EPSCA Updates: its good news!

[John Upham]

Following a long and gruelling campaign of hard work by Alex Holowczak and others, reform and much needed update for the 21st century is in the air.

The Leicester based EPSCA AGM took place on September 28th and rather than wait many months for the official so-called "minutes" to appear, here (from AH) are the essential outcomes regarding the EPSCA Inter-Association Championships.


"Here's a summary of what happened, noting that all of these changes will come into force from 2026, and thus 2025 will be the last with the old arrangements.

1. The Girls competition will be reduced to a team of 6, but Associations can enter up to two teams.

2. The Under 11 and Under 9 competition will be teams of 12, but counties can enter up to two teams.

3. The format of the Under 11 and Under 9 will be Zones as we have now, with a Major Final and a Minor Final. The top teams go into the Major Final and the next set of teams go into the Minor Final. No Association can have more than one team in each Final, e.g. if Kent A and Kent B finish 1st and 2nd in their Zone, then the B team nevertheless goes into the Minor Final. The size of each Final will be capped at 12 teams, with the Controller retaining the existing flexibility to allocate places to the Finals based on the number of entrants into each Zone.

4. Each tournament will be a Team Swiss rather than a Jamboree, based on Gamepoints rather than Matchpoints. The tie-breaks remain unchanged.

5. Under 11 and Girls competition: 4 rounds of 25+10. Under 9 competition, 5 rounds of 15+10.

6. The dates will be spread out more in future to avoid "player burnout" where some children played several Saturdays in a row; these are the dates for 2026:
24 January: U11 Zone
28 February: U9 Zone
14 March: U11 Final
18 April: Girls Final
25 April: U9 Final

Finally, Nigel Dennis will stand down as organiser of the Inter-Association Competition after the conclusion of the 2025 event."

[Roger Lancaster]

That all sounds sensible so well done, "Alex Holowczak and others". My personal view is that EPSCA IACs have been overtaken in importance on the junior chess calendar by other events, notably UK Chess Challenge, and is now little more than another rapidplay event at a time when there's a paucity of classical chess events targeting juniors. I don't dispute that rapidplay games are fun but whether juniors learn much by bashing out moves without too much thought is debatable. Counter-argument seems to be that younger juniors, in particular, can't cope with classical chess - longer time limits, need to keep score, etc. While that's undoubtedly true of some, there are plenty (certainly 6-year-olds and occasionally younger) of exceptions. In that context, the revival of the Junior 4 Nations - albeit on a scaled-down basis without the top players - is to be welcomed.

[Neill Cooper]

Any news on their U11 and U9 inter-school competitions?

[John Upham]

Any news on their U11 and U9 inter-school competitions?

I believe that this matter was discussed on the

EJOG Chess Tutors Forum on WhatsApp

As I recall Angela Eyton is leading the way....

Predictably the EPSCA web site

https://www.epsca.org.uk/npscc-1

shows the latest details of the 2023 event and nothing more recent.