Category: Crewe’s Congress Crew

Another great weekend at one of our annual congresses

We had 8 players across across the 5 sections.

In the Open section we had the regular congress Crew Carmel, Harry and Simon.

Dave L in the Major

Jamie in the Inter

Dave P in the Minor section and Dave R, Jack and Mal all in the Standard section

Our top player for the weekend Jamie Roberts his starting rank was 17 and ended joint first on 4.5/5 Well done Jamie

Just to add a few more stats to this weekend’s adventure in Blackpool for our regular Congress Gang.

Dave P of course managed to miscount our number of players – despite naming all 9 of them (he says there was 8 LOL).

There were 375 entrants to the congress and only one out of the 375 managed to score 5 out of 5 – and unsurprisingly this was in the lowest section (The Standard).

As Dave P says we had players in all five sections, with the standout being Jamie Roberts who illuminated Blackpool’s prestigious congress by winning the Intermediate Section (U1850) with a superb score of 4.5/5, defeating the only Intermdiate player to have 100% going into Round 5. Jamie’s performance rating for the weekend shows as 2110 on the Chess Results server, worthy of any player in the Open Section.

Our three players in the Open all scored well in a firecely competitive section, and finished 2 or 3 places above their starting ranks in all cases ! Carmel scored 2.5 rating 2119, Harry 2pts/2111 and simon 1.5pts/1869.

In the Standard section I would like to make a special mention of young Jack Patullo who scored 2 pts ranked at number 72, but finishing 13 places higher in his first senior congress – well done Jack – in playing such a massive congress. The last mention goes to Dave Roberts, who enjoyed the benefit of playing Mr D Fault in round 5 and was able to watch son Jamie battle his way to collect 1st prize.

Full congress results and some pgn games from the Open section

The Motley Crewe just before our last game

12 Crewe players descended on the annual rapidpaly congress at Stockport this weekend.

We had an impressive 5 players in the open and by the end of round 3, Harry managed to beat Carmel’s nemesis Mike Surtees. leaving Harry on 2.5/3, Carmel on 2/3, Kamil on 1.5/3 and Simon and Dave L both on 1/3.

Our only player in the Major Jamie Roberts was on an impressive 2.5/3

All 3 players in the Inter Doug, Dave P and Tommy were all on 2/3

In the Minor section Mal was on 2/3 with Matthew on 1/3

By the end of round 6 our best score in the Open came from Carmel with an excellent 4.5 placing her 3rd.

Harry and Simon had a very respectful 3.5/6 and Dave L and Kamil finished on 2/6

Jamie had a very tough 3 rounds after lunch remaining on 2.5/6

In the Inter Tommy did the team proud with a impressive 4/6 and Dave and Doug finished on 3/6

Mal and Matthew both ended on 3/3

Full tournament details

The Motley Crewe

Yes I can count 11 players in the photo and the 12th player was our cheerleader and our photographer(Dave Roberts).

We did had a 13th Crewe player a Renegade player who hopefully we will see back at the club soon.

The weekend was, of course, time for the fabulous Shropshire Chess Congress. You know all about this one, it is held in a great venue in Telford. The playing area is comfortable and spacious. There is loads of free parking. Whenever I go anywhere with my beloved, we have a saying; “it’s all about the food”; well the cafe in the venue was as good as always. I had the veg curry, which came with chips, rice, and yes, some nan too. You may like to know that fried breakfasts were also being offered by the cheerful staff. Anyway, I will stop drifting off into a food reverie, and I should mention that some chess was played. I was pleased to see a new member joined the Crewe CC Tourist Club; Simon Humphries played his first ever weekend congress. He played well and was our top scorer, getting 3.5 in the minor. Simon is one of our newer members, and looks liked he is getting hooked like the rest of us. Harry drew with the top rated player in the open in round one. I got to the live boards in the major in the last round ( hope they delete the game from t’internet soon). Jamie got annoyed, though it was hard to tell, with his first round loss, and bounced back with a couple of wins. I will not forget, for a bit, Harry jumping about like a cat on a hot tin roof, while trying to watch Carmel losing, then winning, then drawing a blitz finish against an FM. It was a great weekend; you should come next year.

Some of the gang are pictured below.