Blayney Chess Club 2007 NSW Country Reserve Team Champions   

1^st Blayney Open a huge success

The Blayney Chess Club was very pleased with it’s first ever Open Tournament. With tremendous support from the Blayney Bowling Club, ICR Engineering, Blayney Newsagency, Newmans Fuels, Blayney Bytes, Quality Building Supplies, Hang Sing’s Restaurant and many others who gave much appreciated minor support, the first ever Blayney Open Chess Tournament would rate as a huge success by any standard.

Players came from all over the state, some travelling up to four hours, with two interstate visitors, one from Queensland, the other from the ACT, to join the locals in contest for the honour of being the winner of the inaugural Blayney Open.

Play commenced with 34 players, and the first round went much as expected, with the all the higher ranked players’ registering wins. The only mildly startling result was young Evan Stroeve from Bathurst securing a draw in his match with Tony Baldwin. With unrated youngsters, it is always hard to be sure of just how good they are, and Evan’s further success in this tournament serves as notice that he is definitely one youngster to be on your guard if you play against him.

Round Two didn’t follow the same script though. Someone neglected to tell Queensland visitor John Ager that he was severely outranked in his match against tournament number two seed Brian Jones. John played extremely well to secure a winning advantage and go on to register a win that all of us ordinary chess players dream of, a win over a titled player in a tournament situation. Blayney junior, Garry Mann also scored a minor victory, by holding Dubbo’s number one, Trevor Bemrose to a draw in their round two match. Bathurst’s Slavko Kojic also confirmed the opinion on his ability with a hard fought draw against wily Canberran, Bill Egan.

Saturday came to a conclusion with Lee Jones, David Castor, and Peter Abbott all registering their third win for the day to be co-leaders at the halfway point. Trevor Bemrose and Garry Mann both scored nice wins over strong opponents to be sitting just behind the leaders with 2.5 points from a possible 3.

Sunday morning action was highly entertaining, Lee Jones accounted for one of his co-leaders, Peter Abbott in a very intense struggle. Trevor Bemrose decided that he wasn’t going to be left out of discussions, scoring a huge win over the more fancied David Castor to move into a clear 2^nd in the tournament, whilst John Ager continued his good tournament with a draw against top local Fritz Van der Wal.

Round Five and Lee Jones continued to account for all challengers, managing to overcome Trevor Bemrose in another good game. Brian Jones, David Castor, and Mike Canfell all kept themselves in contention with good wins, while Fritz Van der Wal accounted for Garry Mann in an interesting game to also remain in contention.

The final round commenced with Lee Jones in the comfortable position of only needing a draw to secure the tournament win. Mike Canfell was the player given the unenviable task of upsetting the tournament leader. Only a win would get Mike back on level terms with Lee. Two other competitors on four points, Brian Jones and David Castor, were willing him on his battle whilst they fought hard against each other in the hope that they may grab a share of first place. Fritz Van der Wal played Bill Egan and Trevor Bemrose faced Slavko Kojic, all aware that if results on the top boards went their way, they would have the opportunity of being among the placegetters.

Mike Canfell tried valiantly, but Lee Jones wasn’t going to let first place slip at this crucial moment, and went on to score the win. In the process, Lee has set a high standard for future Blayney Opens, his 6 from 6 performance will be a tough benchmark for any future competitors to measure up against.

In the battle for 2^nd place, Brian Jones and David Castor were definitely not interested in sharing the prize, they were going at each other like caged lions, with both players looking to be on the verge of winning at different times. In the end, David Castor prevailed in one of the hardest fought games of the whole tournament.

While all the attention was focused on the leaders, Fritz Van der Wal was quietly going about scoring that much needed win over Bill Egan. This was a much tougher task than most realised, Fritz and Bill have played each other many times over the years, and their results would be about 50-50 with both acknowledging that the other’s style of play is difficult for him to overcome. Trevor Bemrose and Slavko Kojic both wanted the win, but were unable to find any advantage and eventually had to settle for the draw.

These final results meant that the placings for the 2007 Blayney Open were, 1^st Lee Jones 6 pts, 2^nd David Castor 5 pts, 3^rd Fritz Van der Wal 4.5 pts. All of these players are worthy recipients of their prizes, and give the Blayney Open prestige by their winning.

In the Minor Divisions, the Under 1600 prizes were won by Gary Losh and Slavko Kojic, with 4 pts in equal first, and John Ager, Garry Mann, and Bill Egan in equal 3^rd on 3.5 pts. This effort secured the Best Junior Prize for Garry Mann. The Under 1200 division was hotly contested with five players finishing equal first in that one. Helen Aylwin, John Cooper, Evan Stroeve, Ramon Aich, and David Pisani were the co-winners with their good performances of 3 pts from a possible six.

Rod McPhee was the recipient of the Hang Sing’s Restaurant/Blayney Sports Best Local prize.

Winners of the lucky draw prizes were: B&B Fuels Visitors prize, Alexander Aich from Dubbo; Blayney Pharmacy Local Players Prize, Brian Patten; Blayney Chess Club Junior Prize, Jason McKinnon. Jason is one of three members of this family who made the trip from Ardlethan to participate in the tournament, and the book will certainly be a welcome addition to their chess library.

With the benefit of lessons learnt from their first ever effort at running an Open Tournament, the Blayney Chess Club look forward to bigger and better Open events in future years. For now, we will gladly enjoy the calmer atmosphere of our regular Thursday evening club nights at the Bowling Club from 6pm.

Once again, we invite any interested people to come along, enjoy a game or two, a chat among friends. With refreshments readily available, it is always an enjoyable way to spend an hour or two.

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Last modified: 24/10/2008