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The Tortoise and the Hare. Two takers for the 2024 Trophy.
The 2024 Luton chess club championship began in July 2023, with a format that was determined by a number of limiting factors:
1. The chess club was restarting after the COVID pandemic lockdown with new and existing players coming to the University of Bedfordshire to play over the board chess. Nobody at this stage knew the true playing strength of anyone else. The only fair means to find out was an all play all tournament, allowing any club member to play another over two ECF rated match games.
2. The chess equipment available at the beginning of the tournament were legacy mechanical clocks from the chess club of years ago, without incremental timers. The time available to play chess matches was limited by the 10 pm closing time of the University Library. This meant the most practical time control for the tournament had to be 1 hour for all moves, each player, and all moves to be recorded until the final 5 minutes.
3. From July 2023 to June 2024, the club membership increased in size, with newcomers to over-the-board chess, juniors as well as experienced and strong players. The club championship would therefore be an open event for any Luton club member with an ECF membership to enter at any time to gain practice and skill at serious chess.
At the beginning of the tournament, in the summer and autumn, a leader soon emerged to be in a class of his own, newcomer to Luton; Tommy O'Brien. Unfortunately, the 12 month length of the tournament was not everybodys liking, and some of the strongest players in the club, Tommy O'Brien, Marek Gladysz, Michael Joseph and Octavian Arsenie dropped out of the tournament to concentrate on league matches.
The next phase of the tournament heading towards winter, and the new year, another newcomer to the club arrived to stun us all and move up the rankings; Julian Hudson. By this time, the University of Bedfordshire had generously funded the purchase of new chess equipment for students, including digital clocks. It was too late the change the time control of the tournament, but players could manage their time trouble a little better now.
Into Spring and Julian Hudson raced ahead like a hare, winning all of his games to emerge on top of the tournament, until another newcomer to the club emerged, Peter Daly who managed to snatch a single win, blighting Julian's hitherto unblemished record at the club. Slowly, but surely, log time club stalwart Samir Vora moved into second place.
And finally, into summer and June for the last matches. By this time, Julian, exhausted by work, was not available to play any further matches in the tournamanent and Samir, like the tortoise in Aesop's Fables, won his remaining matches to close the gap. The final result was Julian Hudson and Samir Vora in joint top place on 12 points each, with Dixon Jones reaching an impressive third place on 8 points.
The full results can be found below:
Luton Chess Club Champioship 2024 final standings
Congratulations to Julian and Samir on winning this mammoth tournament, and whose names are jointly on the trophy (see picture). And well done to all those who took part.
The next club championship will be a different format, probably a Swiss over longer time controls.
One final note. The Trophy was to be presented by Sarah Arkle, Director of the Library where the chess club meets every Tuesday. Sarah Arkle has generously allowed the chess club to meet at the ground floor library, given the club storage cabinet for equipment and supported students at the university to play chess. Sadly, Sarah was not well enough to present the trophy this month in July and the club has decided to wait for her recovery and celebrate together. I'm sure I speak for everyone in the club, in wishing Sarah the very best and we look forward to seeing you back at the university.