Photographs from the 2023 Hampshire Chess Congress which was held 3rd to 4th November 2023. Photographs were taken by Graham Stuart, Martin Simons and Peter Eales. We were missing our normal photographer Keven Lamb and I certainly apologise for my attempts!
Previous years are available from the Gallery page.
Young players shine at the Hampshire Chess Congress
The Hampshire Chess Association 2023 Congress was held at the Lysses Hotel in Fareham on the 3rd to the 5th November 2023 with a record 90 entries playing across three sections.
Iwan Cave (Chandlers Ford) retained the Hampshire Individual Championship and the Silver Rook Trophy on tie-break from Tom Bird (Portsmouth). Two other players also finished level on 4½ points from the six rounds.
The Open section was run as a FIDE rated event for the first time, resulting in a big increase in players competing for the first prize over recent years.
Last year, Iwan became the youngest winner of the Hampshire Individual, a tournament that has been running since 1930, and is now a two-time champion before the age of 17. Iwan now has his eye on Tony Corkett’s record of 10 Championship titles.
In the minor section, another junior and former Pilgrim’s School pupil, Freddie Christou-Moore finished clear first with 5 out of 6, and as the highest scoring Hampshire qualified player in the section he also won the Parsons cup.
The University of Southampton Chess Club was the largest single cohort, with a great turn out of 14 players.
The full list of prize winners is:
OPEN
1st = (4½ pts) Iwan Cave (Chandlers Ford), Finn Schell (Southbourne), Peter Hasson (Farnham), Tom Bird (Portsmouth)
Under-2015 Grading Prize (3½ pts) Richard Thorburn (So’ton Uni), Abhishek Pradhan (Reading), Colin Knight (Basingstoke), David Cordner (Southampton), Kai Sandbrink (Oxford University), Aleksandrs Karasevics (Southampton), Martin Clancy (Ringwood).
The Silver Rook was won by Iwan Cave
The Len Walters Board was won by Tom Bird
MAJOR
1st = (5 pts) Brendan O’Gorman (DHSS), Edward Blanden (Emsworth)
3rd = (4½ pts) Tim Jones (New Milton), Andrew Waters (Rainham Kent)
Under-1750 Grading Prize (4 pts) – Daniel Miller (Horsham)
The Peter Marshall Cup was awarded to Edward Blanden (Emsworth) as the best placed Hampshire qualified player.
MINOR
1st (5 pts) Frederick Christou-Moore (Eton College) who also wins the Parsons Cup
2nd = (4½ pts) Edward Burton (So’ton Uni), Michael Eason (Chichester)
Under-1450 Grading Prize (4 pts) Ben Hermanns (So’ton Uni)
The Gillian Moore Cup – was shared by Helen Archer-Lock (So’ton Uni) in the Major and Rosamund Hale (Southampton) in the Minor with 3½ points
The John Dunleavy Memorial Prize for the best game in any section will be announced later, on the Hampshire website – www.HampshireChess.co.uk
Finally, the Hampshire Chess Association would like to say a big thank you to Kevin Thurlow for his work at this year’s congress. Kevin is a well known arbiter on the UK chess circuit, and has been our arbiter for many years. This weekend he announced our event was his last ever congress as an arbiter.
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