Images from the Southern Gigafinal

[John Upham]

449 Images from the Southern Gigafinal covering both days may be found at

http://johnupham.smugmug.com/Chess/UKCC

Use the slideshow option to best view the captions.

As usual, any help replacing "?"s with something more descriptive will be much appreciated!

I now need to have a lie down in a darkened room!

[Peter D Williams]

449 Images from the Southern Gigafinal covering both days may be found at

http://johnupham.smugmug.com/Chess/UKCC

Use the slideshow option to best view the captions.

As usual, any help replacing "?"s with something more descriptive will be much appreciated!

I now need to have a lie down in a darkened room!

Some good pictures you have taken of the young chess players.I like the picture of we off all those hands good picture

I was surprised to see Yang-Fan Zhou, in this event as it appeared rather weak for him unless the prize money is really big for a Gigafinal? I would have thought he would qualify automatically for the Terafinal?

[Dan O'Dowd]

No player can qualify automatically except if they happen for example to be the sole section entrant in their megafinal, though they will still play with the other age groups. A funny thing happened to me once when there were just two of us in the Boys U18, and we were never paired together. I outrated my friend who I had also travelled with, by about 50 points, but I had a horrible day and ended up not even qualifying, unlike him. The prize money for winning the event outright is massive these days yes, about £3000 for the winner I think it is.

[Alex Holowczak]

The prize money for winning the event outright is massive these days yes, about £3000 for the winner I think it is.

The first prize was £2,000 in 2012.

[Peter D Williams]

No player can qualify automatically except if they happen for example to be the sole section entrant in their megafinal, though they will still play with the other age groups. A funny thing happened to me once when there were just two of us in the Boys U18, and we were never paired together. I outrated my friend who I had also travelled with, by about 50 points, but I had a horrible day and ended up not even qualifying, unlike him. The prize money for winning the event outright is massive these days yes, about £3000 for the winner I think it is.

I am surprised that Yang-Fan Zhou is not allowed to qualify for the Terafinal by his chess rating.

I guess if you play chess for money that is the event to win as £3000 is a lot of money.Many will be hoping Yang-Fan has a bad day I believe he win it as he is a wonderful chess player.