Happy Birthday IM Craig Alexander Hanley (23-iii-1984)
Craig was born in Pontefract in West Yorkshire.
He became a Candidate Master in 2001, a FIDE Master in 2002 and an IM in 2007. His peak rating was 2447 in April 2007.
Craig plays for Spirit of Atticus in 4NCL (Four Nations Chess League) and has a current ECF standard play grading of 242.
Here is his FIDE player card
Birthday of IM Peter Thomas Roberson (22-iii-1989)
Peter is IM Squirlolz on chess.com
Peter’s games from chessgames.com
During the 2021 – 2022 4NCL season Peter played for The Sharks 1 and scored 7.5/9 making his first GM norm and then followed that up in the 2022 – 2023 4NCL season scoring 9/11 securing his second GM norm in twelve months. Hopefully the third and final norm will be soon coming!
BCN remembers Richard Guy who passed away in Calgary, Alberta, Canada on Monday, March 9th, 2020 at the splendid age of 103.
Richard Kenneth Guy was born on Saturday, 30th September 1916. On this day construction on the Hell Gate Bridge in New York City was completed.
He was born in Nuneaton, Warwickshire to William Alexander Charles Guy and Augusta Adeline Guy (née Tanner). RKGs parents had married in the final quarter of 1915 in Solihull. William was headmaster of Atherstone Elementary School.
Richard attended Warwick School excelling in mathematics where he was a boarder and prefect. In December 1934 He obtained a County Major Scholarship for Mathematics provided by the Lord Kitchener Memorial Fund gaining his Northern Universities Higher School Certificate in July 1935.
He went up to Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge University in October 1935 graduating in 1938. Stephen Hawking was also an alumni of Caius College.
The 1939 register records Richard aged 23 living as a lodger in the Blower household of six at 436 Buxton Road, Stockport, Cheshire, England. This address has since been converted to residential flats. He was a teacher of mathematics in a local secondary school.
During the second world war Richard saw non-combative service in the Royal Air Force working on forecasting the weather and improving the methodologies. This work was a critical component of the British war effort.
In the final quarter of 1940 Richard married Nancy Louise Thirian in Bingham, Nottingham. Nancy (in fact, she was known as Louise) was born in Islington in the third quarter of 1918 and passed away in 2010. They had three children and Michael JT Guy was also a significant mathematician.
According to Wikipedia : “In November 1942, Guy received an emergency commission in the Meteorological Branch of the Royal Air Force, with the rank of flight lieutenant. He was posted to Reykjavik, and later to Bermuda, as a meteorologist. He tried to get permission for Louise to join him but was refused. While in Iceland, he did some glacier travel, skiing, and mountain climbing, marking the beginning of another long love affair, this one with snow and ice.”
In August 1951 Richard relocated to Singapore and taught for ten years at The University of Malaya and following that he worked at the Indian Institute of Technology in Delhi. Finally, in 1965, he moved to Calgary and taught in the Mathematics Department at The University of Calgary. For fuller details of his extensive mathematical career see the many links at the foot of this article.
RKGs final address in England was 145 Sunderland Road, Forest Hill, London SE23 2PX:
Richard’s chess career was active whilst at Warwick School. He played for the school “eight” in matches against teams such as Birmingham University and King Edward’s School, Birmingham.
Richard’s interest turned away from over-the-board play but he did find time to compete in the Major Open of the August 1946 British Championships in Nottingham. Only two game scores are known where he lost to Dr. Fazekas and Gordon Crown: both very strong opponents.
The December 1947 edition of British Chess Magazine contains RKGs very first Endings column taking over from TR Dawson. The column was introduced thus:
“Mr RK Guy has kindly consented to take over the Endings Section. All communications should now be sent to him at 33 Westwood Park Forest Hill London SE23.” TRD went on to write:
“With this page I reluctantly terminate on health grounds some forty years of work in the Endings field, and my contributions to this corner of the British Chess Magazine. To the many readers of these pages, a Merry Christmas and steadily improving years.”
RKG was to edit this column until his final piece in June 1951. RKG wrote in the July 1951 column (now edited by HF Blandford): “My address after August will be University of Malaya, Singapore. I have enjoyed these few years, and am sorry to leave you, although you will be in capable hands. HFB is player and problemist, but his greatest love is for endings, and he has won many international prizes.”
RKG is known for almost 200 endgame studies.
This is study #53, page 57 from Test Tube Chess by AJ Roycroft:
RK Guy
The Field, 28 xii 1940
win, 3+2
The win is by a white king march from the h-file onto the same file as the pawn, instead of the reverse!
1.Bb4!/i Rh2+;
2.Kg7 Rg2+;
3.Kf7 Rf2+;
4.Ke6 Re2+/ii;
5.Kd5 Re3;
6.Kd4 wins
(i) Why not 1.d8=Q. Because of 1…Rb8; 2.Qxb8 stalemate!
(ii) 4…Rf8 not on because of 5.Bxf8
and this one is study #148, page 106 of the same publication:
RK Guy
British Chess Magazine, x 1943
win, 6+4
1.Sc1+ Kc4;
2.b3+ Kd4;
3.Se2+ Ke4/i;
4.Sg3+ Kd4/ii;
5.Rf4+ Ke5/iii;
6.Re4+ Kd5;
7.Rd4+ Kxd4;
8.Sf5+ Ke5;
9.Sxd6 Kxd6;
10.h4 wins.
(i) 3…Kd3;4.Rd5+ Qd5;5.Sf4+ Ke4;6.Sxd5 Kxd5;7.h4 wins.
(ii) 4…Kd3;5.Rf3+ Kxd2;6.Se4+, or 5…Kd4;6.Sf5+.
(iii) 5…Kd5;6.Rd4+ Kxd4;7.Sf5+.
A lot of checks, but also a lot of play.
For more examples of RKGs work we recommend his AVRES database entry.
In 2020 John Beasley wrote: “Richard did not achieve the same renown in our field as he has in the field of recreational mathematics, but his studies are neat and many are also instructive, a point which he considered important. We have been the richer for his presence.”
Along with Hugh Blandford and John Roycroft, RKG was one of the inventors of the GBR code (Guy–Blandford–Roycroft code), a system of representing the position of chess pieces on a chessboard. Publications such as EG magazine use it to classify endgame types and to index endgame studies.
Here is an appreciation from John Beasley
RKGs entry on the AVRES database
RKGs entry on chesscomposers.blogspot.com
An Interview with a mathematician
An obituary from The Calgary Herald
A tribute from The University of Calgary
A tribute from A Periodical
A tribute from the American Mathematical Society
100th birthday tribute from the Mathematical Association of America
RKGs Wikipedia article
Happy Birthday GM Harold James Plaskett born on this day (March 18th) in 1960
Here is his Wikipedia entry
Here are his games
Jim obtained his FM norm in 1980 according to Gino de Felice.
From Chessgames.com :
“Harold James (Jim) Plaskett was born in Dkeliha, Cyprus. He was awarded the IM title in 1981 and became a GM in 1985. Plaskett’s tournament results include first place at Plovdiv 1984 and a tie for second at Hastings 1984-85. He was British champion in 1990.”
In December of 2021 Camberley Chess Club (ECF Club of the Year for 2021) had Jim as an invited guest to one of their Tuesday evening Zoom calls. Here is a taster of the full video:
James Plaskett almost became a millionaire
BCN remembers Reginald Bonham (known as “Bon”) who passed away, this day, March 16th in 1984 in Worcester, Worcestershire.
In the 1970 New Years Honours, Civil Division he was awarded the MBE for “Services to the blind”. Interestingly, in 1992 his sister Mary also received an MBE for “Services to the blind” This is surely an unusual happening.
Reginald Walter Bonham was born on Wednesday, January 31st 1906 : the same day as the Ecuador–Colombia earthquake which measured 8.8 on the Richter Scale.
He was born in St. Neots, Huntingdonshire, Cambridgeshire.
In the 1911 census aged 5 he lived in the High Street, St. Neots with William R Bonham (father, master butcher, aged 45), Edith Mary Ann Bonham (mother, 38), Howard William Bonham (6), Maurice George Bonham (3) and Ernest Charles Bonham (1). The family had a servant / domestic duties assistant called Elise Annie Goss aged 18. The census did not record any disability for Reginald.
Reg, like others in his family, suffered from deficient eyesight and was therefore unable to attend a “mainstream” school.
From 1922 – 1925 he attended the Royal Worcester College for the Blind (originally Worcester College for the Blind Sons of Gentlemen) in Whittington Road, Worcester, WR5 2JX. The Headmaster (GC Brown) encouraged his chess and rowing talents and in 1926 he was sent up to St. Catherine’s College, Oxford to read mathematics.
Reginald was a highly competant rower, competing for his college and reaching the trial stage for the Oxford Varsity crew.
In 1934 Reg founded the Braille Chess Magazine.
In the 1939 census he was recorded as living at 4, St. Catherine’s Hill, Worcester, WR5 with his wife, Josephine Bonham (born 24th September 1904). Reginald was listed as being a Mathematics tutor at the Royal Worcester College for the Blind (originally Worcester College for the Blind Sons of Gentlemen) in Whittington Road, Worcester, WR5 2JX. The college is now named New College Worcester. Their home was around a mile from the College. Josephine was listed as carrying out “unpaid domestic duties”.
He taught a combination of Braille and mathematics and was an amateur thespian and keen bridge player.
Interestingly RWB in 1939 was an ARP (Air Raid Precautions) Warden and a St. John Ambulance volunteer for the College.
He was Worcester champion twenty times and four times Midlands champion winning the Birmingham Post Cup twice.
On June 6th 1947 Bonham played in Birmingham in a match between Great Britain and Czechoslovakia playing Ladislav Alster and won this attractive game :
In 1951 he founded the International Braille Chess Association (IBCA) and continued as its President for 23 years. The IBCA affiliated to FIDE in 1964. see http://www.schachkomet.de/ibcachp4.htm for historical detail.
He was Blind World Champion in 1958 and Correspondence Blind World Champion in 1957, 1959, 1961, 1964 (jointly) and 1966.
He was active in postal play, taking part in international events in the decade after the war when few British players ventured “into Europe”. A note in the 1972 BCM (page 216) records the award of the title Correspondence GM of the Blind by the International Braille Chess Association, so his omission from the recent book British Chess seems rather unfortunate.
Among the titles won by Reginald Bonham were British Correspondence Championship, shared in 1947 with J. Cairncross and shared in 1951 with E. Brown) and Midland Champion (1947 and 1950).
Tim Harding kindly adds :
“He had earlier been runner-up in the BCF’s 1938 CC Championship and, most importantly, he won the 1942/43 Championship outright with 9/10, a point and a half ahead of David Hooper. (By then the BCF and BCCA championships had been merged into one event.)
The crosstable is on page 254 of my book Correspondence Chess in Britain and Ireland 1824-1987.”
One of his students was broadcaster Peter White MBE who described Bon in his autobiography See it My Way
From British Chess Magazine, Volume XCII (92, 1972) Number 6 (June), page 216 we have this item in News in Brief :
“At the closing ceremony of the 4th Chess Olympiad for the Blind at Pula, Yugoslavia (April 6-18) the International Braille Chess Association awarded the title of Correspondence Grandmaster of the Blind to R.W. Bonham of Worcester, for having won the Postal Championship more than three times.”
From British Chess Magazine, Volume CIV (104, 1984) Number 5 (May), page 194 we have this obituary :
“We regret to announce the death in March of two early winners of the grandmaster title (the other was Comins Mansfield MBE).
R.W.Bonham (31 i 1906 – 16 iii 1984) died at Worcester, where he had long served as a Master at the Royal Worcester College for the Blind. In the 1950s he took part in the British Championship with success. Many older players will remember him fingering his special board before announcing his move and checking his clock with its markers outside the glass face.
He was also (with Wormald) joint author of those fine little books Chess Questions Answered and More Chess Questions Answered.”
Sadly, RWB did not merit articles in Sunnucks or Golombek’s Encyclopedias or Hooper’s and Whyld’s Oxford Companion or, as mentioned previously, British Chess.
Here is a short biography from Ray Collett and here is his Wikipedia article.
More information here.
The Braille Chess Association used to have an entry in its Hall of Fame.
We remember IM Michael Basman who passed away on October 26th, 2022
Mike attended The University of Leeds as an undergraduate reading history.
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.
Best wishes to GM Dr. Jonathan Mestel on his birthday
A(ndrew) Jonathan Mestel was born in Cambridge on Wednesday, March 13th 1957. On this day the Presidential Palace in Havana was attacked with the object of killing Fulgencio Batista, the incumbent President.
Jonathan’s parents were Leon and Sylvia Louise Mestel (née Cole) who were married in 1951. Leon was a world-class astronomer and astrophysicist whose PhD supervisor was Fred Hoyle. Jonathan has a brother Ben and sisters Rosie and Leo.
Living in Cambridge he attended Newnham Croft Primary School and at the age six was taught chess by his father Leon. By the age of seven Jonathan was matching his father and not long afterwards he was beating him consistently. East Cheshire Chess Club was his first club and therefore the opportunity to play adults other than his father.
The Mestel family moved to Manchester in around 1967 and Jonathan attended Manchester Grammar School along with chess players Emmanuel Rayner and Ian Watson. Famously he grew a substantial beard and moustache and apparently “they (MGS) disapproved of it” resulting in a ban until the beard was removed. Jonathan duly obliged and returned to school but was sent home once more since he had retained the moustache: “They did not mention the moustache!” we are told. A further ban was resolved when the offending item was also removed.
Jonathan obtained a PhD in mathematics from Trinity College, Cambridge and the associated thesis was entitled “Magnetic Levitation of Liquid Metals”.
Jonathan is Professor of Applied Mathematics at Imperial College London. As well as teaching, his research interests include magnetohydrodynamics and biological fluid dynamics.
In the third quarter of 1982 Jonathan married Anna O’Donovan in Cambridge and they soon settled in the central Cambridge area where they remain to this day. They have a son, David. Sadly, it was reported in The Problemist that Anna passed had away on December 26th, 2022.
Bridge
Jonathan has represented England at bridge joining a group of English players such as Peter Lee and John Cox who also represented their country at bridge. Paul Littlewood, Paul Lamford and Natasha Regan are amongst many others who have combined bridge and chess to a high level . Here is Jonathan’s English Bridge Union page. He remains highly ranked in the bridge world to this day.
Jonathan noted:
I should mention that all my hair fell out for no obvious nor serious reason – neither my bidding nor partner’s dummies are responsible. Few would argue with that last statement.
His earliest recorded appearance in chess databases is from the Rhyl based British Under-14 championship in 1969 where he beat DA Winter. The eventual winner of that event was Jonathan Speelman. Jonathan M. recounts that he shared 3rd place with two others and that the prize allotted to the three of them was a whopping £2 10s to be divided equally. This amounted to 16s 8p each. Since the entry fee was 15s it meant he had cleared a notable profit of 1s and 8 pence!
The following year all British Championships competitors were sent to Coventry and Jonathan and Jonathan shared the Under-16 title whilst Bob Wade won the main event with 8/11.
1971 was no less successful and Jonathan travelled to the location of England’s Eiffel Tower (Blackpool) returning home with the British Under-18 title. Jonathan mentioned that he should have entered the Under-21 event instead.
Brighton 1972 was Jonathan’s first appearance in the “main event” having broken the record for the youngest qualifier. This record was later broken by Richard Webb and then by Nigel Short. His final score was a creditable 6.5/11 giving him =5th overall aged 15 years and seven months. In 1972 this was an incredible achievement. Regrettably, these days achievements such as this appear to pass unreported.
At Eastbourne 1973 he was =7th with possibly the best hair cut of anyone:
1974 was a breakthrough year internationally as Jonathan won the (unofficial) World Cadet Championship in Pont Sainte Maxence in southern France. The following year IM David Goodman followed up by winning the same title.
Interestingly travel arrangements for the above event were not so smooth as was the crossing of the English Channel. The hovercraft broke down; Jonathan arrived much later than anticipated and unable to find civilised accommodation leading to an Orwellian style “Down and Out in Paris” sleeping arrangement in a Paris gutter.
At Clacton 1974 Jonathan was one of seven who finished on 7/11, the title going to George Botterill after an all-play-all play-off in Wales.
1975 started well with a bronze medal in Tjentiste (former Yugoslavia now Bosnia Herzegovina) for the World Junior Championship (happening at the same as the British in Morecambe preventing a 1975 British Championship appearance).
1976 brought further success at Portland School, Edgbaston with a first place scoring 8/10 and an IM norm in the Birmingham International tournament:
and here is a sparkling game from the 1976 Robert Silk Fellowship Tournament:
Jonathan followed this at the Portsmouth 1976 British Championships with a splendid outright first place with 9.5/11 , the highest score since Malik Mir Sultan Khan in 1933. Also, nine consecutive wins from the starting gun was most definitely a record!
Leonard Barden assessed Mestel’s performance this in the Guardian:
“Jonathan Mestel’s reaction at Portsmouth to become British Champion at age 19, the youngest ever, and with a record series of nine wins, was characteristically low-key. He declined an interview with BBC’s World at One in favour of a continued sojourn on the beach, declined an invitation to the Chorley Congress (where the inducements for him to play were rumoured to include a chauffeured Rolls-Royce from station to town hall, and where the points might well have enabled him to overhaul the leader in the £1,000 Cutty Sark Grand Prix) in favour of a holiday in France, and even ‘declined’ the chance of a record total in the final round when he gifted a pawn in the opening to Whiteley in simple fashion”
Barden went on to praise Mestel as, along with Miles, one of the two young players ‘with genuine promise of ultimately reaching the world super-class.’
1977 led to the International Master title and in 1982 the Grandmaster title. In reality, the GM title should have been awarded two years earlier from Esberg 1979 but more on this FIDE blunder later.
In the 1979 Dataday Chess Diary Harry Golombek OBE wrote this:
“I wrote in last years diary that I doubted whether Jonathan would ever change his variability, adding ‘Probably there will always recur this rise to the heights and fall to lower levels.’
To some extent this is still true. But his play in 1977 and 1978 has shown a greater firmness of purpose and revealed more powers of endurance and stamina than I had realised he possessed earlier on. Thus, for instance, in the last round of the European Team Championship finals at Moscow in 1977, playing the black pieces against the West German master Kestler, he was the last to finish and he defeated his opponent after nearly 12 hours play and some 105 moves.
He is one of our players who is nearing the grandmaster title, both in play and, as it were, in figures. At the Lord John Cup Tournament in London, September 1977, he obtained the g.m. norm by coming equal 2nd with Quinteros and Stean below Hort. He did this with a score of 6 when 5.5 would have been sufficient for the norm.
To my mind he is the ideal tournament competitor since he can always be relied upon to delight the onlooker with some fresh and original piece of chess. It is this talent which makes me think there is practically no limit to the heights he may attain as a player.
In the following game, played at the European Team Championships at Moscow 1977, Mestel gives signs of a new and mature sureness of purpose, whilst retaining all his incisive and ambitious qualities.
In 1978 Jonathan was part of the English team of Mestel, Speelman Taulbut, Goodman and Jonathan Kinlay that travelled to Mexico and won the World Under-26 Student Team Championships. This was a huge achievement as beating the USSR in a chess team event simply did not happen. It is not clear even that the Russian team were all bona fide students: some looking decidedly unstudent like!
The splendid Aztec calendar trophy you can see Jonathan clutching above was taken back to England and generously donated to Bob Wade who, in turn, wrote in his will that it should be returned to Jonathan. To this day this wonderful trophy proudly lives with Jonathan and Anna in their house in Cambridge.
From British Chess (Pergamon Press, 1983), Botterill, Levy, Rice and Richardson we have this appreciation by George Botterill:
“The tournament at Esbjerg in 1979 was a bitter-sweet experience for Mestel. He won many fine games on the way to sharing first place with the hefty score of 9.5 out of 13.
But the real prize for which he was competing was the final norm that would have completed his qualification for the title of grandmaster. In the last round a draw would have been sufficient, but it was not day for peaceful negotiation since his adversary was also his nearest rival, Vadasz, who needed to win in order to tie for first place.
The nervous strain of having two aims in sight, first place and the coveted norm, told on Mestel who played rather beneath himself to lose. It was some consolation that the following victory over Finland’s leading player was hailed as the best game of the tournament.”
If the previous game gives you the idea that Mestel is especially skilled in the handling of an attacking phalanx of pawns, just take a look at this contribution to England’s bronze-medal result in the 1980 European Team Championship.
It is nice to be able to conclude that since the above was written Mestel’s chess status has changed and the story of his near miss at Esbjerg in 1979 turns out to have a happy ending. His GM title was ratified by the FIDE Congress at Lucerne 1982*.”
*It transpired that the initial norm calculation in 1979 was incorrect and it should have been awarded after all. Better late than never!
Jonathan recounts that on St. George’s Day (April 23rd) 1982 he had an important interview in the morning in Cambridge which went very well followed by round eight of the Phillips and Drew Masters at the GLC in London against Lajos Portisch. Here is that game:
So quite a good day all in all!
From The Oxford Companion to Chess (OUP, second edition, 1996) by Hooper & Whyld:
“English player, British Champion 1976, 1983 and 1988, World Under-18 Champion 1974, International] Grandmaster (1982). In the 1976 British Championship he made a record by winning 9 successive games. Mestel’s opportunities for master play are infrequent – he is a lecturer at a University; he scored perhaps his best at London 1977 when he was second ( +4=4—1) equal with Quinteros and Stean after Hort, and he has played several times in the English Olympiad team since 1976. Mestel also an outstanding solver of chess problems, has represented his country in world team solving championships, and was awarded the title of International Solving Master in 1986”
From The Encyclopaedia of Chess (Batsford, 1977), Harry Golombek wrote :
“British Master and British Champion 1976, who was born in Cambridge and packed into the three years 1974-6, in the period of time when he grew from seventeen to nineteen, more chess and more success than most people achieve in a long lifetime.
He first made his presence felt in the international field when he won the cadet championship at Pont Sainte–Maxene in France in 1974. This was an unofficial world under-18 championship and he confirmed this good impression by very nearly winning the British Championship in Clacton in the same year. He figured in a seven-way tie for first place but failed to win the play-off for the title.
The next he gained his first international master norm at the Birmingham international tournament where he finished equal second with Matera (USA) and Miles (England), a point below Matulovic of Yugoslavia whom he beat in their individual game.
He was little disappointing in the World Junior Championship at Tjentiste in Yugoslavia in 1975 in which he came third below the Russian Chekov and the US player Larry Christiansen. It was thought that, talented though he was, Mestel lacked stability and was too variable in his form to achieve the highest honours.
But the next year, 1976, was to show that was quite a false appreciation of his talents and character. First in April he won and international tournament which, if not as strong a the previous Birmingham, was still touch event to win ahead of the Yugoslav Grandmaster Damjanovic.
Then came a most remarkable achievement in the British Championship at Portsmouth where he won his first nine games in succession thereby winning the title and establishing a record for the British Championship with his run of victories.”
Mestel has his own named variation in the Giuoco Piano first played in Mestel-Doyle, Dublin 1975:
According to Wikipedia : “Between 1976 and 1988, he was a frequent member of the English Chess Olympiad squad, winning three team medals (two silver and one bronze). In 1984, he earned an individual gold medal for an outstanding (7/9, 78%) performance on his board. Other notable results for English teams occurred in 1978 at the World Student Olympiad in Mexico and at the 1983 European Team Chess Championship in Plovdiv. Both of these events yielded gold-medal winning performances, the latter being exceptional for the highest percentage score (6/7, 85%) on any board. As a player of league chess, he has been a patron of the 4NCL since its earliest days and represented The Gambit ADs in the 2008/9 season.” Jonathan revealed that his most pleasing OTB performance ever was that of Plovdiv.
Jonathan has maintained a long time interest in problems and studies, both solving them and composing them. In 1986 he was awarded the International Master title for solving and in 1997 the International Grandmaster title for solving and in the same year he won the World Chess Solving Championship.
He has represented England in the World Team Solving Championships on many occasions winning in 1986, 1990 (shared with USSR), and then a run of 2005, 2006 and 2007.
He has played many times in the Lloyds Bank and (now) Winton Capital sponsored British Solving Championships (quite often located at Eton College, Berkshire). He has won the individual title firstly in 1982-83 and then a further 17 times not to mention many times as runner-up.
Here are a few examples:
Firstly a prize winning study…
J. Mestel
1.p Niekarker Kruujebitter Ty (tt), 2006
[FEN “8/4pP1k/5q1p/4p3/ppQpP3/3K1pp1/2P5/6R1 w – – 0 1”]
White to Play
and Draw
1.Qe6! [1.Qc8? Qxf7] 1…Qxe6 2.f8Q [2.f8N+? Kh8! (2…Kg8? 3.Nxe6 g2 4.Nxd4 exd4 5.Kxd4) 3.Nxe6 g2] 2…f2 [2…Qa6+ 3.Kd2 Qe2+ 4.Kc1 Qe3+ 5.Kb2] 3.Rxg3 f1Q+ [3…Qa6+ 4.Kd2 f1N+ 5.Kc1 Nxg3 6.Qf7+] 4.Qxf1 Qa6+ 5.c4! bxc3+ [5…dxc3+ 6.Ke3! (6.Kc2? b3+!) 6…Qxf1 7.Rg7+ Kh8 8.Rg8+ Kh7 9.Rg7+ Kxg7] 6.Kc2 Qxf1 7.Rg7+ Kh8 8.Rg8+ Kh7 9.Rg7+ Kxg7 ½-½
and another study:
and another:
and
and
and now a problem:
Jonathan Mestel
British Chess Magazine, 2007
#3, 7+6
Here is his staff page from Imperial College, London
and his personal page may be found here
A.J.Mestel. Not Your Ordinary Grandmaster. by Neil Blackburn (aka Simaginfan).
Here is his Wikipedia entry
BCN wishes Mandy Hepworth Happy Birthday (12-iii-1968)
Mandy Allison S. Hepworth was born in Scunthorpe, (now) Humberside (but at the time Lincolnshire) on Tuesday, March 12th 1968 to Neville Ian Hepworth and Alice Hepworth (née Ma). Neville was a Computer Manager and Alice Ma was originally from Singapore. The family moved to “Mulgoa”, The Fleet, Fittleworth, Pulborough, RH20 1HS, West Sussex.
(Thanks to David Mills who updated us on the Lincolnshire / Humberside issue)
Neville taught Mandy how to play chess.
She attended Westergate Comprehensive and Community School where Peter Barton coached both the boys and the girls teams.
From The Bognor and Arun Chess Club Archive we have :
“One particular junior, Mandy Hepworth, came to notice. In the British championships at Brighton in 1980 she came first equal in the girls under-14 competition. Peter Barton also organised some external competitions and from 1981 for a few years he organised young masters’ tournaments at the Westergate School after receiving sponsorship from the Amey Roadstone Corporation. ”
From The Bognor Regis Observer we have :
Westergate girls were chess queens in 1980
This group of girls had every reason to smile ‘“ they had just pulled off the school chess world’s equivalent of David v Goliath.
“It was January 1980 and they all attended Westergate Comprehensive and Community School and had just beaten the mighty Dorothy Skinner High School, in Brighton, to qualify for the final of the Sussex Girls under-16 chess championships.
The team’s captain, Mandy Hepworth, who was just 11-years-old at the time, was lauded by the school’s chess teacher as “one of the hottest properties in junior chess”.
His name was Peter Barton and, according to the report published in the Observer on January 25 1980, he had masterminded something of a chess resurgence at Westergate.”
Some 50 youngsters at the school were playing chess proficiently and 10 of them were girls.
Even though junior chess was somewhat dominated by boys at the time, Mr Barton was confident his girls could deal with any challenge thrown at them by anyone – and he had high hopes for Mandy.
He told the paper: ‘For a girl she has remarkable ability and we would hope to enter her for the British junior championships later this year.
In the past it has always been a boys’ game but, if you can catch the girls when they are young and keep their enthusiasm, there is no reason why they cannot go on to become masters.’
Does anyone know if the girls won the final? Did Mandy make it to the British junior championships?”
Mandy entered her first major competition when she was 11 and beat her father when she was 14. She became the Under-12 British Girls’ Champion (Ed: this is not correct) and the Under-14 Champion in Brighton, 1980 (shared with Susan Walker), the Under-16 Champion in Brighton, 1984
In 1985 she played in the Eileen Tranmer Memorial in Brighton. All the players resided in the same guest house. The event was organised by Ray Keene. Mandy was 4th with a TPR of 2296.
In 1986 she represented England in the Women’s Olympiad (Dubai) and scored an excellent 75% on the Reserve Board.
In 1988 she played at the Oakham Young Masters and had a tough time scoring 2.5/9
In October 1988 she travelled to Adelaide, Australia to play in the World Under-20 Girls’ Championship.
Following that we have no further information. It would appear (perhaps you can help?) that Mandy gave up competitive chess and did not play again.
We end with this against an experienced opponent :
BCN remembers John Cochrane who passed away on March 2nd 1878.
From The Oxford Companion to Chess by Hooper & Whyld :
Scottish player, barrister, called to the bar in 1822. If the so-called romantic style existed then Cochrane has a claim to be regarded as its founder. A dashing player, he attacked at all costs often sacrificing pieces with abandon, a style that was successful in the England of the 1820s; but when in 1821 he went to Paris, then the world’s chess centre, he was beaten by both Deschapelles and Bourdonnais. Subsequently he studied the game but he did not change his style. In 1822 he published A Treatise on the Game of Chess, a popular book largely based on Traite des Amateurs (see Verdoni) and Lolli but with a few contributions of his own.
Although Cochrane came from an old Scottish family he led the London team in the famous correspondence match against Edinburgh, 1824-8. He persuaded his team to play the Scotch Gambit, but when London had obtained a fine position Cochrane left for India. Although the Londoners, led by Lewis, failed to carry the attack, the Scotch Gambit became fashionable for more than 15 years, and other lively attacking openings were developed.
Cochrane stayed in India until his retirement in 1869 except for one visit to England, 1841-3, when he played hundreds of friendly games against Staunton, who began by winning a large majority, Wilhelm Steinitz knew both contestants and states that their last encounter was a match of 12 games. Staunton conceding pawn and move for the first six- and that Cochrane made an even score when receiving odds but won (-1-3—2— !) when playing on even terms, John Cochrane should not be confused with James Cochrane (c, 1770-1830), co-author of a book on the Muzio gambit.
Here is his Wikipedia entry
The Cochrane Gambit is :
and the Cochrane Variation in the King’s Gambit is :
The Sicilian Defence, Staunton-Cochrane Variation is :
and the Scotch Gambit, Cochrane Variation is :
The Cochrane Defence is a drawing method for in the rook, bishop & king vs rook & king ending.
