Jonathan Hawkins is British Champion 2015

Shock Champions at British Champs 2015

This year’s British Chess Championships has just come to an end and those who placed bets on the event may well have been disappointed. Three times champion and newly 2700 GM David Howell was the firm favourite going into the tournament. The “half-time” report showed that GM Howell and GM Daniel Gormally were leading the pack on 5.5/6 with GM Nicholas Pert the only one on 5/6.

A very happy GM Nick Pert, leading the tournament and
hoping to finally win the lucrative British Championship title.

It really looked like this could be Gormally’s year as he only dropped half a point to Howell (which we already know shouldn’t have happened) and taken out who was thought to be David’s biggest rival, 2014 co-champion Jonathan Hawkins. The quality of Gormally’s games also looked like he was in form and no one else could really stop him.

The British Ladies’ Chess Championships are merged with the main championships and this year there were five contenders for the title, all of whom have represented England at an international level. I, myself was the top seed and somewhat favourite for the title, but in reality I was never able to play all 11 rounds due to being scheduled for dental surgery, so it was up to the other four ladies to battle it out. After round 6, the youngest contender (only 14 years old), Akshaya Kalayalahan was leading the pack with 3.5/6, having only lost to GMs Gormally and Flear. In fact, she was well on course for a WGM norm.

 Akshaya Kalaiyalahan - the young talent who is sure to be England’s next WIM!

Meanwhile, on top board, a shock defeat for GM David Howell as he just blundered a piece against GM Nick Pert and was not the first person to do so this tournament.

Just the round prior to that, GM Mark Hebden declined Nick’s draw offer only to trap his own knight at the side of the board. A very bizarre occurrence, but Nick was not going to look a gift horse in the mouth. So, for the first time in the tournament, David had been knocked off board one and was due to play black against his co-champion GM Hawkins in round 8.

 GM Hawkins makes his move vs IM Richard Pert

This year’s competition has really been bottom heavy with only 11 GMs playing and then the rest of the field being reasonably similar strength, apart from Nick’s twin brother IM Richard Pert, who was on a very decent 5/7, only losing to David Howell in a complicated game, where he possibly was better.

Nick Pert’s twin brother IM Richard Pert had
a great tournament and finished equal 5th.

Therefore, round 8 was an interesting line-up, where the top 5 boards was an all-GM battle. It is often the case in national championships to see top players halve out rather quickly. After all, these guys have known each other for years and have had a fair few battles over time. However, apart from on board one, which was over rather quickly (Pert-Gormally), there were three decisive results, with White coming out victorious in all. With Howell not managing to beat his co-champion from last year with the black pieces, he was down on board three for round 9 and things were looking rather open for the 2015 Championships.

Two of our most experienced players who battled it
out in a long, well-fought game. GMs Flear and Hebden.

 Everyone’s favourite Ginger GM, Simon Williams

The women’s championships was really between three and after 8 rounds, it was completely neck and neck with WIM Heather Richards, WFM Sarah Hegarty and Akshaya Kalaiyalahan all on 4.5/8. Akshaya just needed one more titled player in order to secure at least a WIM norm for herself from this event with a couple of rounds to spare to aim for bigger norms!

WIM Heather Richards, now residing and representing Australia,
but still qualifies for the British Championships.

With round 9 seeing all draws at the top, it was getting tighter for that race to the title. Someone has to eventually take a risk in order to push ahead of the pack. 14 year old Akshaya played a lovely game to outplay Richard Weaving (2257) to pull ahead of the pack of ladies as Sarah Hegarty lost her game. However, Heather Richards, who has been an experienced England International player, but now represents Australia since living there for the last few years managed to somehow pull out a whole point out of a position where she was a piece down making it very interesting in the ladies’ competition going into round 10.

With GM Pert and GM Gormally both leading on 7/9, both having played David Howell, they were pretty confident that this was their year to have a play off for the championships. Gormally had the easier of the two pairings as he was White against IM Pert and Nick was black against the GM who has been dominating the World and European Senior Championships over the last couple of years – GM Keith Arkell. However, with both these games ending in a draw and very disappointingly, Gormally not even trying to win his game, Hawkins and Howell could smell the opportunity and converted both their games as black against strong GMs to catch up the leaders.

 A very smiley former English Champion and World Senior Champion, GM Keith Arkell.

Daniel Gormally could not contain his nerves this year for long enough to win the title.

With everything to play for in round 11, the four leaders on 7.5/10; GM Howell, GM Pert, GM Hawkins and GM Gormally, having all played each other, all got downfloats to those on only 7/10. A play-off was inevitable…

But then something very odd happened… the former World Senior Chess Champion Keith Arkell went down very easily in a ball of flames against GM Hawkins, giving him, quite possibly, his easiest victory of the tournament, when he needed it the most. No-one could believe what they were seeing! With the Pert twins having an inevitable draw, this put pressure on both Gormally and Howell to produce results and stop Hawkins just walking home with the title. Sadly, in a must-win game, Gormally chose to repeat the position against lower rated Summerscale to settle for what could have been third place.

 Hawkins deep in thought…

 GM Summerscale not concentrating on his game, but still managing to get decent results!

However, anyone that knows David Howell, knows that he is a fighter and would never accept a quick draw under most circumstances. He has had the most incredible year, winning the 2014 British Championships, narrowly missing out on a medal in the Olympiad, 2nd place in both Gibraltar and Isle of Mann and just continually great performances throughout the year. With his new 2700+ rating, he was determined to show people why he is in that elite group of players. In a very tricky game throughout, it seemed that Mark blundered at a very critical point, but despite trying right to the bitter end, David just could not convert the advantage and just like that Jonathan Hawkins became the 2015 British Chess Champion.

Interestingly, this game also had a "twin" in this championship.

 David donning his ‘famous’ chess wristbands,
but sadly failed to ‘three-peat’ his success!

GM Hebden’s resilience was too much to break down this year,
despite David beating him for the title in the last round last year.

The commentary team of IM Ravikumar and IM Martin chose
Hawkins' final win as their ‘Game of the Day’.

The ladies’ championships was now down to two female players – Akshaya and Heather. In the last round, they were both paired against much stronger players where any result for either would have been a good performance. However, Heather got slowly outplayed, but it was Akshaya’s opponent who was begging for a draw throughout. Once she saw she could secure the title, she accepted the draw and along with it, her first WIM norm and the U2000 rating prize!

British Champion and British Ladies’ Champion 2015!
GM Jonathan Hawkins and Akshaya Kalaiyalahan

An incredible tournament for both winners; Jonathan Hawkins has surprisingly only been a GM about a year, but has been the British Champion for the last two years in a row! Akshaya Kalaiyalahan was sub 2000 before this tournament, but her rating will shoot to close to 2200 now and is definitely a future star for England.

For anyone who is interested in seeing the pair pick up their prizes, the whole ceremony was filmed and can be viewed on YouTube.

Final results:

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The British Championship was a huge chess event with many tournaments - and a large number of prizes.

Prizewinners’ List

Source: Official tournament site

Links Official tournament site All games in PGN The games are being broadcast live on the official web site and on the chess server Playchess.com. If you are not a member you can download a free Playchess client there and get immediate access. You can also use ChessBase 13 or any of our Fritz compatible chess programs.