Sheffield & District Chess Association

Established 1883

 

I<< HOME

Notices

 

 

12/03/2023

Sheffield Congress 2023

 

Plans are afoot to revive the Sheffield Chess Congress.  The previous series ran from 2011 to 2017.

 

The intention is to run

a 2-day weekend event   

with 3 rounds on the Saturday

with 2 rounds on the Sunday   

 

with 4 sections as follows:

Section

Rating Limit

Open

none

Major

Under 1900 rating

Intermediate

Under 1600 rating

Minor

Under 1300 rating

 

and a time limit of 75 minutes for the game with 10-second increments from the start.

 

The venue is confirmed as King Edward VII School as used from 2012 to 2017.

 

There is a preferred date in November,

but whether that is feasible depends on whether the 4NCL picks that date for its 2023-24 season.

 

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

 

The idea was hatched by a group of members of the Woodseats Chess Club who were returning from playing in the Doncaster Congress in February 2023.

 

Efforts were made by Bill Ward to rustle up engagement from others in the Sheffield chess community with the result that a meeting took place on Saturday 11th March 2023 at Bill’s home.  Snow meant that for a while the meeting was variously to be face-to-face or by Zoom, or both, or neither with postponement to some later date.  However, it happened.

 

Those attending the meeting were Bill Ward, Connor Fairfield, Phil Beckett (linked in by Zoom), Jonathan Arnott, Peter Ackley, Geoff Brown and Steve Mann.

 

Bill’s contribution to the overall exercise will be mainly limited to providing a venue for meetings along with attendant tea, coffee and biscuits.

 

Connor is the self-appointed primary pre-event worker, exploring the avenues, and setting up the arrangements.

 

All subject to the date not clashing with pre-existing commitments, Phill, Jonathan, Peter and Jim Burnett (not at the meeting) have all expressed a willingness to act as controllers/arbiters at the event.  Phill is a level 2 ECF arbiter, Jonathan is a level 1 ECF Arbiter, and it seems Peter is due to be added to the list at level 1 and is working to get to level 2.  Jim has been chief controller at Doncaster for a long time and has acted as a controller at Sheffield in the past, and he is likely to have qualified at Level 1 by the time of the event.

 

Geoff seems to have agreed to act as entries secretary.

 

Steve Mann is doing the website.   (http://mannchess.org.uk/SheffCong.htm)

 

Once date has been fixed the event can be added to the ECF Calendar (to “reserve” the day).  Costing can then be done, and entry fees and prizes can be determined.  After further minor details have been finalised, the event can be advertised fully, via entry forms, websites and whatever other methods.

 

Then you can send in your entry!