The Real British Championship?

Once upon a time, way back at the beginning of the 90s in fact, I played in a weekend tournament in Swansea. It was a pretty unremarkable affair but for two things: the presence of David Bronstein (he mentions it in his List of Results at the end of Sorcerer's Apprentice, I just looked it up and apparently he scored 4/5 finishing just behind GMs Hebden and Ward) and the name.

Bronstein describes it as an "International Tournament". That's pushing things a bit but I suppose technically his presence alone makes it true. The organisers, however, really went for broke and declared their event to be The British Isles Open. I suspect it was the desire to attract sponsorship (at which they'd been pretty successful if memory serves) rather than delusions of grandeur that was the motivation behind their decision. Either way in reality a provincial weekend five round swiss remains exactly that whatever you choose to call it - a point, I'm quite sure, that was not lost on a single one of the participants.

I'm taking this stroll down memory lane because the start of the sixth Staunton Memorial at Simpsons in the Strand this afternoon has me wondering whether the event going into its penultimate round in Liverpool today is anything other than a two week tournament with a poncey name.

Certainly nobody will claim whoever it is that ends up crowned as 'champion' is the best player in the country this year or even the strongest player active this week. The Staunton Memorial alone has snaffled four leading English GMs who would have expected to have done well in the Championship had they chosen to play there. Mickey Adams and Nigel Short share a ratings superiority over the leading competitors in Liverpool that runs into 100s of elo points while Peter Wells and Jon Speelman, ranked in the bottom third of those playing in London, would have been seeded fifth and sixth respectively had they preferred to head North.

Last year (see the comments box here) EJH noted the clash between the Staunton Memorial and the British Championship and implicitly, it seeemed to me at least, raised the question of whether this was deliberate. True or not the juxtaposition of the two events does rather underline the fact that the tournament to determine the official champion of our country is simply not an attractive proposition for the leading players. I know this is not an original observation and I know, as I mentioned in last year's comments box, that this problem is not unique to chess, but still I think it's a great shame.

Turning things around is no doubt not an easy matter but I'd start by working towards making the championship a twelve participant all-play-all. In the meantime I'd stop calling the winner 'British Champion'. It might not be as pretty but 'Strongest-amongst-those-who-bothered-their-arses-to-turn-up' would at least be more honest.


PS:
Not that winning the whole thing is the only reason to enter a tournament. Congratulations to Jack Rudd who, EJH tells me, achieved an IM norm with his victory over Yang Fan Zhou yesterday. I wonder if he'll go on to match the exploits of my other hero of the week Phillippe Petit. Perhaps a tight-rope walk between the two towers of the Royal Liver Building is in order Jack?