Wanstead & Woodford Chess Club
Season 2000/01
Blitz Championship
John Wagstaff Cup
Play-off - 10th July 2001
| 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | Total | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Steve Gilmour | 1w | 0 | 1 | 1w | 3 | ||
| 2 | Larry Marden | 0 | 1w | 0w | 1 | 2 | ||
| 3 | Julian Winkworth | 0w | 0 | 1 | 0w | 1 |
The Blitz Championship tournament, held on 15th May 2001, resulted in a three-way tie between Julian Winkworth, Larry Marden and Steve Gilmour, in his first full season with the Club.
The play-off was held on 10th July and followed the format of the initial tournament, blitz games with 10 minutes on each clock per game. The triangular play-off was double round.
The event opened with a shock result in the first game with the outsider Steve Gilmour winning with the black pieces against Julian Winkworth. But it was a close-run thing; when Gilmour mated Winkworth with king and promoted queen v king, Gilmour had three seconds left against Julian's four - wonderful things these digital game timers.
Gilmour showed this result and indeed, his presence in the play-off, was no fluke by taking the point in his next game, against Marden. Winkworth then kept his chances alive with a win on time against Marden.
The first cycle therefore finished with Gilmour on 2/2, Winkworth 1 and Marden no score.
Gilmour remained in assured mood in beating Winkworth for the third time (once in the original tournament and twice here), thereby wrapping up the Blitz Championship with two rounds to spare. This left the other two to slug it out for second place.
Marden scored his first point with a clock win over the new Blitz Champion and then secured second place by completing a miserable evening for Winkworth.
So our new member has made his mark at the Club in quick time. He perhaps feels some affinity to Goran Ivanisevic: feeling lucky to have made the play-off, he then stormed through the opposition to clinch a memorable victory! His touch was assured, he stayed cool under pressure and, perhaps most importantly, handled the clock well. Many congratulations to him.
IDH