Well gentle reader. I have just arrived in Dundee for the start of the 150th Anniversary tournament which is running alongside the Scottish this year. 2 extra days of work :(
It has been a pretty hard week already. Saturday I came back from Ireland, Tuesday at zero dark hundred I flew down to London, yesterday I flew back getting in just before midnight.
I think it is fair to say my motivation levels are at an all time low this year.
Tonight the players, organisers and officials have gone out for a meal. I decided early on to avoid it. Couple of reasons for it. Firstly I hate mass meals like that and secondly, I am out on my feet. Still have several hours of stuff to do for the Scottish this year so decided the slack time would be a good time to catch up.
As usual I will run a blog with my usual ill judged sense of humour :D
Day 0 of the Championships (Day 1 of the APA)
OMG I am so nervous. We are using the wireless boards, the first time since I finally worked out what was wrong with them. Typically it is a prestigious tournament we are using them on...
Fingers, toes, arms, you name it are crossed as I hope and pray that the fix a) works and b)holds.
What was I worrying about??? Apart from a battery pack that discharged too quickly, there were no issues at all!
So today was the first day of the APA. It sees GMs and a couple of IMs from far flung places such as Greece and Lithuania take on the cream of Scotland. We have the current champion Keti, Andrew, Colin and Craig as the pride of Scotland, taking on the rest of the world in the shape of Keith Arkell, Pia Cramling, Spyridon Kapnisis, Martin Petr, Eduardas Rozentalis and Simon Williams.
Incidentally this will also be my final IA norm so I will have to behave myself, honest gov!
Play today took place in the Hilton Hotel in the middle of Dundee. I have to say the room was very nice. Will find out tomorrow what the playing hall is like. Going to be a busy day, we kick off with the Blitz Championships and then launch headlong into the championships proper! It is going to be a long, hard 10 days for Alex and me!
You did a good if not great job. Also I did think of saving you some of the buffet but it was to nice to keep.Howard Wood
ReplyDeleteYou do great work the lot of you.
ReplyDeletetoo tired after playing in Macedonia at the Olympiad for the Blind
Stephen Hilton
At last the chess Scotland website has a facelift bringing it from the early art deco epoch of the 1930's into the 21st century.
ReplyDeleteWhile one appreciates the tremendous effort to organise this tournament we are still admittedly a chess backwater. Imagine a live stream with chess commentary. All it takes is a google account and a webcam and some VOIP headgear. Imagine interviews with the players post game giving their insights into what transpired during the game. Imagine real time feeds to sites like chessbomb with computer assisted analysis for engine junkies to troll each other over 0.8 of a pawn advantage. Imagine being able to download pgn's flawlessly and effortlessly of all the games and playing over them to marvel at the subtleties. I'm tripping out here my friends, reel me in and let reality set it. We should be thankful that we can follow any of the games online at all.
wow IM Greet is rockin the 150
ReplyDelete