Last weekend saw the grandly named ‘Nottingham Summer Chess Festival’ at the Dunkirk Community Centre.
It combined a 4 round ‘Congress’ (3 sections) with a 4 round Rapidplay (2 sections) and a 7 round Blitz (1 section).
A total of 55 people played (25 local players), with 20 playing in all 3 events, 15 in two events and 20 in one event.
Marian was the only Gambiteer who entered all 3 events. He entered the Open section of the Congress and in round 1 lost to a 10 year old. Probably worth mentioning she is already rated around 2000 so he lost to a likely future IM or GM. By comparison, local IM Jonah Willow was rated 1600 when he was 10 years old. Marian finished on 1 point after facing some decent opponents.
Three more Gambiteers joined him in the Rapidplay Open and the Blitz on Sunday.
Mike B came joint 3rd on 3 points in the Rapidplay Open, losing only to Alex Posazhennikov.
Drag escaped with a lucky draw in round 1 v Marshall who was 2 pawns up. He then lost to Alex Posazhennikov before being gifted a queen by Marian in round 3 and finished on 2.5 points.
Marian lost his 3 games (bye in round 4) but the first loss was to a 2200 player.
Marshall also ended up on 1 point after facing stronger opponents.
The Blitz, with the highest entry of 32 players, was an exciting event. After 4 rounds Ewan Fewell was on 4 points. Half a point behind were Matthew Inglis and Mike, who had beaten an IM in round 3 (OK, the IM got his title in 1987 and is 70 years old but is still a strong player). 6 players were on 3 points including Drag who had lost to Matthew in round 1 and then was extremely lucky in round 2 to swindle a back rank mate against Marshall who was a rook ahead at the time.
In round 5 Mike beat Ewan and Matthew also won. Drag was winning but messed up and never recovered, losing his final two games as well. In round 6 Mike drew with Matthew allowing Ewan and Volodymyr Mylovanov (who had drawn with Mike in round 3) to catch up on 5 points.
In the final round Mike and Volodymyr won their games and Matthew beat Ewan, meaning Mike ended up joint 1st on 6 points. Congratulations Mike!
Marian scored 3.5 points and Marshall got 1.5 points in his first ever Blitz event.
It’s good to have another local event to complement the Nottingham Congress and Rapidplay.
The next one will probably be in September or October.