7th Teesside Individual Chess Championships: Entries Building

Entries are building up nicely for the 7th Teesside Individual Chess Championships.

Indeed, given the number of envelopes that have appeared this week, the post person in the Marsh Towers neighbourhood mistakenly thought it was 14 February all over again.

We currently have roughly one third of the usual number of entries (which is very good at this stage) and quite a few of those will be making their tournament debuts.

The closing date is Wednesday 6 June.

Further details can be found here.

CSC Training Day Tour 2017-8: Leeds

Yesterday we returned to Leeds to deliver the Yorkshire leg of the 2017-8 CSC Training Day Tour, exactly one year to the day since the inaugural event.

12 delegates brought a whole range of abilities and experience to the day, from chess players who had been active over the board for 40 years but had no teaching experience to exactly the opposite scenario.

The offices of Peter Mason - a delegate on last year's course - again proved to be a perfect venue.

Dan Staples, Regional Coordinator for Yorkshire, made the opening remarks. In fact Dan wears so many different hats for CSC that he could even put a hyperactive milliner to shame.

Chris Fegan, CSC's Chief Operating Officer, travelled down from London for the day to inform the delegates of our mission and activities.

Then it was straight into the training activities, for which we can let the photographs tell the story more or less on their own...

Mini-games in action

I have known Kevin ever since we played for Guisborough Chess Club back in the early 1980s but this is the first time I have ever seen him move around the room like a bishop. Not counting the time he got back to the digs after a nightclub visit during the 1985 Penrith Congress, of course.

More role-play human pieces followed, including the rook...

...the knight - complete with a jump over a chair (health and safety please look away now)... 

...and despite the Henry VIII appearance, a queen.

Richard tries to outmanoeuvre a queen with an army of pawns.

Funds run tight towards the end of a school year. Dan and Chris
gamely saved on expenses by sharing a suit for the day. 

With Kevin - one of my all-time best friends and big supporter of my events.

The face of victory.

Never mind finding the camera, Hema - just keep concentrating on the board!

A different kind of roll-play: dice chess can end with a check from an unprotected pawn.

I thoroughly enjoyed working with such a fabulous group of people. Thank you, everyone! 

Head here for details of forthcoming CSC Training Days. The 2017-8 is drawing to a close but the schedule for 2018-9 should be available in the not too distant future.

New Shadow

Following successful shadowing sessions with Andrew MacQueen and Sean Cassidy, last week brought a new visitor to Teesside.

John Lydon, one of the very determined delegates who made it through to the Newcastle leg of our Training Day Tour back in snowbound February, made a somewhat easier journey this time to be with me at both The Links (one day) and Park End (two days).

John worked with a large number of children from Year 3, Year 4 and Year 5. He also enjoyed his two Park End school lunches!

John made a big impact when he first arrived at school. As his visit coincided with the SATS exams, the initial reaction was that he was an Oftsed assessor or investigator, causing temporary panic to spread through the school.

John will now spearhead an attempt at building up CSC activity in Carlisle. A suitable spot for a place on the 2018-9 Training Day Tour, I would say.

Thank you for all of your hard work, John! 

Gigafinal Entries

The Teesside Megafinal and Gigafinal qualifiers are now listed on the UKCC site, so it is time to enter the Gigafinal.

Just find our region and the name of the qualifiers using the drop-down arrows.

Incidentally, this is a good time to draw your attention to the special Megafinal Champion Pack, which is a suitable way to reward your own child for an excellent performance.

7th Teesside Individual Junior Chess Championships

All of our CSC Teesside Schools and CSC Libraries have received a copy of the entry form. Please check with your school if you have not received a form.


Event: 7th Teesside Individual Junior Chess Championships.

Venue: Yarm Preparatory School, Grammar School Lane, Yarm, Stockton-on-Tees, TS15 9ES 

Please note - if you played in the recent Megafinal, that was at the Senior School just across the road from the Preparatory School.

Date: Saturday 9 June 2018

Timings: Please arrive for 9.45 a.m. Play will start at 10.00 a.m. The prize giving will be at approximately 2.30 p.m.

Format: All players will play five rounds, on the Swiss system. 

We have sections for Under-7s (Year 2s), Under-9s (Year 3s and 4s), Under-11s (Year 5s and Year 6s) and Over-11s.

The champions (Boys and Girls) of each section will receive the trophies and titles. 

Open to junior players in the boroughs of Stockton-on-Tees, Hartlepool, Redcar & Cleveland and Middlesbrough.

The tournament is not just about winning titles and trophies. It should be seen primarily as an excellent experience for all competitors who will be able to learn a lot by playing against new opponents from a large number of different schools.

General Information: 

The closing date is Wednesday 6 June 2018.

We cannot accept late entries and will definitely not be able to take extra entries on the day.

We cannot offer full supervision anywhere outside of the playing rooms. Parents/guardians must supervise their children at all times other than when the children are in the playing rooms.

Parents, guardians, teachers and chess coaches will not be allowed in the playing rooms during the rounds.

Problems arising during the games will be solved by the tournament Arbiter or another member of the control team. Children must alert the officials to any problems by raising their hand at the time. It is very difficult to solve problems retrospectively.

We will not be operating a tuck shop at this event and we advise you to bring a large packed lunch.

We will be working very hard on the day trying to ensure everyone has a great time. As usual with our events, we want to keep the pressure on the children to an absolute minimum. To help protect this ethos, we want the children to relax between the rounds and to temporarily forget about their chess battles. It would be greatly appreciated if all parents, guardians, teachers, chess coaches et al supported this ethos too and helped all of the children to enjoy the day without applying any pressure between the rounds.

Full reports will appear across our range of social media platforms. Please let me know on the day if you have any concerns regarding the use of photographs, names or any other information.

The Arbiter's decision in all matters relating to the tournament is final.

Any late announcements and updates will follow on here, on our Facebook page and via our Twitter account.

2018 Teesside Megafinal (4)

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Today we conclude our coverage of the 2018 Delancey UK Chess Challenge Teesside Megafinal with a final gallery (from the prize giving ceremony) and a summary of the champions and qualifiers.

Supremos and Supremas

These quaint titles are on of the traditional trademark touches of the UK Chess Challenge.

Various complicated tiebreak methods are utilised to determine which people take the title in the event of shared places and for Teesside the respective Supremo and Suprema 2018 titles go to:

U-7s

George Forshaw

Olivia Kennedy

U-8s

Noah Coulman

Hannah Weid

U-9s

Jack Tickle

Lily Tattersall

U-10s

Ajay Selvan

Grace Crawford

U-11s

Yusuf Syed

Alice Sturman

U-13s

Shrish Nair

Aishani Paul

U-14s

Gautam Sathyamurthy

U-17s

Crispin Roundtree

Gigafinal Qualifiers

Here is the roll of honour for our 2018 Gigafinal qualifiers.

Olivia Kennedy, Zane Barznji, George Forshaw, Oskar Rooney, Aisling Timmons, Olly Bruce, Sophie Hall, Noah Coulman 

Zachary Green, George Oliver, Hannah Weid, Wyatt Girling,
Natasha Pointon, Minakshi Palat Meethale

Jack Tickle, Aryan Nalawade, Lily Tattersall, Aditya Paul, Harry Charlton, Cody Braithwaite, Frankie Parker, Edward Lamb, Niamh Boddy, Effie Poole, Marshall Lancaster, William Hepples, Wilf Thompson, Ewan Flynn

Ajay Selvan, Alex Gray, Liam Marshall, Samuel Bolton, Avanish Batra, Ella Field, Grace Crawford, Thalia Smith

Yusuf Syed, Henry Parker, Saisparsh Sidaginamale, Alice Sturman, Sebastian Chambers, Ben Clayton, Gautam Sathyamurthy, Crispin Roundtree, Ihsaan Mahmood, Shrish Nair, Alfie McMonagle, Aishani Paul.

Gigafinals can be entered here. The Teesside names will be available on there soon and then it will simply be a case of finding a qualifier's name on the drop-down arrows.

This concludes our Megafinal coverage for 2018. A decision will be taken later regarding the possibility of a Megafinal on Teesside for 2019.

Meanwhile, we hope our new qualifiers will enjoy the 2018 Gigafinals.


2018 Megafinal Index

Results

Gallery 1

Gallery 2

Gallery 3 and summary

2018 Teesside Megafinal (3)

Today we present a second gallery from our Delancey UK Chess Challenge Teesside Megafinal.

A final gallery - of the prize giving - will follow tomorrow, together with a summary of the champions and Gigafinal qualifiers.

The calm before the storm

'There's nothing to this Megafinal lark.'