The UK Chess Challenge is an annual four-stage chess competition for school-age children from the United Kingdom. Michael Basman created the competition in 1996. The director of the tournament is Sarah Longson (née Hegarty) supported by her husband Alex Longson. Longson is former British Ladies Chess Champion and represents England at Olympiads. Over 40,000 children play in the competition at the school stage and the eventual winner wins £2,000 and is crowned as UK Schools' Chess Challenge Champion. The competition is sponsored by Delancey.
Stages
School
The first stage involves school chess clubs holding a qualifying competition to determine the strongest player for each gender-year combination, e.g. U-11 boys, U-9 girls. Each such player qualifies to enter the county Megafinal competition. For schools without chess clubs, there are alternative competitions called Last Chance Saloons that will also enable qualification to the Megafinal.
Megafinal
A one-day Megafinal is held within most UK counties to determine the strongest player from the county or local area within each gender and year combination. Each such player is titled Supremo (boys) or Suprema (girls). The top player plus all those scoring 3.5/6 or better qualify for the Gigafinal.
Gigafinal
There are usually 3 one-day Gigafinals—one for Northern counties; one for Southern counties and one for the Midlands . As with the Megafinal, each Gigafinal is held to determine the strongest player for the qualifying region within each gender / year combination. Each such player is titled Ultimo (boys) or Ultima (girls). The Ultimo / Ultima players from each Gigafinal qualify to enter the Terafinal Champions competition. Until 2002, the two runners-up in each category qualified to enter the Terafinal Challengers competition. Currently ( in 2019 ) anyone scoring 4 or above qualified for the challengers .
Terafinal
There is 1 final Terafinal competition—The Ultimo's and Ultima's in each age group (including those who were tied on the same score in first place) play in one of the 5 sections depending on age. A contestant can move up to an older age group on request. The sections are: U8, U10, U12, U14 and U18. There are trophies, medals and money given out as prizes depending on the age group.
Challengers
At the moment this event has 5 age groups the same as the Terafinal. The top two players (no matter what gender) that have not already qualified will go to the Terafinals. Any players tied on the same score which is the highest will go to the tiebreaks.
List of winners for the oldest age group
Year Winner 0000 Richard Cleveland 1998 Adam Hunt 1999 Thomas Rendle 2000 Lorin D'Costa 2001 Lorin D'Costa 2002 Lorin D'Costa 2003 Lorin D'Costa 2004 Ben Purton 2005 Stephen Gordon 2006 James Hanley 2007 Peter Poobalasingam 2008 Peter Poobalasingam 2009 Felix Ynojosa (cat, es) 2010 Felix Ynojosa (cat, es) 2011 Yang-Fan Zhou 2012 Brandon Clarke 2013 Marcus Harvey 2014 Marcus Harvey 2015 Matthew Wadsworth 2016 Joseph McPhillips 2017 Harry Grieve 2018 Koby Kalavannan 2019 Koby Kalavannan 2022 Yichen Han 2023 Artem Lutsko
References
- McClain, Dylan Loeb (6 November 2022). "Michael Basman, Chess Master Known for 'Bad' Openings, Dies at 76". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 7 November 2022.
- "Michael Basman obituary". The Times. 7 November 2022. Archived from the original on 7 November 2022.
- "Michael Basman, chess champion known as a quirky tactician and a keen promoter of the game – obituary". The Telegraph. 30 October 2022. Archived from the original on 30 October 2022.