Annual Report 2021 - 2022
The University of Warwick Chess Society has had a ground breaking year, rebuilding from Covid 19 and hitting many more new firsts! We achieved a record 250 members (with 220 joining within the first twenty days of Term 1). This allowed us to field six teams in the local League, and eight teams to the 2022 British Universities’ Chess Championships also winning the BUCA Championships for the 4th time!
Our usual events, from the Summer Barbeque, the Freshers’ Tournament, the Leamington Bar Crawl, the Christmas Meal, to the Skool Dayz Chess Circle, continued to be roaring social occasions. Chess wise, the Don’t Stress Play Chess outdoor chess sessions, the Freshers’ Tournament, and the Simultaneous Display with GM Keith Arkell were a hit, along with the usual trips to the Birmingham, and Coventry Rapidplays. We’ve been delighted to introduce the new Warwick Autumn Open, herald a post pandemic return of the 4th Warwick FIDE & ECF Rapidplay Tournament, and introduce our first Warwick Chess XI Football Team. On inclusion, diversity, and widening participation, the Society has made brand new steps, with (1) new weekly Warwick Womens’ Clubnights, (2) new fortnightly Warwick 2200+ Clubnights for the strongest players, and (3) a re established Warwick Chess in Schools team. We held our first public 24-hour Charity Chess Marathon, fundraising for Care Education Trust. Final year members and alumni, can now look forward to joining the new Warwick Chess Alumni Association set up this year!
Year in Summary
Big thanks goes to all our members, the 2021 22 Executive Team, and our sponsor Optiver, for making all these achievements possible!
Meghana Mohan, & James Parkinson President(s) 2022 2023 University of Warwick Chess Society
Key Successes 2021-22 Rebuilding in a post-Covid era... • A record 252 members • Largest British University Chess Society • National: British Universities’ Champions 2022 • Local: Coventry League Champions 2022 • International: One 20/20 Chess Team • National: Eight BUCA Teams • Local: Six Coventry League Teams • Freshers’ Tournament: 91 Players + 3 Arbiters! • Warwick Autumn Open: 60 Players • GM Keith Arkell Simultaneous: 65 (57 8 to Keith!) • 4th Warwick Rapidplay: 90 players (Hitting full capacity!) • Chess Football Squad: 33 players • Set up Warwick Womens’ Chess Club 32 Players • Set up Warwick 2200+ Club 12 players • Warwick Chess in Schools - 22 Team Members • Charities: 24 Hour Chess – fundraising for Care Education Trust. • Society Trips: Birmingham, and Coventry Rapidplays! • Set up the Warwick Chess Alumni Association! Sponsored for 6 years by
Given the success of the society across the last five years, the structure of the society today, reflects this growth. We are always looking to continuously improve and deliver great competitive, internal, social, womens’ chess, charity, online, training, and outreach events, to all our 250 members and the wider local community
With an eighteen member Executive Committee, the President(s) and Treasurer is responsible for setting the overall direction of the society, and for the society’s finances. This work is supported by an Non Executive Chairman, usually a former President / senior member of the executive still involved in the Society, able to provide advice, continuity, maintains links with the Alumni Association.
The rest of this report will surmise the regular activities that we organised this year look out for all the new events too! As ever, these achievements would not be possible without all the hard work from our members, the whole 2021-22 Executive Committee, and the generous support of the Warwick Students’ Union, and our sponsor, Optiver a global market maker. In particular, it has been a pleasure this year to welcome representatives of the local Coventry & District League, the English Chess Federation, and Chessable to witness our success.
1. The Big Picture
The three Vice Presidents (Publicity and Communications; Competitive Chess and External Affairs; Internal Affairs and Casual Chess) chair one Sub Committee each, to ensure that weekly, monthly, and yearly events are delivered effectively. Sub Committees meet regularly, whilst the full Executive Committee meets at least twice per term. To keep track of all our events, this exec structure was conceived this year (2021 22) by Chun Chiu and Ziad Fakhoury, which has been maintained for 2022 23 and the foreseeable future. All communications between Executive Members are conducted in organised Discord channels, to optimise decision making, so that it is much easier to follow and keep track of all our activities. We try to follow best practice, akin to how Slack is used in business and industry.
1.1
Freshers’ Week
Freshers’ Week is as always the most important week of the year for recruitment; as a University, we get an influx of new members every year! This year, we gave out 2,000 flyers advertising our first week, which include our Freshers’ Clubnight (Week 0 Thursday), where 100+ new members attended! During this time, we always design a promotional video that runs through all of Term 1 on the Piazza Big Screen in the centre of Warwick campus, which all students will pass As ever, we had a huge presence and interest during this years’ Freshers’ Fair, as well as throughout Arrivals Weekend (Week 0) on the Piazza, outside the Student Union) fuelled by the marketing genius of Ziad Fakhoury, last year’s online chess boon, and the Queens’ Gambit Effect!
Afterwards, it was a pleasure to welcome our new members to their first Society social at Bar Fusion, on campus., before going to the T Bar Pool tables!
1.2 Freshers’ Tournament
Results: https://chess results.com/tnr582060.aspx?lan=1&art=4
During Freshers’ Week, our second major event is the Freshers’ Tournament (Week 0 Saturday)
This year, we had ninety one players plus three arbiters and a number of spectators! The organisation for this event took immense planning and precision processing all the entries showing up on the day, is no easy feat for any organiser! For extra fun, we had an Armageddon finish for the tie-break. Special shout-out goes to Chun Chiu for the seamless logistics of the day!
2.2 Warwick Womens’ Chess Womens’ Chess Clubnights started this year, running every Thursday 6 7pm from Term 1 to 2, in OC0.05, on the ground floor of the Oculus Building These sessions run directly before general clubnights, so members may attend both in succession! Warwick Womens’ Chess made leaps and bounds this year, with thirty two members, and a number of socials outside of Womens’ Clubnights. Popular events included the Curiositea Social, and the Faculty of Arts Coffee Social, as well as the joint Social with Warwick Women in Engineering Society photos below!
2.3 Socials & Events For a successful comeback from a Covid 19 season, 2021 22 was a make or break year for reviving and revamping on many of the traditional chess calendar! The Chess Summer Barbeque, Ice Skating, the Leamington Bar Crawl, the Skool Dayz Circle, Laser Tag, and the Christmas Meal made a roaring return, as well as Joint Karaoke Night with Psychology Society, and Chess goes Real Ale Festival!
2.4 Society Trips With the return of over the board events, Warwick Chess organised a few trips with minibuses to local Rapidplays in Birmingham and Coventry, as well as to the London Chess Festival on Trafalgar Square. Select members also made trips to far away rapidplays in Golders Green, and further afield.
2.5 Warwick 2200+ Club Led by our inaugural Chair, Holden Davis (2210 Chess.com), Warwick formed the 2200+ Club for the first time, to encourage our top players to play, train, and socialise. 2200+ Club clubnights run every fortnight on Wednesdays, in the new Faculty of Arts Building. To join the 2200+ Club, one must have a 2200 rating or above, for either FIDE, ECF, Chess.com, or Lichess. There are currently twelve active members, with the strongest being Assoc. Professor and FM Sam Chow (2325 FIDE).
Next season, the Society looks forward to the largest trip of the year, staying in Birmingham for the British Universities’ Championships (BUCA). Whilst it was unfortunate that BUCA was held online this year due to Covid uncertainties, we did win the 2022 Championships, for the fourth time in its history!
This year saw the advent of the new Warwick Autumn Open Championships (a Swiss tournament followed by a knock out playoff for the top eight players), as well as the return of 4th Warwick FIDE and ECF Rated Rapidplay Tournament. With Covid, the Society branched out into online streaming, with a new Twitch channel, and videos uploaded to our Youtube channel. Last but not least, we have welcomed many distinguished guests, including English Womens’ Champion (2019 2022) Louise Head, ECF Manager of Arbiters Ravi Sandhu, a special guest from Chessable, and of course, GM Keith Arkell for a simultaneous display.
Weekly Tuesday Coventry League matches, the monthly 20/20 Worldwide Online League, the British Universities’ Championships, the Warwick Rapidplay, the Warwick Autumn Open Championships, special guests to Warwick Chess, and online chess streams covering our players and teams, all come under the Sub Committee for Competitive Chess, coordinated by the Vice President for Competitive Chess and External Affairs, Jonathan Fowler.
3.1 Local - Coventry & District League
Nationally, we were delighted to field eight BUCA teams, and win the 2022 British Universities’ Team Championships (https://twitter.com/bucachess/status/1500381970878115841). Internationally, we play in the 20/20 Chess Worldwide League, and at the time of writing with one round left in the season, Warwick University is ranked 15th out of 140 teams from across the globe (https://results.scorchapp.co.uk/t/worldchessleaguelive2021 2022/standings/10).
3.2 National – BUCA; International - 20/20Chess
Results: https://covchessleague.blogspot.com/2022/05/cdcl season 2021 22 results.html
3 Competitive Chess & External Affairs
This year, Warwick Chess was able to field six teams in the Coventry & District Chess League. The CDCL provides the bulk of competitive chess for our members, with matches running every Tuesday 7.30pm. Some of our stronger players, play for our Solihull in the Birmingham League. This year, Warwick Chess was able to win allthree Divisions of the Coventry League; special thanks goes to all the players, and the three Division captains - Joe Varley, David Maxen, and Tom Campbell.
3.3 The 4th Warwick University Rapidplay After a Covid hiatus, the 4th Warwick University FIDE and ECF Rated Rapidplay, made a dramatic return. The event sold out all 90 spaces a week before the event, a record for Warwick Chess. Next year to anticipate this demand, we are looking at offering 120 spaces. The Rapidplay is known for its low entry fee of £10, as well as, giving all its entry fee takings back into prizes money (& expenses). The Arbiting Team consisted of two Warwick Alumni, FIDE Arbiter Hok Chiu, and National Arbiter Jorel Ali, along with ECF Manager of Arbiters, Ravi Sandhu. Among the players, there were five titled masters, two of whom were members of Warwick Chess. Open: https://chess results.com/tnr609556.aspx?lan=1 Major: https://chess results.com/tnr609593.aspx?lan=1 Minor: https://chess-results.com/tnr609592.aspx?lan=1
3.7 Warwick Online Chess Online chess comprises of fielding competitive teams, running the Warwick Autumn Open Championships, and producing training and streaming content for our members. This year, we introduced our first Online Chess and Tournaments Director, Jack Nolan, who has been instrumental in running some excellent live streams, providing analysis during major games where Warwick players have been competing in! Follow Warwick Chess on Twitch and Youtube!
3.5 Womens’ Competitive Chess
Several members of Warwick Womens’ Chess compete in very high level chess tournaments This season, we have been delighted to see Vash Ravi (Chair of Warwick Womens’ Chess) win the 2021 Coventry & District League Rapidplay Womens’ Champion title. We were also delighted to support Meghana Mohan qualify and compete at the Chessable English Womens’ Championships, in Kenilworth.
3.6 Invited Guest - WFM Louise Head In Term 1, it was a pleasure to welcome back WFM Louise Head, from Edinburgh to our usual Thursday Clubnight, and T-Bar Social. Louise is the 2019 to 2022 (and 2017) English Womens Chess Champion. She is currently Executive Vice Chair for the Warwick Chess Alumni Assoc., and is a former President of the Society. She is currently working towards a PhD in Physics
Meghana had a few ups and down, but members of the old and new Executive Committee (those without exams!) came down to support her, and had a lovely meal with GMs Keith Arkell and Mark Hebden, joined by Irina - a special guest and representative from Chessable!
From the Society’s perspective, training and development, and outreach come hand-in-hand. Resources developed for our beginners and intermediate players, can easily be adapted for our Warwick Chess in Schools programme. Each year, we run a Beginners’ Course, along with supporting intermediate players with more catered support. This year, Simeon Bott and Anuman Goel took the initiative on this, producing worksheets, and organising Puzzle Rush sessions for the members. We have also been delighted to see our Outreach Team, which runs the Warwick Chess in Schools programme, reach twenty-two members - thanks to the diligent efforts of Ben McHugh. The team is funded by Warwick Volunteers (a non profit arm of the University) to go into local primary schools to support chess endeavours. Alongside this, the Team also works with local clubs, in the Coventry & District League.
Society members can find out about our events on all platforms. Callum Doherty has been instrumental this year, in revamping this side of the society. To us, widening participation inside the University, and giving back to the wider local community, are two sides of the same coin; both, very important to us. This year, we ran our first 24-Hour Charity Chess ‘Marathon’ , raising £150+ for CET!
4.1 Outreach, Training & Development
3.8 Warwick Autumn Open Championships
The Warwick Autumn Open Championships, was set up this year to catering for the huge demand for competitive chess matches. The Championships ran over Term 1, comprised of seven rounds of rapidplay chess, played online or in person. Sixty-two players entered. The top eight players (Luke Nelson, Jamie Read, Ivan Nikolov, Anuman Goel, Jake Liang, Taran Jina, Vikas Sajanani, and Ben Lewis) qualified for the knockout play-offs, which was streamed over a DGT Board, for spectators to view over subsequent clubnights. The final match was played at Week 10 Clubnight.
Society communications (Newsletters, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Discord, emails…), producing marketing materials, flyers, banners, charity and fundraising, outreach (Warwick Chess in Schools), training and development, and Don’t Stress Play Chess sessions, come under the Widening Participation Sub Committee. This is chaired by the Vice President for Publicity & Communications.
4 Publicity & Communications
This year, we have been proud to organise our 24 Hour Chess ‘Marathon’, where Warwick Chess played chess round the clock, to raise money for Care Education Trust a charity working globally on education in Asia and Africa. From Wednesday 4pm to Thursday 4pm (Term 2 Week 10), the Society set up stand in the middle of the campus Piazza with a giant chess set, and a number of tables and chess sets for the public to play. We braved the elements, from the rain to sun, to the crowds coming out of Warwick SU’s Pop raising over £150 for charity! Special shout out goes to incoming President (2022 23) James Parkinson, who staying for all24 hours!
4.2 Charities & Fundraising
Branching out, Masters student and Society Chairman, Taran Jina was tasked with setting up an Alumni group that would act as a sister club to Warwick Chess building a network for graduating members of the University society, to stay in touch and occasionally play chess. The Alumni Association has made leaps and bounds in this time. The Alumni returned to the University for Chess Skool Dayz (showing the Covid generation of Warwick Chess how to Circle), organised trips to tournaments in Bristol, Birmingham, and Warwick, fielded teams to compete in online chess leagues, played friendly matches with chess alumni from other universities, organised a Christmas Reunion in London, and travelled to watch Chessboxing at Tufnell Park. Today, the University of Warwick Chess Alumni Association, is a registered English Chess Federation Club, which one can find on the ECF Club Finder!
At the time of writing, the Association are currently organising a Graduate Celebration event for members of Warwick Chess in the Summer of 2022, to celebrate all the graduates across the last few years, in particular, the three Classes of 2022, 2021 and 2020, who are graduating together.
6. Warwick Chess Alumni Association
Warwick Chess Alumni Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/promotedpawns
President(s): Meghana Mohan, & James VPTreasurer:ParkinsonAndyLin(Publicity):Andrew Gissop VP (Competitive): Joe Varley VP (Internal Affairs): Sophie Clark Chairman (NED): Tom Campbell Womens’ Chess Chair(s): Elvire De Thomasson & Ester Dooley 2200+ Club Chair: Victor Stoyanov
Executive Committee 2021-22 Executive Committee 2022-23 Events & Socials: Thu Nga Nguyen Online & Tournaments: Sidharth OutreachPanicker & WP: Warrick Scaife Training & Development: Ben Lewis Logistics & Welfare: Kieran Lang Division 1 Captain: Ivan Nikolov Division 2 Captain: Tommy Coker Division 3 Captain: Eva Pacararu Captain (Football): Andy Hani
Chairman (NED): Taran Jina Events & Socials: Liam Rai & Elvire De
President T1: C. Chiu, Z. Fakhoury President T2: S. Bott, C. Doherty
OnlineThomasson&Tournaments: Jack Nolan Womens’ Chess: Vash Ravi (Chair), Meghana Mohan, Deema Khunda 2200+ Club Chair: Holden Davis Outreach Officer: Ben McHugh Training & Development: Simeon Bott & Anuman Goel Division 1 Captain: Joe Varley Division 2 Captain: David Maxen Division 3 Captain: Tom Campbell Captain (Football): Andy Lin
Treasurer: Maria Giselle VP (Competitive): Jonathan Fowler VP (Internal Affairs): Vikas Sajanani VP (Publicity) Callum Doherty
