Birthday of FM Alexander Longson (01-x-1982)
Tag Archives: UKCC
Birthday of FM Alexander Longson (01-x-1982)
Birthday of FM Alexander Longson (01-x-1982)
Birthday of FM Alexander Longson (01-x-1982)
Remembering IM Mike Basman (16-iii-1946 26-x-2022)
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.


Birthday of GM Ravi Haria (07-ii-1999)
BCN sends birthday wishes to GM Ravi Haria.
Ravi Haria was born Sunday, February 7th, 1999 in Elstree, Hertfordshire. “Maria” by Blondie was top of the hit parade. Ravi currently resides in London.
Ravi attended Lonsdale School in Barnet and then The Haberdashers’ Aske’s Boys’ School and now reads History at University College, London.

Ravi learnt at the age of 6 and joined Barnet Knights Chess Club in 2005.
Ravi’s first recorded tournament was the 35th Barnet Knights Under-8 rapidplay on September 25th 2005. Also playing of note were Jonathan Pein and Isaac Sanders.
His first recorded standard play game was in the London Junior Under-10 Championships on December 9th 2006.
By the time he was eight he had attracted the attention of the England selectors and played in the 2008 Commonwealth Championships in New Delhi coming home with a bronze medal.


In 2008 Ravi won the British Under-9 title in Liverpool. He said afterwards:
It was quite nice to be leading everyone and I felt proud of myself. I’m not sure how I control my nerves but it feels really good to win.
His mother Sona said:
It’s a bit overwhelming but we just support him. It means you have to give up a lot of time for him but it’s really nice to see that he’s getting somewhere.
This was followed in 2014 by winning the British Under-18 championship in Aberystwyth aged 15 and then the same title in 2017 in Llandudno.

In 2016 Ravi was equal 2nd to Deep Sengupta at the Hastings Masters Open with an impressive 6/9 and a TPR of 2563. This performance secured his second IM norm.
The IM title was conferred at the 88th FIDE Congress 2017, 7-15 October, Goynuk, Antalya, Turkey.
He scored six points after 11 rounds at the 2017 World Junior championship in Italy and 5.5 points at the 2017 WYCC U-18 group in Uruguay.
Ravi completed his British junior titles run by becoming the current (no OTB event in 2020) British Under-21 champion in 2019 in Torquay scoring an emphatic 6.5/9 securing a share of third place.

Ravi became a FIDE Master in 2015 at the age of 16 and and International Master two years later making him England’s second youngest IM after Matthew Wadsworth.

His peak FIDE rating was 2497 in October 2021 and currently (February 2022) is 2490.
In 2019 Ravi teamed up with IM Adam C. Taylor to join Adam’s Making Grandmasters training venture.

On January 28th 2021 Thinker’s Publishing released The Modernised Anti-Sicilians, Volume 1, Rossolimo Variation which is a massive 520 page tome on the following position :
which was reviewed by FM Richard Webb.
which we hope will be followed by at least Volume 2!

Ravi has plus scores against : Matthew Turner, Simon Williams, William Claridge Hansen, Bob Eames, David Eggleston and Arul Gupta to name but a few.

With the white pieces Ravi unsurprisingly plays the Moscow and Rossolimo variations against the Sicilian, the Ruy Lopez and, in recent years, he has adopted the Reti/English complex.
As the second player he plays the French Winawer and (refreshingly) the Abrahams-Noteboom Variation of the Semi-Slav.
For your entertainment we have these two brevities :
and
Ravi has played for University College London. Hendon and Cavendish in the London and other leagues and in 4NCL he started with Kings Head, transferring to Cambridge in 2014 and finally moving in 2016 to Wood Green.
In this game Ravi punishes IM Malcolm Pein who has a bad day at the office :

Ravi is Mesutgm on chess.com and lichess
Over the 19th – 23rd August 2021 Ravi played in the Wood Green Invitational round-robin event at Oddfellows Hall, Stafford.
Ravi scored 7.5/10 and secured his second Grandmaster Norm and a TPR of 2680.

Over the August Bank Holiday weekend of 2021 Ravi played in the Northumbrian Masters GM Tournament at the splendid Marriott MetroCentre, Gateshead winning jointly with Conor Murphy scoring 6.5/9 with a TPR of 2600. This gave Ravi his third and final GM norm.
The norm was ratified at a recent FIDE Congress. As of February 2022 Ravi stood at 2490 for standard-play.
Birthday of GM Ravi Haria (07-ii-1999)
BCN sends birthday wishes to GM Ravi Haria.
Ravi Haria was born Sunday, February 7th, 1999 in Elstree, Hertfordshire. “Maria” by Blondie was top of the hit parade. Ravi currently resides in London.
Ravi attended Lonsdale School in Barnet and then The Haberdashers’ Aske’s Boys’ School and now reads History at University College, London.

Ravi learnt at the age of 6 and joined Barnet Knights Chess Club in 2005.
Ravi’s first recorded tournament was the 35th Barnet Knights Under-8 rapidplay on September 25th 2005. Also playing of note were Jonathan Pein and Isaac Sanders.
His first recorded standard play game was in the London Junior Under-10 Championships on December 9th 2006.
By the time he was eight he had attracted the attention of the England selectors and played in the 2008 Commonwealth Championships in New Delhi coming home with a bronze medal.


In 2008 Ravi won the British Under-9 title in Liverpool. He said afterwards:
It was quite nice to be leading everyone and I felt proud of myself. I’m not sure how I control my nerves but it feels really good to win.
His mother Sona said:
It’s a bit overwhelming but we just support him. It means you have to give up a lot of time for him but it’s really nice to see that he’s getting somewhere.
This was followed in 2014 by winning the British Under-18 championship in Aberystwyth aged 15 and then the same title in 2017 in Llandudno.

In 2016 Ravi was equal 2nd to Deep Sengupta at the Hastings Masters Open with an impressive 6/9 and a TPR of 2563. This performance secured his second IM norm.
The IM title was conferred at the 88th FIDE Congress 2017, 7-15 October, Goynuk, Antalya, Turkey.
He scored six points after 11 rounds at the 2017 World Junior championship in Italy and 5.5 points at the 2017 WYCC U-18 group in Uruguay.
Ravi completed his British junior titles run by becoming the current (no OTB event in 2020) British Under-21 champion in 2019 in Torquay scoring an emphatic 6.5/9 securing a share of third place.

Ravi became a FIDE Master in 2015 at the age of 16 and and International Master two years later making him England’s second youngest IM after Matthew Wadsworth.

His peak FIDE rating was 2497 in October 2021 and currently (February 2022) is 2490.
In 2019 Ravi teamed up with IM Adam C. Taylor to join Adam’s Making Grandmasters training venture.

On January 28th 2021 Thinker’s Publishing released The Modernised Anti-Sicilians, Volume 1, Rossolimo Variation which is a massive 520 page tome on the following position :
which was reviewed by FM Richard Webb.
which we hope will be followed by at least Volume 2!

Ravi has plus scores against : Matthew Turner, Simon Williams, William Claridge Hansen, Bob Eames, David Eggleston and Arul Gupta to name but a few.

With the white pieces Ravi unsurprisingly plays the Moscow and Rossolimo variations against the Sicilian, the Ruy Lopez and, in recent years, he has adopted the Reti/English complex.
As the second player he plays the French Winawer and (refreshingly) the Abrahams-Noteboom Variation of the Semi-Slav.
For your entertainment we have these two brevities :
and
Ravi has played for University College London. Hendon and Cavendish in the London and other leagues and in 4NCL he started with Kings Head, transferring to Cambridge in 2014 and finally moving in 2016 to Wood Green.
In this game Ravi punishes IM Malcolm Pein who has a bad day at the office :

Ravi is Mesutgm on chess.com and lichess
Over the 19th – 23rd August 2021 Ravi played in the Wood Green Invitational round-robin event at Oddfellows Hall, Stafford.
Ravi scored 7.5/10 and secured his second Grandmaster Norm and a TPR of 2680.

Over the August Bank Holiday weekend of 2021 Ravi played in the Northumbrian Masters GM Tournament at the splendid Marriott MetroCentre, Gateshead winning jointly with Conor Murphy scoring 6.5/9 with a TPR of 2600. This gave Ravi his third and final GM norm.
The norm was ratified at a recent FIDE Congress. As of February 2022 Ravi stood at 2490 for standard-play.
Birthday of GM Ravi Haria (07-ii-1999)
BCN sends birthday wishes to GM Ravi Haria.
Ravi Haria was born Sunday, February 7th, 1999 in Elstree, Hertfordshire. “Maria” by Blondie was top of the hit parade. Ravi currently resides in London.
Ravi attended Lonsdale School in Barnet and then The Haberdashers’ Aske’s Boys’ School and now reads History at University College, London.

Ravi learnt at the age of 6 and joined Barnet Knights Chess Club in 2005.
Ravi’s first recorded tournament was the 35th Barnet Knights Under-8 rapidplay on September 25th 2005. Also playing of note were Jonathan Pein and Isaac Sanders.
His first recorded standard play game was in the London Junior Under-10 Championships on December 9th 2006.
By the time he was eight he had attracted the attention of the England selectors and played in the 2008 Commonwealth Championships in New Delhi coming home with a bronze medal.


In 2008 Ravi won the British Under-9 title in Liverpool. He said afterwards:
It was quite nice to be leading everyone and I felt proud of myself. I’m not sure how I control my nerves but it feels really good to win.
His mother Sona said:
It’s a bit overwhelming but we just support him. It means you have to give up a lot of time for him but it’s really nice to see that he’s getting somewhere.
This was followed in 2014 by winning the British Under-18 championship in Aberystwyth aged 15 and then the same title in 2017 in Llandudno.

In 2016 Ravi was equal 2nd to Deep Sengupta at the Hastings Masters Open with an impressive 6/9 and a TPR of 2563. This performance secured his second IM norm.
The IM title was conferred at the 88th FIDE Congress 2017, 7-15 October, Goynuk, Antalya, Turkey.
He scored six points after 11 rounds at the 2017 World Junior championship in Italy and 5.5 points at the 2017 WYCC U-18 group in Uruguay.
Ravi completed his British junior titles run by becoming the current (no OTB event in 2020) British Under-21 champion in 2019 in Torquay scoring an emphatic 6.5/9 securing a share of third place.

Ravi became a FIDE Master in 2015 at the age of 16 and and International Master two years later making him England’s second youngest IM after Matthew Wadsworth.

His peak FIDE rating was 2497 in October 2021 and currently (February 2022) is 2490.
In 2019 Ravi teamed up with IM Adam C. Taylor to join Adam’s Making Grandmasters training venture.

On January 28th 2021 Thinker’s Publishing released The Modernised Anti-Sicilians, Volume 1, Rossolimo Variation which is a massive 520 page tome on the following position :
which was reviewed by FM Richard Webb.
which we hope will be followed by at least Volume 2!

Ravi has plus scores against : Matthew Turner, Simon Williams, William Claridge Hansen, Bob Eames, David Eggleston and Arul Gupta to name but a few.

With the white pieces Ravi unsurprisingly plays the Moscow and Rossolimo variations against the Sicilian, the Ruy Lopez and, in recent years, he has adopted the Reti/English complex.
As the second player he plays the French Winawer and (refreshingly) the Abrahams-Noteboom Variation of the Semi-Slav.
For your entertainment we have these two brevities :
and
Ravi has played for University College London. Hendon and Cavendish in the London and other leagues and in 4NCL he started with Kings Head, transferring to Cambridge in 2014 and finally moving in 2016 to Wood Green.
In this game Ravi punishes IM Malcolm Pein who has a bad day at the office :

Ravi is Mesutgm on chess.com and lichess
Over the 19th – 23rd August 2021 Ravi played in the Wood Green Invitational round-robin event at Oddfellows Hall, Stafford.
Ravi scored 7.5/10 and secured his second Grandmaster Norm and a TPR of 2680.

Over the August Bank Holiday weekend of 2021 Ravi played in the Northumbrian Masters GM Tournament at the splendid Marriott MetroCentre, Gateshead winning jointly with Conor Murphy scoring 6.5/9 with a TPR of 2600. This gave Ravi his third and final GM norm.
The norm was ratified at a recent FIDE Congress. As of February 2022 Ravi stood at 2490 for standard-play.
Birthday of GM Ravi Haria (07-ii-1999)
BCN sends birthday wishes to GM Ravi Haria.
Ravi Haria was born Sunday, February 7th, 1999 in Elstree, Hertfordshire. “Maria” by Blondie was top of the hit parade. Ravi currently resides in London.
Ravi attended Lonsdale School in Barnet and then The Haberdashers’ Aske’s Boys’ School and now reads History at University College, London.

Ravi learnt at the age of 6 and joined Barnet Knights Chess Club in 2005.
Ravi’s first recorded tournament was the 35th Barnet Knights Under-8 rapidplay on September 25th 2005. Also playing of note were Jonathan Pein and Isaac Sanders.
His first recorded standard play game was in the London Junior Under-10 Championships on December 9th 2006.
By the time he was eight he had attracted the attention of the England selectors and played in the 2008 Commonwealth Championships in New Delhi coming home with a bronze medal.


In 2008 Ravi won the British Under-9 title in Liverpool. He said afterwards:
It was quite nice to be leading everyone and I felt proud of myself. I’m not sure how I control my nerves but it feels really good to win.
His mother Sona said:
It’s a bit overwhelming but we just support him. It means you have to give up a lot of time for him but it’s really nice to see that he’s getting somewhere.
This was followed in 2014 by winning the British Under-18 championship in Aberystwyth aged 15 and then the same title in 2017 in Llandudno.

In 2016 Ravi was equal 2nd to Deep Sengupta at the Hastings Masters Open with an impressive 6/9 and a TPR of 2563. This performance secured his second IM norm.
The IM title was conferred at the 88th FIDE Congress 2017, 7-15 October, Goynuk, Antalya, Turkey.
He scored six points after 11 rounds at the 2017 World Junior championship in Italy and 5.5 points at the 2017 WYCC U-18 group in Uruguay.
Ravi completed his British junior titles run by becoming the current (no OTB event in 2020) British Under-21 champion in 2019 in Torquay scoring an emphatic 6.5/9 securing a share of third place.

Ravi became a FIDE Master in 2015 at the age of 16 and and International Master two years later making him England’s second youngest IM after Matthew Wadsworth.

His peak FIDE rating was 2497 in October 2021 and currently (February 2022) is 2490.
In 2019 Ravi teamed up with IM Adam C. Taylor to join Adam’s Making Grandmasters training venture.

On January 28th 2021 Thinker’s Publishing released The Modernised Anti-Sicilians, Volume 1, Rossolimo Variation which is a massive 520 page tome on the following position :
which was reviewed by FM Richard Webb.
which we hope will be followed by at least Volume 2!

Ravi has plus scores against : Matthew Turner, Simon Williams, William Claridge Hansen, Bob Eames, David Eggleston and Arul Gupta to name but a few.
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With the white pieces Ravi unsurprisingly plays the Moscow and Rossolimo variations against the Sicilian, the Ruy Lopez and, in recent years, he has adopted the Reti/English complex.
As the second player he plays the French Winawer and (refreshingly) the Abrahams-Noteboom Variation of the Semi-Slav.
For your entertainment we have these two brevities :
and
Ravi has played for University College London. Hendon and Cavendish in the London and other leagues and in 4NCL he started with Kings Head, transferring to Cambridge in 2014 and finally moving in 2016 to Wood Green.
In this game Ravi punishes IM Malcolm Pein who has a bad day at the office :
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Ravi is Mesutgm on chess.com and lichess
Over the 19th – 23rd August 2021 Ravi played in the Wood Green Invitational round-robin event at Oddfellows Hall, Stafford.
Ravi scored 7.5/10 and secured his second Grandmaster Norm and a TPR of 2680.
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Over the August Bank Holiday weekend of 2021 Ravi played in the Northumbrian Masters GM Tournament at the splendid Marriott MetroCentre, Gateshead winning jointly with Conor Murphy scoring 6.5/9 with a TPR of 2600. This gave Ravi his third and final GM norm.
The norm was ratified at a recent FIDE Congress. As of February 2022 Ravi stood at 2490 for standard-play.
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.
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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 and usage of IT.
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According to the ECF Sarah’s nominal club is Marple but she also plays for Stockport and 4NCL 3Cs.
