English Chess Forum

Would this be worth trying ?

I have a potential sponsor who is keen on the idea but what do the chess players think ?

Sounds interesting, but a couple of warning notes:

(a) Easter weekend is already a very popular time for people to run events; you might be pushing into a very crowded market.

(b) 20 seems a strange number of rounds. It's far too many for a Swiss to produce sensible pairings, and the only way an all-play-all can have that many rounds is if it's a 6-player quadruple-rounder.

To help with traveling a late start Friday and early finish Monday so a 4 6 6 4 with up to 4 byes

The Welsh Championships and Southend on Sea which are both congresses and in the south, are there others that aren't listed yet ?
This would be either Midland or in the North depending upon avoiding existing events and where is most suitable.

The element of the luck of the draw or a bad game are removed, it's down to stamina and ability.

Gareth T Ellis wrote:The element of the luck of the draw or a bad game are removed, it's down to stamina and ability.

I'm still in my teens, and by the end of a 6-round rapidplay I'm usually exhausted. I dread to think how I would feel after 20 rounds, especially if I was a few decades older!

That said I'm sure there are some people (fool)hardy enough to try it...

The West of England Championship is always at Easter weekend as well. (Usually in Exmouth, although it may go somewhere else next year.) I don't know if there are others.

Gareth T Ellis wrote:To help with traveling a late start Friday and early finish Monday so a 4 6 6 4 with up to 4 byes

The Welsh Championships and Southend on Sea which are both congresses and in the south, are there others that aren't listed yet ?
This would be either Midland or in the North depending upon avoiding existing events and where is most suitable.

Bolton has an Easter Congress which has run for a very long time. There is a "Busy Person's" event (a blitz) on the Saturday afternoon during a gap in the normal-play event.

John, this is only to see if there is sufficent interest from players and the availablility to do it.

The busy people players wouldn't be interested as they don't have the time to enter your main congress and the congress players must prefer congress games to rapidplay so again no clash of interest, but at least I now know that Bolton is on that weekend.

It would be useful if the ECF calendar listed these events

IM Jack Rudd wrote:The West of England Championship is always at Easter weekend as well. (Usually in Exmouth, although it may go somewhere else next year.) I don't know if there are others.

The WECU Congress is in Exmouth again next year, but being held in a different hotel just up the road.

Gareth T Ellis wrote:It would be useful if the ECF calendar listed these events

The ECF Calendar lists tournaments only when events submit their tournaments to the calendar. This is probably a better approach than guessing which events are going to be held when, and assuming events will run on the same weekend of the year from one weekend to the next.

However, the ECF does publish an archive of events dating back to 2010, so people can see which congresses they've played in, and see which events are on at particular times of the year. Here's the page for March 2013: http://www.englishchess.org.uk/calendar ... arch-2013/

Easter was right at the end of March last year, and I see the following events:
e2e4 Dublin International
CCF Easter LP Congress
Bolton Easter Congress and Busy Persons Blitz
UK Chess Academy Easter Congress
WECU 65th Open Easter Congress
Southend Easter Chess Congress

Gareth T Ellis wrote:John, this is only to see if there is sufficent interest from players and the availablility to do it.

The busy people players wouldn't be interested as they don't have the time to enter your main congress and the congress players must prefer congress games to rapidplay so again no clash of interest, but at least I now know that Bolton is on that weekend.

It would be useful if the ECF calendar listed these events

I should say that I haven't been involved in the Bolton Congress for thirty years or so (late 70s/very early 80s, when I used to help with the controlling). I'm presuming that it's planned for 2014, but you'd have to check with the organiser.

Just an idea, but why not make it 4 seperate tournaments of 5 rounds (with fairly small prizes) and then an overall winner from the 20 rounds. Makes the swiss system sensible, still a test of stamina and you can recover from a bad result.

One alternative format that I'd very much like to see in the UK is the Utrecht blitz tournmament.

Groups of 20 players play 19 rounds APA ... at 5mins each per game that's just over 3 hours assuming they dont mess it up by 'helpfully' accerating games and blockign themsleves...

Top 2 into A final, next 2 to B final, etc... they run it with 400 players in a day .... if there's less than 400 you could flex the number qualifying for the A, B finals, etc and put the 'rest' into a big swiss?

I seem to remember that everyone in the A-final was guaranteed something and about half of us in the B-final got something too...

Quite a few wanderign GMs an IMs rocked-up when I played it.


Paul Dargan

In case anyone is wondering, there is no reason why such an event should not be FIDE rapid rated, in fact it would be encouraged.

IM Jack Rudd wrote: (b) 20 seems a strange number of rounds. It's far too many for a Swiss to produce sensible pairings, and the only way an all-play-all can have that many rounds is if it's a 6-player quadruple-rounder.

There are established Rapid-play events which run over two days, with 11 rounds. The British Rapid play is one and currently possibly unique in the UK.

Easter is a a popular period for events. You may need to add the Surrey Open to the list. 2013 didn't take place but I believe it was scheduled to return in 2014.

If you wanted to use all four days, perhaps a back to back Rapidplay of eleven rounds on the first two days and then Blitz for the other two.

Apart from a possible Bolton congress, subject to confirmation, they all seem to be in the south