Birthday of FM Alexander Longson (01-x-1982)
Tag Archives: UKCC
Happy Birthday IM Marcus Harvey (24-vii-1996)
BCN wishes Happy Birthday to IM Marcus Ross Harvey born on this day (Wednesday, July 24th) in 1996. Killing Me Softly by the Fugees was top of the hit parade.
Marcus was born in Oxford and attended The Marlborough School, Woodstock, Oxfordshire and then (in 2014) at The University of Southampton he studied mathematics.
Originally playing for Bicester Marcus now represents Witney Chess Club in local leagues.
Marcus first played in the British Championship in 2011 (Sheffield).
Originally playing for Oxford he now plays for Wood Green in the Four Nations Chess League (4NCL) and Southampton University in the Southampton League.
In 2014 Marcus won the title of “Strat” (the overall Terafinal winner) of the 2014 Delancey UK Chess Challenge at Loughborough Grammar School.
Marcus has a FIDE rating of 2440 and an ECF grading of 240.
In 2018 he won the Witney Open outright with 4/5 and, in the same year, was runner-up to David Howell in the UK Blitz Open with 12.5/15 and a of 2589.
In 2019 he was =1st (with Mark Hebden) in the 4NCL Easter Open in Stevenage. Later that year Marcus was losing semi-finalist (to Gawain Jones) in the London Classic Blitz Knockout.
Marcus, on home ground, won the 43rd Kidlington Open in 2020 and followed this with and is the current 2020 English Online Blitz Champion beating IM Andrew Greet, FM Jonah Willow, IM Ameet Ghasi and IM Andrew Horton in the final.
In the Pro chess league he represents UK Lions.
On 6th November 2019 we reported that Marcus had obtained his second International Master norm at the recent (October 2019) Hull 4NCL International Congress by scoring 4.5/9 with wins over IM Andrew Greet and IM Richard Palliser.
On July 17th 2021 Marcus was joint winner with IM Peter Roberson in the 1st Chessfest Decode Rapidplay with an impressive 6/6 and a TPR of 2911.
Marcus overcame Rory McLean, Theo Koury, Steven Coles, FM Alexis Harakis, CM Jonathan Pein and rapidplay / blitz specialist IM Ameet Ghasi to share first place.
Over the 19th – 23rd August 2021 Marcus played in the Wood Green Invitational round-robin event at Oddfellows Hall, Stafford.
Marcus scored 6/9 and secured his second International Master Norm and a TPR of 2532.
<img class=” wp-image-18696″ src=”http://britishchessnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/untitled_wgi.jpg” alt=”Wood Green Invitational Round-Robin event at Oddfellows Hall, Stafford. August Bank Holiday Weekend, 2021″ width=”654″ height=”229″ /> Wood Green Invitational Round-Robin event at Oddfellows Hall, Stafford. August Bank Holiday Weekend, 2021
Over the August Bank Holiday weekend of 2021 Marcus played in the Northumbrian Masters GM Tournament at the splendid Marriott MetroCentre, Gateshead scoring 6/9 and TPR of 2559 and earing his fourth IM norm. His standard play rating of 2451 (September 2021) is sufficient and now only requires the next FIDE Congress to ratify the IM title.
Marcus enjoys playing the Smyslov-Larsen opening with white
and the classical French and the Nimzo-Indian Defence.
It is clear that Marcus is now surely a strong candidate for England’s next Grandmaster.
Happy 76th Birthday IM Mike Basman (16-iii-1946)
Happy Birthday IM Michael John Basman (16-iii-1946)
Mike attended The University of Leeds as an undergraduate.
Here is Mike’s wikipedia entry
Here are his games
An interesting article from chess.com
Confessions of a Crooked Chess Master – Part 1 from Kingpin
Confessions of a Crooked Chess Master – Part 2
From Chessgames.com :
“Michael John Basman was born in St Pancras, London, England. He was awarded the IM title in 1980 and having dual nationality won the Erevan Championship whilst living there in the early 1970s. He was also a pioneer in the production of audio tapes for chess.
He is noted for his use of unorthodox flank openings, such as 1.g4, 1.h3, 1.e4 g5, etc. He expanded on the work of Henri Grob with his book on the topic of 1.g4, The Killer Grob.
He created the UK Chess Challenge, a tournament for juniors of all standards and ages progressing over four stages.(1)”
MJB won the ECF President’s Award in 2013.
Mike recently received a “bursary” from FIDE as a tribute towards FIDEs more senior players.
Happy Birthday WFM Sarah Longson (née Hegarty) (02-x-1988)
We send best wishes to WFM Sarah Natasha Longson (née Hegarty) on her birthday this day, (October 2nd) in 1988.
From Sarah’s web site :
“I have played competitive chess since the age of 7 when I became UK U7 Girls Chess Champion and appeared on Blue Peter where I met the then world champion Garry Kasparov. Since then I have represented England in many international competitions and in 2013 won the British Ladies Championship.”
In 2016 Sarah and partner FM Alex Longson made a successful bid for ownership of the UK Chess Challenge which was auctioned by the bankruptcy receiver of IM Mike Basman, the previous owner.
Sarah and Alex have modernised the UKCC considerably especially in the areas of communications an usage of IT.
According to the ECF Sarah’s nominal club is Marple but she also plays for Stockport and 4NCL 3Cs.
