Two further rounds in the John Kingston Memorial 55+5 competition have seen some dramatic shifts in the leaderboard as we head towards the final few rounds. David Paul won a tenacious endgame against Guy Burns and an interesting game against Lars Dobbertin-King to rise to the top of the leaderboard – but only by half a point. Trailing him are Alan Winfield, Alistair McGowan and Gordon Lyall, with Ross Jackson and Lars Dobbertin-King each only one point behind. With three rounds to play before a winner is declared, David may be the favorite but his position at the top is far from assured with so many strong players still in contention! Among the juniors, Mark Summers has risen to the top after a win over Rose Kingston. Full results here.

Entry forms were also handed out for the Upper Hutt Chess Open tournament, which received a good response. 

After play, a committee meeting was held. We discussed accounts and funding, but also changes to our calendar for the year. As a result, we have updated the calendar for 2018. The 25+5 tournament has been shortened, the ladder is longer, and a new “chess variants” night has been added which should be a lot of fun! In addition, we discussed our new Kapiti 2000 tournament, details of which will be posted here over the next day.