Results of the second Club online Tournament 26th May
We held our second online chess club Tournament last night, Tuesday 26th May, on lichess.org. Eleven of us played. I Hope you all enjoyed the Tournament.
Congratulations to Carouselman (Don) who came 1st.
Well done to WillHeSac (Graham)who came second, and CFCC-Phil (Phil Overton)who came third.
Over various playing sessions I played 50 games in all (24 on the 23rd, 26 on the next day). Of those, I won 12, drew one – and lost 37, coming 210th out of 459 players…
Just a reminder that there is an online tournament tomorrow evening Tuesday 26th May, at 8pm. It is on lichess.org, for members of the Chandlers Ford Chess Club. The event is an Arena format, as many games as can fit into the hour. Time control is ten minutes per player each game.
A roundup of what’s happening in the next few days – and what’s not.
What’s not. The weekly Play Chess for the NHS event on chess.com isn’t happening now. They ran 4 events in all.
What is:
The Checkmate Covid-19 marathon in aid of the British Red Cross
There will be a charity chess event starting tomorrow for 24 hours Saturday 23rd May on chess.com: The English Chess Federation is holding a 24 hour chess marathon in aid of the Red Cross, from 5pm Saturday to 5pm Sunday. The games are 5 minutes per player. Here’s the announcement on chess.com:
Please help to make this event a great success by being part of the tournament. The more players the better. Entry is free, but if you donate over £5 you are eligible to win one of the numerous prizes. Join the tournament, and who knows, you might get paired against the likes of participants like GM Michael Adams, GM Gawain Jones, GM Matthew Sadler or GM Simon Williams!
What is it? A 24-hour chess marathon of 5 minute a side games. All funds raised go to the British Red Cross and their work fighting the effects of the coronavirus.
When? It starts at 5pm (UK time) on Saturday 23rd May.
Who can play? Anyone who is a member of chess.com and the Club https://www.chess.com/club/english-chess-federation is welcome to play. The Club is open to all (you do not need to be a member of the ECF). Please join. The more players the merrier. You can play as many or as few games as you like over the course of the 24 hours.
You do not have to donate (although it would be very much appreciated). Note: to win one of the prizes you need to have donated at least £5. The ‘physical’ prizes, for example, signed books, are only open to those with UK addresses.
How can I donate? Everyone can donate at https://tiltify.com/+chess-v-covid-19/checkmate-covid19. Please note that if you are playing in the tournament and donating we prefer that you donate via the registration form mentioned above so that we can easily match your chess.com username so that you are eligible for prizes.
Chandlers Ford Chess Club Tournament Tuesday 26th May
Over on lichess.org there is our own club tournament on Tuesday evening, 26th May. Like last Tuesday, this will run for one hour 8-9pm, games ten minutes per player per game in an Arena format.
How to join the Chandlers Ford Chess Club Tournament
Register on lichess.org if you haven’t yet joined lichess.
The first Chandlers Ford Chess Club online tournament was held last night, Tuesday 19th May, on lichess.org. Thanks to everyone who took part.
The format was an ‘Arena’ tournament in which players are paired automatically, and lasted an hour. The time control was ten minutes per player per game (Rapid play).
Ten players participated in this first tournament – a very encouraging level of participation.
Congratulations to Phil Overton on winning the tournament! Well done too, to Sam Murphy at 2nd place, and Rob Sims 3rd.
Players seemed to enjoy the tournament, so a new one has been set up for next week, 8pm Tuesday 26th: Arena 26th May. See you there!
Just a reminder that there is an online tournament tomorrow evening Tuesday 19th May, at 8pm. It is on lichess.org, for members of the Chandlers Ford Chess Club. The event is an Arena format, as many games as can fit into the hour. Time control is ten minutes per player each game.
Malcolm Clarke’s hopes for chess online – at club and county, in his latest press article.
Despite the lockdown Chandlers Ford chess club still hopes to run it’s popular summer tournament again this year, with the most likely scenario being that the majority of games will be played online and several players have expressed an interest in playing.
The number of online chess events continues to grow and the English Chess Federation is trying to introduce an online county championship. It is early days yet, but Hampshire is already making enquiries even if there is no compulsion to enter and it could provide opportunities for those who never played county chess over the board to represent the county.
The Tournament is set for next Tuesday, 19th May 2020, at 8pm, and will run for one hour. Games will be ten minutes for each player, with no additional increment. Once your game ends you get paired again, and so on until the hour is up. It is available for Chandlers Ford Chess Club lichess team members, so if you’d like to play, register on lichess, then join the Chandlers Ford Chess Club ‘team’ . Then on Tuesday join the fun at Chandlers Ford Arena tournament!
The winner will be announced on this website and on our Facebook Group. No prizes I’m afraid…
Last week I played in the Play Chess for the NHS charity tournament on chess.com. Two players from our club entered, myself and Maha. And Maha won last week!
The time control is Blitz– 10 minutes per player per game in a one-hour event, so you’d expect up to 3 games in that time. This could be more if your games are completed in shorter time: there are no rounds, so you get paired after each game, with as many games as you can fit in one hour.
The organisers have a Just Giving page (Mike Hill, fundraising for NHS Together) for voluntary donations of any amount. A good cause! I will be playing again tomorrow, 9th May: the events are each Saturday 2pm for one hour, on chess.com.
Charity fund-raising online chess tournament on Saturdays 2pm.
While social distancing is making over the board chess difficult to arrange a national chess initiative is being set up by keen chess player Jon Hill and his brother and coordinated by Joanne Ferry which it is hoped will raise £10000 for the NHS.
They will be hosting weekly tournaments every Saturday at 2pm on chess.com and are encouraging those who take part to donate to their Just Giving page ahead of playing.
They are encouraging everyone to donate as much or as little as they can, even £1 to join in, and won’t be checking each players donation as they understand money is an issue for many at this difficult time. They will trust that everyone who joins in will have given what they can, and will continue to encourage playing chess as a means to keep our players occupied and safe at home during lockdown.
Chess.com’s app is currently under construction and so they ask that players use a mobile browser or laptop to play so they don’t encounter any issues. The tournaments will be an Arena style with a time limit of 1 hour with 10 minutes blitz standard chess games. It should be great fun as everyone gets to play different players from around the world as many times as they want to, within the hour. Their points are calculated at the end and the winners are announced.
The top 3 winners will receive an online trophy next to their username on chess.com. Also, the top ten winners of every tournament will be published on their Facebook page.
The English Chess Federation grading database gives two types of Grades: your Standard grade and your Rapid-play grade. What are the differences between these types of game? And what are Blitz and Bullet games? We take a minute to look into the different types of chess game.
Standard and Rapid are just two of several types of chess game duration. There are also Blitz and Bullet. Time duration is usually defined as the amount of time each player gets to complete the game, and can be formed of a base set amount of time plus an option for extra time added with each move made – called an increment (such as 5 seconds per move and so on). Online you might see a time control described as a number followed by a + another number – for example 5+3: it will be the base amount of time in minutes + number in seconds for the increment: 5 minutes plus 3 seconds per move in this example (for a Blitz game).
Another type of time control can also be set on the time for each move.
Standard
Standard: chess clocks at 90 minutes each
Standard chess games are defined by the international Chess body FIDE as being chess games where each player’s thinking time is at least 60 minutes.
There are various ways Tournaments and Leagues determine their time-control: this could be one fixed time of say 90 minutes for all moves each, or to have a time-control for a certain number of moves followed by a fixed ‘quick play finish’ (QPF) to complete all remaining moves (example: 36 moves in an hour and 15 minutes, followed by 15 minutes each QPF to complete all remaining moves). Another method is to have a fixed element plus increment: each player has a basic amount of time, but every move they make gains extra time on the clock, say 5 seconds a move; digital clocks are necessary for this.
For our League games (certainly in the lower Divisions) and our own tournaments we favour a fixed all-moves time control of 90 minutes each (i.e. without adding increments). The digital clocks count down, and analogue clocks, where used, are set at half-past four, flag falls (time’s up) at 6 o’clock. Whoever’s flag falls first loses the game – they’ve “lost on time”.
Rapid-play
Rapid-play is defined as being a game where players’ thinking time is more than ten minutes but less than 60. Some tournaments now have games where the players have 25 minutes each to start with, with an increment of say 5 seconds a move: these games do not usually go beyond one hour in all.
Rapid-play: chess clocks set for 30 minutes each
Blitz
chess clocks set for 10 minutes each (Blitz)
Blitz is where all moves are played in 10 minutes or less each per player. If a game time is under 3 minutes, that is defined as Bullet.
Bullet
Bullet chess: less than 3 minutes
Bullet games are under 3 minutes for each player. Playing this type online would avoid the inevitable knocking-over of pieces in a frantic live face-to-face game..
Castle Chesshttp://www.castlechess.co.uk/ their time control is of Standard type of length, 36 moves in 90 minutes plus 15 QPF to finish.
Southend Easter Congress (cancelled for 2020…) http://southendchesscongress.org.uk/ Another example of a Standard play tournament: 90 minutes per player per game PLUS 30 seconds per move.
Docklands Rapid-playhttp://www.spanglefish.com/docklandschessclub/ An example of Rapidplay, time control at their regular tournaments in Poplar is 25 minutes plus 5 seconds per move (i.e. about an hour a game in all).
Golders Green FIDE Rapidplayhttp://goldersgreenchess.blogspot.com/ also have a time control of 25 minutes per player plus 5 seconds per move increment. Interestingly they seem to be running online tournaments whilst the Covid-19 Coronavirus health crisis continues, using Lichess.org as hosts (join team Chess-England).
Lichess.orgArenas (tournaments) for Blitz as well as other types – bullet, Rapid etc.
Chess.com online chess website: players can select the time limits for their games.
