Chess Scotland
Juniors
designed by kids,
for kids!
Dalguise Chess Weekend 2005
By David Oswald
 
“IM
Steven Mannion…. I can beat him!”
These were the ambitious words of Calum Macqueen before his encounter
with the international master. Although despite valiant effort, Calum lost that game, he still went on to win the
tournament with an impressive 5/6. The international master, “Sneaky” Steve
had to settle for the best adult prize with 6/6.
There was an impressive turnout (57 in total!) at the Dalguise
activity weekend 2005 and the chess was played in great spirit over all six
rounds. The eventual winner Calum Macqueen, used his quick thinking and knowledge of
unusual gambits (including a win with d4 Nf6 g4!? against Ian Macgregor)
to capture the title from last years winner Hugh Brechin.
Hugh as well as Robbie Coleman and Blair Hawthorne finished
in joint second place with 4.5 out of 6. Under 16 British Girls Champion, Lynsey Shovlin finished
on 4 out of 6 and won the Best Girl’s prize (taking advantage of her sex
again!). Jamie Robertson obtained the late starter prize after he
achieved 3 points out of his last 4 games. The giant Killer prize went to Emma
Grant who managed to beat an opponent who was a massive 474 points higher
than her. This is an incredible achievement and just proves that you should
never be pessimistic about a game if an opponent has a higher grade than you.
The under 1250 grading prize was shared by Andrew McClement
and Calum Vipond.
The under 900 grading prize was achieved by Johnathon
Scott and the under 500 grading prize went to Morvan
Petrie, who filled in for the unfortunate, Craig Petrie. The final
prize and possibly the most precious was the draw of the “golden ticket”.
With all the names in the hat we all anticipated who would gain free access
to every tournament in Scotland
with the “golden ticket”. The draw was made and Allister
Jarvie won, however as he plays few tournaments
he generously offered a re-draw. The suspense and tension was evident as the
re-draw began and Lynsey pulled another
random name… The winner was Sam Gregory from Edinburgh who immediately and excitedly
shouted “That’s me!” Many congratulations Sam.
Now with the chess out of the way we move onto the real reason why everyone
turned up to Dalguise… The Activities!
On a wild Friday night, my dorm was
full of excitement and anticipation of the next day. We stayed up especially
late (to the displeasure of Stuart Leslie) and all woke on Saturday
morning eager for breakfast. Many others had suffered from a lack of sleep
also, but still dragged themselves out of bed ready for the first of the
activities.
My group’s first activity was Jacobs Ladder. This was an excellent
team building exercise, which involved trying to climb as high as possible up
the logs by using each other and the ropes. However the next activity and
quite possibly one of the scariest experiences of my life was the Trapeze.
Lynsey Shovlin on the Trapeze
This involved climbing up to a
launch pad, on which your feet barely were able to fit and have the courage
to jump off and try to catch a Trapeze bar, which is more than six
metres above the ground. Most people participated in this frightening
activity, including some of the youngest members on this weekend trip who
bravely jumped from the dangerous and dithering heights of the launch pad.
Personally I aged 10 years after the first attempt and vowed never to attempt
this again……well until next year at least.
After this exhilarating activity we all grabbed some lunch and chatted
amongst ourselves about the different activities. Some of us decided to
participate in a game of football. It was an enthralling encounter and ended
in a fascinating draw with “Sneaky” Steve (Mannion)
slyly and stealthily scoring a sensational header with a shrewd and sneaky
(hence his name) run to the back post in the last minute. This header helped
cancelled out the ugly but effective “route 0” football played by the
opposition.
The next activity was initiative exercises and to some of us that came
as a relief as we were thankfully keeping our feet on the ground. In this
activity, teamwork was the key to success in both these physical and mental
challenges. The first few challenges were mainly mental and the opposing team
took the lead (mainly due to a member of the British Quiz team Champions, Hugh
Brechin).
The
Spiders Web- One of the Initiative Exercise Activities
However, soon the more physical
challenges arrived and due to my team mates excellent skipping ability we won
on the final challenge. It was another example of the great spirit and
teamwork that was evident throughout the weekend. The next activity and the last
of the day was the Climbing Wall. This was a unique experience that
helped many conquer their fears of climbing.
After everyone had had an
attempt at the climbing the Climbing Wall the instructor made us play
an exciting game known as “gladiators”. This involved two people who were
half way up the Climbing Wall having to pull one anothers
rope from their waist. This was thrilling to watch and play and caused great
excitement throughout the group with Lloyd Hughes, “Sneaky” Steve and myself
defeating Hugh Brechin, Connor Woods and Robbie
Coleman, respectively.
Somewhere
in there is “Sneaky” Steve Mannion who
defeated Connor Woods.
Lloyd
Hughes defeating Hugh
Brechin.
After
returning the equipment to the house we all rushed off to acquire some well
deserved food. Subsequent to dinner we finished off the tournament with a
tough four rounds of chess.
Following on from the tournament, we used the rest of the night (and the early
part of the next morning) to socialise, play poker, doubles and eat lots of
sweets. The next and final day of our weekend in Dalguise
started with waking up to the sweet smell of sausages that awaited us.
Breakfast was eaten rapidly and many had second or even third helpings!
The first activity that my group would
encounter on Sunday morning was Orienteering. This was another team
building exercise when one of the most important rules was that the group
could not split up, however the team “More than Lucky” which included Hugh
Brechin, Lloyd Hughes and Stuart Leslie
broke this rule and were unfortunately disqualified. The “Billy Benkos” were the eventual team which won finishing in
an impressive 41 minutes. That team consisted of Sneaky Steve, Robbie
Coleman, Scott Jordan and myself. This
very tiring exercise consisted of a lot running around the Dalguise Campus, and developed our map skills, especially
for those who had not participated in orienteering before.
The final activity before lunch was the Zip wire, which was another
frightening activity especially for those that disliked heights. As most of
the group were high up we decided to calm our nerves by singing Christmas
Carols. The most popular carol was “Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer”. Most of
us participated on the Zip Wire showing our determination and courage
and although there was a lot of pleasure involved there was also a fair
amount of pain (mainly for the boys) and therefore for many of our group just
one go on the Zip Wire was enough.
Phil returning to safety after the Zip
wire (in a fair amount of pain)
After the Zip Wire we had lunch
and we watched from inside the lunch hall as the rain began to fall. However
this did not dampen our spirit and we soldiered on to the next activity,
which was Archery for my group. At the start of Archery, we all
enjoyed firing arrows at the targets and sharing a joke with one another.
Then the instructor, Alex made us play an interesting game of Blind
date. Which colour you hit on the target would determine… who you would have
your date with…. where you would have it and how you would get there. Connor
Woods (aka Robin Woods) unfortunately was not
firing arrows like Robin Hood as his date was with Mathew O’Donnell. in sunny Grangemouth arriving by
a “Skip On Wheels”. However not all of the blind dates ended up in
disappointment as my date turned out to be taking Donna Officer to
Ibiza by Spaceship!
The very final activity of the weekend and possibly the most challenging was
the 30ft high Sequoia Scramble made from climbing walls and ropes.
This tricky challenge was very successful with many reaching the top and most
participating. Despite the rain starting to fall more heavily at this stage
everyone continued on showing great determination and mutual support.
Overall, Dalguise 2005 has been a very successful
tournament and a very enjoyable one as well. I would recommend it to anyone
who enjoys the outdoors and can also play chess. After playing in this tournament
I have witnessed some extraordinary young talent from both watching and
playing games. There were many good young players at this tournament and from
the ones I played against James Todd and Ali Roy both played
particularly well. Another commendable note is that there were 14 girls
playing in this tournament which is a very high number for any tournament in Scotland.
Hopefully they will all continue playing and try to persuade their friends to
get involved in chess. One final mention is for the daring, IM Steven Mannion who as you have
probably gathered obtained the nickname “Sneaky” throughout the
weekend. I have to say Sneaky Steve is the first IM I have ever seen
complete the Trapeze, Zip Wire, Sequoia Scramble, and Climbing Wall and help
the Billy Benkos to victory in orienteering
all in one weekend! I would like to thank the lovely Lynsey
and John Shovlin for organising this
wonderful tournament and I hope it all goes as smoothly next year as it did this
year. I look forward to seeing you all next year!
The Prizegiving
– Final Standings
1st = Calum MacQueen
5/6
2nd= Hugh Brechin, Blair Hawthorne, Robbie Coleman 4.5/6
Best Adult =
Stephen Mannion IM 6/6
Best Girl = Lynsey Shovlin
4/6
Late Starter = Jamie
Robertson 3/6
Giant Killer = Emma
Grant (474 points)
Grading Prizes
Under
1250 = Andrew McClement and Calum Vipond
Under 900=
Jonathan Scott
Under 500= Morven
Petrie
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