Bristol and Hereford

Ten days away from home this time and the first time that we have done congresses back to back without returning to base. We started with the Bristol Congress, a four day affair with a rapidplay on the Saturday followed by a three day long play. John and I both played in the rapidplay, but I have to say that I made blunder after blunder and only finished on 1 out of 6. I found moving down to 25 minutes after playing 4 hour games a real problem and in future will probably play some 30 minute games against John in preparation. John scored .

Neither of us played in the long play event as the round times were afternoon and evening. We just couldn’t fit a main meal together around running the bookstall and when we would be playing. Instead, we went off for a meal at the start of the evening round and a friend kept an eye on the books whilst we were gone. We varied our destinations – if we aren’t careful we live off Wetherspoon’s 2 meal deal. Fortunately there was also the Hog’s Head doing a two meal deal, and a pizza ‘eat as much as you can’ for £3.99.

Our campsite in Bristol is a wonderfully old fashioned farm site. It’s on the edge of Western-super-mare and is definitely better when the sun is shining! The shower block is good, with four large showers in each of the gents and ladies. The field is flat and there is electric hook-up. Other than that there are fresh free-range eggs for sale. No TV, no bar, no clubroom, no children’s play area. Just a quiet site. It’s also very reasonably priced, so it worked out cheaper to stay on for a couple of extra nights than to drive back home and then almost straight back out to Hereford.

So, what did we do with our two days off? We went to an auction viewing on the Wednesday and to the auction on the Thursday. Unfortunately the lots that we were interested in went above our limit so we came away empty handed. The day wasn’t wasted though as we then headed off to Clivedon Court – a National Trust property. It is an interesting medieval house that is still part lived in today.
On the Friday we packed up the tent in the morning, headed off to Ross on Wye, and put the tent back up again. In contrast to the last site, this one was a much bigger commercial site with children’s play area. However, still no clubroom, TV or bar and to be fair was almost silent from 10.30pm onwards. When we have to be up early in the mornings to play chess you don’t want noise late into the night.

This time John played whilst I looked after the books. Hereford is an under 115 minor section and as John’s grade is now 101, he is playing any minor that isn’t an under 100. He did very well on the Saturday, winning both of his games. He was then down floated on Sunday morning and drew his game. In the afternoon he was down floated again, and again drew. (Shortly before his draw by repetition his opponent had a winning position, but one poor move and a draw could be forced). Fortunately there had been some other draws on the top boards and the tournament leader was only half a point ahead of John.

On Monday John faced a player that he had always lost to before, and this time was no exception. With opposite side castling it was always going to be a knife-edge game and I gather that in places it was quite exciting, until John decided to blunder his queen, he resigned soon afterwards. In the afternoon John needed a win to put him into the prize money. He got a winning position, which he then managed to turn into a losing position, before finally scraping a draw.