A field of 19 teams turned out for the 2024 ACT Teams Rapidplay Championship. In previous years the field would be 10 to 12 teams, but this year saw a big jump in numbers. The ACT chess clubs were well represented by official teams, and there were school teams, junior teams, and teams that were just formed on the day.
In fact the winning team was just such a team, with Harry's Pushers (Harry Press, Milles Patterson, Jerry Cheng, and Padma Gyalpo) winning with a score of 21.5/28. They score heavily on the top 2 boards (13/14), but also had solid results on the bottom 2 boards to emerge as clear winners. In 2nd place were Underscore on 18.5, a junior team who scored a big 3.5-0.5 win in the final round to overtake some more fancied teams. In 3rd pace were Gungahlin A on 18, who also collected the Larko Cup for the best score by an official club team.
The turnout was a bit of surprise for me as the organiser, and when I arrived at the venue was somewhat shocked to see around 25 players already waiting. After the process of registration (and team formation) was completed, the event got off to a quick start. By the end the 7 round tournament was even running ahead of time, which was also a pleasant surprised. And although we don't usually do a lot of teams chess in the ACT, this may change in the future, given the success of this tournament.
No comments:
Post a Comment