good luck matt turner in tromso .

[Ian Lamb]

just like to wish Matt Turner good luck at tromso in norway in August 1-9th quite a strong event http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=5603 for details of other players

[Ben Purton]

Don't go forget Peter Poob, GO PETE!!!!!!!!!

[JustinHorton]

And if things go badly, it's always possible to go whalewatching at midnight. Costs the equivalent of fifty quid as I recall.

[Carl Hibbard]

just like to wish Matt Turner good luck at tromso in norway in August 1-9th quite a strong event http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=5603 for details of other players

The schools get too much holiday me thinks

[Matthew Turner]

Many thanks for your words of support. I hadly looked at the entry list recently, but after having done so I think I might need them!
I would be very surprised if whale watching was £50, I recall someone doing it last year and the figure of £150 springs to mind. With the cost of everything in Norway I might have to use the rest of my mere 10 week holiday to get a Summer job.

[JustinHorton]

Matthew - I think from memory (I was there for my fortieth bithday in 2005) it was advertised down by the large museum (I know there's several) that's on the way out of town going south. But you could always ask at tourist information!

I can remember that it cost basically as much as it cost to get drunk, which was indeed about fifty quid. I selected the drinking option, which was one of the most stupid decisions I have ever made in my life.

[Ian Lamb]

wow matt i thought you have been looking at it a lot as to see who you need to prep up for before the event Ray Robson playing which suprise me.

[Susan Owens]

Starts tomorrow

http://www.arcticchess.org/

Good luck Matt and Peter

( are you sure you wouldn't prefer Torquay ! )

[Leonard Barden]

nice blog from the tournament website......

Its always nice to see people return to Tromsø and Arctic Chess Challenge. This year GMs Bartosz Socko, Jon Ludvig Hammer. Vadim Malakhatko , Amon Simutowe and Heikki Westerinen returns to the Arctic and alot of other players of all kind of strenghts do the same. GM Matthew J. Turner from England are among those who comes back and he even have a close friend in Norway, IM Bjørn Tiller, that participate so it's a kind of vacation too. Here is my portrait of Turner this year:

Matthew Turner (2517) is a former English chess professional. He was born on the 12th of December 1975, and is 34 years old. He became a Grandmaster in 2002, and since the year 2000 he has been stable between 2480 and 2520 with a peak-elo of 2519. Since Turner got his Grandmaster-title he has had a rather low tournament activity where the league 4NCL is his main arena. He nowadays is more a teacher of chess and he works at the Millfield School in Somerset, England. Matthews chess classes includes all levels of play, from beginners to experienced international players. To last year Arctic Chess Challenge he brought with him his 21 years old student Peter S Poobalasingam (2224), and we remember that both of them did well - with Matthew at a strong 3rd place and Peter at an amazing 9th place - performing almost 200 points above his actual elo rating.

In 2001 at Hastings he beat the young Levon Aronian that already was quite some player. But his sweetest chess memory is probably from the Four Nations Chess League in England where the boardorder of his team one season was 1. GM Turner 2. GM Morozevich 3. GM Short...

As white Matthew opts for 1.e4 more frequently, but he plays 1.c4 or 1.d4 regularly too. As black he plays both the Sicilian and the King Pawns opening against 1.e4 and usually the Nimzo Indian or the Queens Indian vs. 1.d4. But he can play many openings and his style is more fresh and creative than technical or theoretical. This means that he don't go for long mainlines, or discusses a lot of theory, but rather opt to get out of book early and create something over the board. He likes to play for an attack, and is not really a positional lion that excel in the late stages of the game.

In Britain many Grandmasters in chess has tried their luck on different Quiz shows at TV. James Plaskett and Bill Hartston is among them, but most successful of them to my knowledge is Matthew Turner. In the TV-show "Countdown" where he participated some years ago now he came to the final! The task was to rearranging letters to make the longest word containing 9 letters. He became second at the end and was happy to get his prize in hardcore cash, instead of a ton of dictionaries as the first prize winner got!

[Richard Bates]

nice blog......

Matthew Turner (2517) is a former English chess professional. He was born on the 12th of December 1975, and is 34 years old.

Have i lost a year? Is it 2010 already?

[Richard Bates]

In Britain many Grandmasters in chess has tried their luck on different Quiz shows at TV. James Plaskett and Bill Hartston is among them, but most successful of them to my knowledge is Matthew Turner. In the TV-show "Countdown" where he participated some years ago now he came to the final! The task was to rearranging letters to make the longest word containing 9 letters. He became second at the end and was happy to get his prize in hardcore cash, instead of a ton of dictionaries as the first prize winner got!

I think Jim got a bit more money...

[Ian Lamb]

Jim won 250 thousand on who wants to be a millionaire and he knew the 500 thousand pound question as well but was not 100% so did not go for it. was just like watching Jim play chess like in time trouble after every time he gave an answer jim took a big gulp of water then just said the answer and played like that for every question.

[Carl Hibbard]

Don't go forget Peter Poob, GO PETE!!!!!!!!!

Looks like they have drawn each other in the second round

[Kevin Thurlow]

Outside England they do the correct pairing rather than artificially separate people who know each other/belong to same club etc! I increasingly have sympathy with this approach as when you fiddle the draw to avoid such clashes, you may affect someone else's chances of a prize. In the Chess 960 event just finished in Mainz, there were only two Dutch players (from the same club) on -1 in the last round out of 30 or so and they had to play each other. (I would maybe want to avoid this in case the two friends arranged a result, which I know they wouldn't in this particular case) It certainly annoyed me when I was trying to get a FIDE rating years ago when arbiters fiddled the draw to give the juniors rated opponents and I played a string of unrateds.
Maybe the best approach is to avoid pairing people from the same club/country etc in round 1 or 2 then pair them strictly according to the rules?

[Leonard Barden]

Drawn is right-in 12 moves.....