Scottish Championship 2016 - Day 6 - When will I learn?

We have a maxim in Engineering.  If it aint broke, don't fix it.  Wise words indeed.  Last couple of days we have had 13 stable boards.  13 is my lucky number so I should have stayed there.  No I wanted to try and get another on to give us 14.  I arrived early and wired up another board.  After an hour of testing, it was working fine.  Play starts and the wired boards kept switching themselves off.  I have spend all day keeping a close eye on the boards because of this!

Today was the penultimate game of the 7 day event.  I don't think I am being unkind when I say that the event has been dominated by 2 players.  Leading on 5.5 we have George Murphy and closely following is James Watson.

By this time tomorrow we will know which of these fine Gentlemen will win the 7 day event.

In the Open, the joint leaders face each other on the top Board.  Keti and Colin will be battling it out to try and remain ahead of the chasing pack.

In the chasing pack is one of our Juniors.  It does not seem that long ago that Declan was winning the primary individual.

Rating performance of 2240, facing his second GM and on a very creditable 4.5/6.  A very excellent performance from Declan to date

To be honest we have had some really good performances in the first 5 rounds from our juniors.  Lukah (3/6) has a 2000 performance rating, and there are several on 2.5/6 with 18-1900 performances.  It is really good to see them doing well in the Scottish.

I was alerted to one of those strange and curious things that can happen.  I have to confess to doing this myself in a league game to the bemusement of the opposition.

The following position arose

White has 2 sensible options Kb1 (+8.65 on the very basic engine I just downloaded) or Kd2 (+4.31).  Incredibly white took the third option and resigned.  Like I mentioned, I did something very similar years ago and was kicking myself for ages after.  Definitely a sore one!

If you have been looking at the photos, you will notice there is a very cheery chap each day, Steven Brown

There is a story behind this.  Apparently he got a hard time for not smiling when I took the picture on Saturday...

When he did it on Sunday, I could hardly hold the camera for laughing :D  The look up and smile has been one of the highlights of the day so I have tried to catch him unawares.  Got him today (and I hope he does not get into trouble for it)

Tomorrow sees the day we dread.  the start of the Weekender meaning we don't get to leave until after 11pm.  I will try to get a blog out but chances are it will be Saturday before I do!