
A record-breaking number of over 1000 players are taking part in the 2013
British Championships, attracted by a combination of the beautiful venue
and the fact that it’s the 100th in a series stretching right back
to 1904. This year it is taking place in the Riviera International Centre
in Torquay. There are 23 different sections at the 2013 British Championships,
catering for all ages and abilities, but the main focus of interest is on
the Championship itself. There are 106 players taking part, of whom 33 are
titled players, including thirteen grandmasters. The Championship runs from
29th July to 10th August 2013.
Selection of games from round four
Select games from the dropdown menu above the board
We
provided you with pictures and standings in our previous report.
British Champions & Their Games - No. 4
1929 - Ramsgate
The British Championship has accommodated players of all stripes, each
with their own back-story, but none as unusual as that of Mir Sultan Khan.
He was first discovered in 1926 by Sir Umat Hayat Khan, in a Punjabi village
playing the Indian form of the game, and took him under his wing. He was
taught the international rules and conventions by a number of tutors, In
the Spring of 1929 he was brought to the UK and was accepted for the British
Championship on the strength of being Indian Champion, but apart from that,
being a complete unknown. Sultan Khan’s short preparation was not
helped by being illiterate, unable to speak English and suffering from malaria
and chronic throat infections.

Indian chess phenomenon Mir Sultan Khan
His
campaign started with a loss to the 60-year-old Rev. Hamond, but he went
on to win by a clear point to the amazement of many. It was no fluke as
he won again in 1932 (London) and 1933 (Hastings). His slow positional style
he inherited from his grounding in the Indian rules, and his lack of book
knowledge often led to hair-raising positions that spectators could scarcely
fathom. It was his utter concentration and fierce will to win that carried
him though.
At the end of that year, his protégé and his entourage had
to return to India, where Sultan Khan was hailed as a hero, but he had had
enough of chess and promptly gave it up, even refusing to teach his own
son, saying he should do something better. His protégé gave
him a smallholding that he farmed happily for the rest of his life, mostly
sitting under a tree smoking his hookah. He died in 1966. His biography
was written by R. N. Coles, who knew him as well as any Englishman.
Gerald Abrahams (right) marked a sharp contrast with
his opponent here in this Round 3 game, being an erudite, witty Liverpudlian
barrister and author of numerous books on chess, law and philosophy.

[Event "British Championship"] [Site "?"] [Date "1929.07.20"] [Round
"?"] [White "Sultan Khan, Mir"] [Black "Abrahams, G. ."] [Result "1-0"]
[ECO "C01"] [Annotator "Jones,Bob"] [PlyCount "73"] [EventDate "2013.07.15"]
[SourceDate "2013.07.17"] 1. e4 e6 2. Nf3 d5 3. exd5 exd5 4. d4 Nf6 5.
Bd3 Bd6 6. O-O Nc6 7. Re1+ Ne7 8. Bg5 Be6 9. Nc3 c6 10. Ne2 Qc7 11. Ng3
O-O-O ({Black is already in difficulties } 11... O-O {is dangerous on
account of} 12. Bxf6 {and the text must inevitably appeal to an aggressive
player like Abrahams. Yet White soon shows that the king is equally in
danger on the Q-side.}) 12. c3 h6 13. Bd2 h5 14. Bg5 Bg4 15. h3 h4 16.
Nf1 Bh5 17. b4 Nfg8 18. Bxe7 Nxe7 19. Ne3 Qd7 20. b5 Rdg8 21. bxc6 Qxc6
22. c4 Qd7 23. cxd5 Kb8 24. Rb1 g5 25. Bb5 Qc7 26. Qa4 g4 { Diagram [#]
Black realises it is now or never. If he delays a move in order to protect
his king, his own attack can never get started.} ({e.g.} 26... Ka8 27.
Rec1 Qd8 28. Bd7 g4 29. Nc4 Bc7 30. d6 gxf3 31. dxc7 Rxg2+ 32. Kh1 Qxc7
33. Nb6+) 27. Rec1 Qd8 28. hxg4 Bg6 (28... Bxg4 {fails after} 29. Nxg4
Rxg4 30. Bd7 Rg7 31. Rxb7+ Kxb7 32. Rb1+ Ka8 (32... Kc7 $4 33. Qxa7#)
33. Bc6+ Nxc6 34. Qxc6#) 29. Rb3 h3 30. Bc6 b6 31. Nc4 Nxc6 {Diagram [#]}
32. Qxc6 ({White was threatening} 32. Rxb6+ axb6 33. Qa8+) 32... hxg2
33. Nxd6 ({Godd enough, but quicker was} 33. Nxb6) 33... Qe7 34. Re3 Rh1+
35. Kxg2 Rxc1 36. Rxe7 Rxc6 37. dxc6 {c7+ is fatal.} 1-0
Round five (Friday, 02 August 2013)

These were the top pairings and results. Leaders
Stephen Gorden (above left) and David Howell, who both had perfect 4.0/4
scores, played a 19-move draw against each other.
No |
White |
Rating
|
Black |
Rating
|
Result
|
1 |
GM
Gordon, Stephen J |
2521
|
GM
Howell, David W L |
2639
|
½-½
|
2 |
GM
Hebden, Mark L |
2555
|
IM
Ghasi, Ameet K |
2459
|
1-0
|
3 |
GM
Wells, Peter K |
2479
|
GM
Kosten, Anthony C. |
2458
|
1-0
|
4 |
IM
Hawkins, Jonathan |
2517
|
FM
Eggleston, David J |
2363
|
1-0
|
5 |
IM
Fernandez, Daniel |
2346
|
GM
Gormally, Daniel W |
2496
|
1-0
|
6 |
GM
Lalic, Bogdan |
2489
|
FM
Chapman, Terry P D |
2308
|
1-0
|
7 |
IM
Rudd, Jack |
2280
|
GM
Williams, Simon K |
2481
|
0-1
|
8 |
IM
Zhou, Yang-Fan |
2469
|
IM
Kolbus, Dietmar |
2288
|
½-½
|
9 |
IM
Lane, Gary W. |
2401
|
Mackle, Dominic |
2216
|
0-1
|
10 |
IM
Bates, Richard A |
2375
|
Weaving, Richard |
2196
|
½-½
|
11 |
GM
Jones, Gawain C B |
2643
|
Mason, Donald J |
2204
|
1-0
|
12 |
Harvey, Marcus R |
2202
|
IM
Palliser, Richard J D |
2453
|
0-1
|
13 |
Anderson, John |
2189
|
GM
Arkell, Keith C |
2444
|
0-1
|
14 |
GM
Ward, Chris G |
2432
|
Yeo, Michael J |
2170
|
1-0
|
15 |
Murphy, Hugh W |
2170
|
IM
Knott, Simon J B |
2318
|
0-1
|

GM Mark Hebden re-joins the leaders after beating
IM Ameet Ghasi

GM Peter Wells joined the leading pack after
beating GM Tony Kosten
Photos provided by Brendan O'Gorman and Keverel
Chess
Selection of games from round five
Select games from the dropdown menu above the board
Top rankings after round five
Rnk |
Name |
Score
|
Rating
|
TPR |
W-We |
1 |
GM
Howell, David W L |
4.5
|
2639
|
2754 |
+0.53 |
2 |
GM
Hebden, Mark L |
4.5
|
2555
|
2678 |
+0.60 |
3 |
GM
Gordon, Stephen J |
4.5
|
2521
|
2714 |
+1.00 |
4 |
GM
Wells, Peter K |
4.5
|
2479
|
2610 |
+0.61 |
5 |
IM
Hawkins, Jonathan |
4.0
|
2517
|
2494 |
-0.07 |
6 |
GM
Lalic, Bogdan |
4.0
|
2489
|
2461 |
-0.10 |
7 |
GM
Williams, Simon K |
4.0
|
2481
|
2469 |
-0.01 |
8 |
IM
Fernandez, Daniel |
4.0
|
2346
|
2574 |
+1.48 |
9 |
Mackle, Dominic |
4.0
|
2216
|
2480 |
+1.61 |
10 |
GM
Jones, Gawain C B |
3.5
|
2643
|
2412 |
-1.04 |
11 |
IM
Zhou, Yang-Fan |
3.5
|
2469
|
2457 |
+0.04 |
12 |
IM
Ghasi, Ameet K |
3.5
|
2459
|
2429 |
-0.06 |
13 |
GM
Kosten, Anthony C. |
3.5
|
2458
|
2421 |
-0.04 |
14 |
IM
Palliser, Richard J D |
3.5
|
2453
|
2421 |
+0.01 |
15 |
GM
Arkell, Keith C |
3.5
|
2444
|
2364 |
-0.36 |
16 |
GM
Ward, Chris G |
3.5
|
2432
|
2411 |
+0.01 |
17 |
IM
Bates, Richard A |
3.5
|
2375
|
2260 |
-0.59 |
18 |
IM
Knott, Simon J B |
3.5
|
2318
|
2294 |
-0.02 |
19 |
IM
Kolbus, Dietmar |
3.5
|
2288
|
2497 |
+1.37 |
20 |
Osborne, Marcus E |
3.5
|
2269
|
2359 |
+0.64 |
21 |
Weaving, Richard |
3.5
|
2196
|
2403 |
+1.34 |
To really appreciate how far the event has come in its 100 years, one needs
to take the opportunity to look back at some of the milestones on the way
– the great characters, the champions and their games. To do this,
IM Andrew Martin is
using his computer skills to pick out some key games from the past and run
his expert eye over them. Similarly, Bob Jones, local chess history writer,
is compiling a set of ten pages, each on a past champion and one of his/her
games. These will appear, one at a time, in the daily championship bulletins.
Here is the first of them.
British Champions & Their Games - No. 3
1938 – Brighton.

Conel Hugh O’Donel Alexander was one of the most
charismatic players of his time, full of a positive nervous energy that
galvanised all who came into contact with him. The war imposed a seven-year
break in what would have been his prime years as a player, but his work
at Bletchley Park in charge of Hut 8 was invaluable. His post-war chess
career is well documented; player, columnist, author, administrator, all
alongside his day job at GCHQ in Cheltenham.
He
became champion again in 1956 (Blackpool), but soon after he retired from
tournament play, as he felt he wasn’t doing himself justice at the
board, and his other roles took over. He died in 1975 and his posthumous
biography was a joint work by Milner-Barry, Golombek and Hartston.
Harold Vincent Mallison (right) had been at Cambridge
with Lionel Penrose and worked his whole life as Maths lecturer at Exeter
University. Between the wars he dominated Devon chess together with A. R.
B. Thomas and Ron Bruce. More details on his life may be found Keverelchess.
In January 1938 Alexander had shown at Hastings that he was the equal of
anyone, coming second with Keres ahead of Fine and Flohr, and was on top
form at Brighton, coming a half point clear of Golombek and Sergeant. He
hit the ground running with this Round one game against Mallison.

[Event "British Championship"] [Site "?"] [Date "1938.07.20"] [Round
"?"] [White "Alexander"] [Black "Mallison, H. V.."] [Result "1-0"] [ECO
"C42"] [Annotator "Mallison,HV"] [PlyCount "77"] [EventDate "2013.07.15"]
[SourceDate "2013.07.17"] 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nf6 3. Nxe5 d6 4. Nf3 Nxe4 5.
d4 d5 6. Bd3 Bd6 7. O-O Bg4 8. c4 O-O 9. cxd5 f5 10. h3 Bh5 11. Nc3 Nd7
12. Nxe4 fxe4 13. Bxe4 Nf6 14. Bf5 Kh8 { According to Alexander, who had
analyzed it, this variation, Marshall's Attack, is unsound and White has
a sufficient defence. This has since been accepted as standard.} 15. g4
Nxd5 ({If} 15... Bf7 16. Be6 Nxd5 17. Ng5 {leading to the variation played.})
16. Be6 Bf7 ({If} 16... Nf4 17. Bxf4 Rxf4 18. gxh5 Qf6 19. Bg4 Rxg4+ 20.
hxg4 Qf4 21. Ne5 {wins.}) 17. Ng5 Bxe6 {The exchange cannot be saved.}
({If} 17... Bg8 18. Bxg8 {and Black cannot play} Rxg8 {because of} 19.
Nf7#) 18. Nxe6 Qh4 (18... Qf6 {might have given Black more attack as he
keeps his strong knight, but White should have sufficient defence.}) 19.
Qb3 $1 {The key move in the variation. White not only guards h3 and attacks
the knight, but also threatens to win the Queen by Bg5, and Black has
no alternative but to part with his strong knight and remain the exchange
down.} Nf4 20. Bxf4 Bxf4 21. Nxf8 Rxf8 22. Kg2 Bd6 23. Qe6 (23. Qxb7 {could
also have been played.}) 23... Qg5 {threatening Qf4.} 24. f4 {Giving up
a pawn for rapid development and to pin Black's bishop.} Bxf4 25. Rae1
Qa5 26. Qe5 Qxe5 27. Rxe5 Kg8 28. Re7 g5 29. h4 gxh4 30. Kh3 h6 31. Rd7
({Not} 31. Kxh4 {because of} Bg5+) 31... b5 32. d5 a5 33. Re7 a4 34. a3
Bd6 35. Rxf8+ Kxf8 36. Re6 Kg7 37. Kxh4 Bf4 38. Kh5 Bc1 39. Re2 {The sealed
move. The game was adjourned here, but Black resigned without waiting
for White's sealed move, although 39...Kf6 might have given some drawing
chances. But the move chosen by White avoids all risks, and wins without
much difficulty.} 1-0