't give medals to everyone and doesn't (as far as I am aware) pay game fee to the ECF and grade his events.

As many are aware, we run the English Chess Challenge (as we don't believe in supporting events where the organiser excludes young players as a result of unproven and probably false accusations against their parents......without the right of reply!). I am delighted that we have developed our event into the Midlands this year, so the competition is now active in several counties. We are trying to set the English Chess Challenge up so that schools or trainers can order an exact amount of each type of prize from us (rather than packs) for the 1st round, basically for cost price plus postage. The mascots and 15 point prizes are deliberately not marked with the year on them so they can be re-cycled the next year. Only the badges have the year on it. The trophies do as well but we present them once the name of the winner of the 1st round has been engraved onto it (something I don't think happens in the UKCC). Ideally we present them at the semi-finals (if they enter) or send them to the trainer to be hadned out at school.

I'm more disappointed that the kids who scored 4.5 points and who were asked to stay for prize-giving rather than starting long journeys home were then given a copy of an obviously unsold UKCC souvenir brochure from 2008 as their prize.

I felt this was more insulting than getting nothing.

Yes - I agree. I think that was taking the proverbial somewhat.

Scott Freeman wrote:We have similar complaints at CCF as we are "professional" although I suspect that I earn a lot less than Basman! Most of our one day tournament fees for both juniors and adults are £15. But for that, in junior events, everyone gets some sort of medal (as long as they stay to prize giving) plus all of the games are graded with the ECF - in addition to all the arbiting team and helpers being properly paid for their day's work. So probably when you add it all up, it equates roughly the same as Basman charges, as he doesn't give medals to everyone and doesn't (as far as I am aware) pay game fee to the ECF and grade his events.

The only Basman event that gets graded is the Terafinal.

Thanks for that Adam. Our of interest, and not knowing how many people play in the Tera-Final, how many players are there roughly and how much does it bring into the ECF coffers?

Scott Freeman wrote:Thanks for that Adam. Our of interest, and not knowing how many people play in the Tera-Final, how many players are there roughly and how much does it bring into the ECF coffers?

The Terafinal features the winners of each age/gender group in the two Gigafinals. There are usually three or four sections for Under 11s or so, and the winners of each of those advance. The winner of the Terafinal gets £2,000. Everyone gets at least £25.

Also, second and third place (and ties) qualify for the Terafinal Challengers. The winner of each of two groups gets £500. The top 20 or so get prizes.

There are 12 age ranges, so there are usually about 50 players in the Terafinal proper, with about 50 players in two Challengers Groups. There's also a smaller "Relax With Chess" tournament, with a smaller prize designed for parents (or presumably, anyone near Warwick who wants a graded tournament). This attracts about 20 entries.

Each section plays 6 games over 2 days (Aug 22/23 this year), with the time control of 30/60 + 15. All games are graded.

Naturally, the southern one is the stronger of the two, quite comfortably. George Salimbeni didn't qualify for either section from the southern one; he'd have had an easier passage through from the northern one.

Are there clocks in all the boards in the Northern Gigafinal? The younger sections at the Gigafinal generally only have them on the top couple of boards, though I don't think the under 7s and under 8s had any at all this year. I've spoke to various chess organisers about this and apparently several of them have offered to lend Basman clocks so that all the boards can have them, but he doesn't feel this is necessary.

A few years ago my son drew with a much stronger boy because they only managed to play 23 moves in the allotted one hour (obviously without chess clocks). At this stage the game was adjudicated a draw because the other boy was only two pawns up - he needed to be at least three pawns up to get the win!

The parent of another boy in their section told me that his son's opponent fell for the old Bxh7+ trap which should have led to a forced mate in a couple of moves, but then just sat there refusing to move for fifteen minutes before finally being awarded a win because he was a bishop up.

There was a strange ending in the under 14 boys section (? might have been under 13) this year. Marcus Harvey managed to draw with the far higher graded Felix Ynojosa in their game in the main tournament. They both finished on 5.5/6 and proceeded to draw two exciting blitz play-offs. I assumed they would have some sort of armageddon time control to separate them, but no - it was all decided on the toss of a coin, in which Marcus called incorrectly.

Jon D'Souza-Eva wrote:Are there clocks in all the boards in the Northern Gigafinal? The younger sections at the Gigafinal generally only have them on the top couple of boards, though I don't think the under 7s and under 8s had any at all this year. I've spoke to various chess organisers about this and apparently several of them have offered to lend Basman clocks so that all the boards can have them, but he doesn't feel this is necessary.

Neither do I. Most players of that age - even at a Gigafinal - don't know how to use them properly, and they cause too much hassle with setting them up, reminding them to press the clock, pressing it with the wrong hand, knocking them off the table...

Jon D'Souza-Eva wrote:A few years ago my son drew with a much stronger boy because they only managed to play 23 moves in the allotted one hour (obviously without chess clocks). At this stage the game was adjudicated a draw because the other boy was only two pawns up - he needed to be at least three pawns up to get the win!

The UKCC has a poor adjudication rule. He says that if you're winning by three pawns, you adjudicate it a win. I do hope that there are no amateur adjudicators out there who give King, Bishop and wrong-rook's pawn v King a win!

Jon D'Souza-Eva wrote:The parent of another boy in their section told me that his son's opponent fell for the old Bxh7+ trap which should have led to a forced mate in a couple of moves, but then just sat there refusing to move for fifteen minutes before finally being awarded a win because he was a bishop up.

Which is wrong, he should have been penalised (perhaps defaulted) for being against the spirit of the rules, and even bringing the game into disrepute. The section controllers (who are often not qualified arbiters), should be encouraging them to move in a timely manner. If the player still refuses, you default him.

Jon D'Souza-Eva wrote:There was a strange ending in the under 14 boys section (? might have been under 13) this year. Marcus Harvey managed to draw with the far higher graded Felix Ynojosa in their game in the main tournament. They both finished on 5.5/6 and proceeded to draw two exciting blitz play-offs. I assumed they would have some sort of armageddon time control to separate them, but no - it was all decided on the toss of a coin, in which Marcus called incorrectly.

That is a bit silly... I would have thought a better (but still unfair) tie-breaker was that the lowest graded player should qualify for the Terafinal, because his opponent's grading performance over those games was higher.