Hamilton Chess Club

The first Fischer Random Chess tourney was held in Yugoslavia in the spring of 1996, and was won by Grandmaster Peter Leko.

In 2001, Leko became the first Fischer Random Chess world champion, defeating Grandmaster Michael Adams in an eight game match played as part of the Mainz Chess Classic. There were no qualifying matches (also true of the first orthodox world chess champion titleholders), but both players were in the top five in the January 2001 world rankings for orthodox chess. Leko was chosen because of the many novelties he has introduced to known chess theories, as well as his previous tourney win; in addition, Leko has played Fischer Random Chess games with Fischer himself. Adams was chosen because he was the world number one in blitz (rapid) chess and is regarded as an extremely strong player in unfamiliar positions. The match was won by a narrow margin, 4.5 to 3.5.

In 2002 at Mainz, an open Fischer Random tournament was held which attracted 131 players. Peter Svidler won the event.

Other interesting events happened in 2002. The website ChessVariants.com selected Fischer Random chess as its “Recognized Variant of the Month” for April 2002. Yugoslavian Grandmaster Svetozar Gligoric published in 2002 the book Shall We Play Fischerandom Chess?, popularizing this variation further.

At the 2003 Mainz Chess Classic, Svidler beat Leko in an eight game match for the World Championship title by a score of 4.5 – 3.5

Opening preparation will go out the window next week with a  little light hearted fun  in the form of  Fischer Random mini tournament.  The games were will be played at 15 + 0.  The starting positions might look something like the diagrams at left, or a similar diabolical arrangement. Dont miss out. Guests also welcome to join in. The tournament will run over 2 weeks. See you there. Fischer random games are not eligible for club ratings

Club ratings and club ladder have been updated, as have the graphs of club ratings.

Next week we will start the Winter Cup. Please if you want to be in, make a commitment to be there for both nights.  The time control will be 20+0, 3 games per night, over 2 nights. We will have two solid hours of chess, so kick off will be as soon as the draw is done. Dont be late.

Prashant and Milton both ended up with 5.0 out of 6. Prashant takes the title of Club Rapid Champ 2016 based on tiebreak score. Sivaram is club Rapid Champ (Junior). Final cross tables below.

Ratings and ladder have been updated. Note that for ratings purposes all games in a multiweek tournament are deemed to happen on day 1 of the tournament, thus the games in the Rapid are deemed to have occurred on 21/6/16 (ie. before the Waikato Open, even though rounds 5 & 6 are actually after the Open)

Currently Hilton is in the lead, but the outcome of the rapid is still up in the air as four players can potentially come out on top. The draw for round six is below if everyone turns up. Let me know if you cant make it. (No half point byes in the final round, so you would be deemed a zero point bye.)

We have had two bye notifications for tomorrow night so the revised round 5 draw is: