Irish Chess Union AGM 2022

cdeb

There's no ageism

There's nobody at the senior events willing to write a report so all can follow the events

sodacat11

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119855013#Comment_119855013

I was ICU PRO for a year. I've taught literally hundreds of children to play chess. I've organised at least five rated tournaments and dozens of unrated ones and I've given away many free chess books to children. You should check your facts before you start mouthing off but hey why break with tradition?

sodacat11

I didn't write a report on Dresden because I didn't play in it. I didn't write reports on the numerous other tournaments I've played in this year because I'm not interested in self promotion. I "moan" as Retd Cpt Loyola calls it when I see injustice and there is plenty of that in Irish Chess the latest being a friend of mine getting a two year ban for allegedly doing something that wouldn't have got anyone else even a 2 hour ban but since there is an appeal going on I won't comment further,,,for now.

Mod edit - personal insult removed

sodacat11

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119856890#Comment_119856890

You omitted to say how much is spent on the seniors in Irish chess,,,,,,,,or did you?

sodacat11

I didn't write a report on Dresden because I didn't play in it. I didn't write reports on the numerous other tournaments I've played in this year because I'm not interested in self promotion. I "moan" as Retd Cpt Loyola calls it when I see injustice and there is plenty of that in Irish Chess the latest being a friend of mine getting a two year ban for allegedly doing something that wouldn't have got anyone else even a 2 hour ban but since there is an appeal going on I won't comment further,,,for now

sodacat11

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119855013#Comment_119855013

I was ICU PRO for a year. I've taught literally hundreds of children to play chess and I've organised numerous tournaments, some rated, so I've done more than most for chess. I'm not one for committees or AGMs.EGMs, reading minutes, talking "through the chair" or any of the other nonsense that goes on when groups of officious people get together so I steer well clear of such things.

Retd.LoyolaCpt

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119867972#Comment_119867972

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119868537#Comment_119868537

From what I previously wrote:

Norm and 50+ events: 7k per year. I guess 1-2k on senior events out of that.

Adult International team costs (exlc olympiad): 1.5k. This is mostly 50+/65+ entry fees.

My point is from a monetary perspective, there is more spent on 50+/65+ events as they don't break even.

I'm assuming that both of your points are that more voluntary time is spent on junior rather than senior events? Volunteers come onto the ICU or volunteer for Irish chess for things they care about generally. At any given time, 1/3 to 1/2 of those involved who get involved are specifically coming on to help junior chess. In my experience, no one has come on to the committee to volunteer to run senior events - which is started it and why I've run it for 4-5 years. Otherwise, it wouldn't happen. I have advertised for a senior officer for 4 years at this point and have never had a taker.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119869105#Comment_119869105

You haven't volunteered in this instance - from my position, you spend hours of time on here when you could write a simple report or email someone in the ICU to post a message.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119869085#Comment_119869085

This is nothing to do with self promotion if all you want to do is say here is the chess-results link for some event.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119868497#Comment_119868497

Apologies to both sodacat and joe. I'm aware of both of your work and I unfairly ignored it.

My points remain that in this instance, I see no ageism and I would urge you to mention it to an ICU official if you want something done on the ICU site.

Joedryan

Fair play @Retd.LoyolaCpt , on the ageism thing I was chiming in more on general terms, it has always been an issue IMHO

sodacat11

Two Irish players competing in the World Seniors this week, Gabriel Mirza and Tim Harding. Great draw for Gabriel in round 1, Tim struggling so far.

Meanwhile three of Ireland's brightest young talents I.M David Fitzsimons, FM Joe Ryan and the untitled but brilliantly talented Sodacat https://www.sunwaychessfestival.com/ will be playing in one of the world's strongest opens in just over three weeks time.

corkcitychess

a bit late now but from the Dresden event I can say overall it was a very enjoyable event and my first time being captain of an Irish chess team hence my dismal performance of 2/7 ;)

The weather was fantastic for October and it was great to catch up with some familiar names from the distant past. The hotel accommodation was 5 star with 3 star Dublin prices! Most evenings groups of us went to dine out at different restaurants in the cultural quarter of the city. 4 of the 13 strong Irish contingent brought their partners and one brought one of his sons so that made a large contingent of 18.

a small cut and paste from Tim's site:

"Especially notable were the results of our top board players: FM John Delaney who scored 6.5/8 in the 50+ section, IM Mark Orr who scored 5.5/9 for Ireland-1 in the 65+ tournament and Colm Quigley who scored 5/9 for Ireland-2. Paul Wallace, on board 2 for the 50+ team, also did very well, scoring 5.5/8."

I believe this event also marked Mark Orr's return to Irish chess after a 10 year absence....welcome back Mark.

other notable results were a few upsets by Gabriel Matthews against much higher rated players.

At the other end of the table Brendan Lyons and myself were not doing so well. Brendan was unhappy with getting 5 blacks and 2 whites but I discovered it is a tricky job being captain sometimes and hard to balance colours with players getting an equal number of games. My no. 1 priority was to give all players an equal number of games.

I had envisaged that (we the 50+ had a squad of 5 whereas the 2 65+ teams only had squads of 4 so they all played every day with no rest day) my team players would each get 7 games and the top performing player would get 8 games....as it happened Gabriel requested a third rest day so he (at his choice) ended up with 6 games thus giving John and Paul 8 games each and Brendan and myself 7 games.

Did I mention that Brendan had 5 blacks and 2 whites? by a strange co-incidence I ended up with 5 whites and 2 blacks so everything levelled up in the end ;) joking apart the Irish team due to their good performance had a few upfloats and downfloats so that had an effect on the draw and colours on a few days.

A lot of photos can be found here taken by the Austrian board 4 and professional photographer Peter Kranzl (a strong Austrian prespective but if you have the patience there are many stunning scenic pics and some of the Irish teams also.)

https://schachunddarts.at/Senioren%20EM%20Dresden/

and a great pic of team Ireland 50+ in action here:

https://schachunddarts.at/senioren-em-dresden/nggallery/page/8#gallery/e002754f666fe18ba64e5a4982150b32/25832

corkcitychess

and some pics by an amateur photographer with a cheap camera

Joedryan

Those are brilliant photos @corkcitychess

On the AGM has anybody got a link to the minutes? We still need to follow up on the Irish ch as seems no official response strangely

Oh, and well done to all the Seniors. great stuff :)

sodacat11

After an excellent draw against a 2600+ GM yesterday in Sitges I.M David Fitzsimons is playing against Vasily Ivanchuk today!!

Joedryan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119995680#Comment_119995680

Apparently 3 people are randomly selected each day for an electronic scan, which is a good thing in my opinion.

I got selected today, which if they had seen my failure of technique they might not of bothered:) On a serious note there seem to be lots of promising under-rated juniors in the event.

sodacat11

David Fitzsimons missed a win in his game v Ivanchuk, probably he gave him too much respect and didn't expect him to blunder.

I had a 100 move five and a quarter hour draw against a 1300 rated player yesteray. I had a winning position (+12 according to Fritz) in an ending where I had N+P v B but even a GM couldn't find the win when I showed it to him despite spending 20 minutes on it. Chess can be a cruel game at times.