What another fantastic Chess tournament here at Redhill Prep!
Well done to all the children who took part there were some excellent games played.
14 schools from across Pembrokeshire and beyond were represented today proving this game remains ever popular!
Here are the medal winners:
1st place- Gold Medal: Samuel Addison
2nd place- Silver Medal: Huw Holliday (Redhill Prep), Sebastian Kummer (Neyland Primary), Theo Otterburn (St. Michael’s) David Pinch Award: Jude Taylor (St. Marks)
Huge thank you to Ian Eustis (WCU), FM Alexis Harakis, Martin Jones and Scott Hammett. Without you we wouldn’t be able to hold this tournament and each of you volunteer your time which is much appreciated.
Also thanks so much to Friends of Redhill for all their hard work today. Next tournament in the autumn term, keep your eyes peeled!
The Chess Olympics was a massive success for the large number of juniors who attended, battling to see who the best variant player was.
Introduced to King of the Hill, Three Checks and Losing Chess, even the weaker players had a chance to outdo the stronger. Phoebe Evans
defeated one of the adults to show she was the best at King of the Hill, whilst Byron Minter and Jacob Wright grabbed the certificates in the
two other areas.
However, the night was centred around the puzzle race that took up half the room! The “on your marks, set, go!” saw who could complete the puzzles fastest, eagerly fighting for their position. In the preliminaries, Jacob stormed to the finish in a shocking 45 seconds. Just when it was believed the record was set, Oscar Purcell managed to come home a second faster to much excitement. As the speeds were announced, everyone waited with bated breath to see Trisztan Saftany called out as the third qualifier.
The three contenders stood ready at the new puzzles of the final, eyeing up the medals that would be handed out at the end line. With the “go!” sending them rattling off, Trisztan and Oscar stumbled near the start and Jacob took his chance to race forward to gold. In a closely fought battle, Trisztan managed to come in for silver, whilst Oscar took the bronze.
In all, highly enjoyable and excitable for the kids, a different spin on the usual nights at the club and a change from the usual coaching. Definitely something to continue with next year!
The Management Board has recently heard of the passing of John Dawes (Castell Nedd). The Management Board wish to send our commiserations to John’s family and friends.
His obituary is below.
OBITUARY
JOHN DAWES
1933-2024
John Dawes joined the old Neath Club in about 1966 but later transferred his allegiance to the town’s other club, Castell Nedd. He was the kind of solid dependable player that every club needs and, in addition to that he sat on the club committee for many years and helped to run one of the club’s many teams. In 2006 he was voted Clubman of the Year, an honour which reflected all the work that he had done for the club over the previous twelve months.
John had a calm and quiet personality but was a very solid player who was a great asset to the club’s second team. On one occasion, he was playing in Briton Ferry. After just half an hour’s play John’s opponent threw the board up in the air, with pieces flying everywhere. The team captain rushed over to find out what had happened and John just commented, “Interesting!”
He was a difficult man to beat and had quite a bit of success against strong players in the club’s annual guest simultaneous displays.
John was followed into the club by his two grandsons, Adam and James Ridgeway.
Outside chess he was an excellent gardener, winning many of the local council gardening awards. He and his wife took part in sequence dancing all their married lives. There is often an argument about whether chess is an art or a science – obviously with John it appealed to his artistic side. He retired from the chess club about fifteen years ago, but will long be remembered.
Some of you will know that on 1st March 2024, FIDE gave an uplift to players at the lower end of their rating list, with no player now receiving a FIDE rating of under 1400, and players between 1000 and 2000 being uplifted to between 1400 and 2000.
FIDE ratings are accepted as the ‘gold standard’ of ratings throughout the world, and I have therefore felt it appropriate to also uplift the WCU Junior Rapidplay ratings to fall back more in line with the new uplifted FIDE ratings.
Accordingly, and backdated to 1st Jan, the following uplifts have been applied to the Junior Rapidplay ratings list:
For anyone under 1000 on Jan 1st New WCU = Old WCU + 500
For anyone 1000 or over on Jan 1st New WCU = 0.5 x Old WCU + 1000
Since most players were under 1000 rating, the effect will simply be an addition of 500 to their rating. For those between 1000 and 2000, the effect is to lift them to between 1500 and 2000. For technical reasons I have reduced the K factor for the latter players from 30 to 20 to make for rather less volatility in the ratings of these stronger players, particularly when playing each other.
It is my expectation that the WCU main list will also have an uplift applied (probably for the new July 1st rating list), but with many new players coming onto the junior list after the March schools’ team championships it seemed best to uplift the Junior Rapidplay ratings at this stage.
Please send any comments/queries to jthornton126@btinternet.com
John Thornton (WCU Junior Rapidplay Rating Officer)
The WCU Selection Committee will meet in April (a little after the Welsh Championships at Easter) to choose, for both the Open Section and Women’s Section, our team, its captain and reserves. The outcome of the meeting will be announced shortly afterwards.
It is expected that this Year’s Olympiad, to be held in an accessible city with a long chess tradition, will prove extremely popular and, as far as Wales is concerned, the WCU’s Easter Congress clearly represents the last chance prospective members of our teams may have of making an impression.
The organisers’ website is due to become functional shortly but the basic arrangements are governed by World Chess Federation statute. Both events take the form of an 11-round Swiss system tournament. Four players represent countries in each round, from a squad of five. The organisers pay the accommodation costs of up to five players per team plus those of a non-playing captain in two single and two twin rooms but not travel costs (the 2022 Olympiad in Chennai was an exception). The WCU is unlikely to be in a position to help with these costs, but travel to Budapest should not prove too expensive.
