Ray Hyde has submitted the following report on Monday evening's simultaneous display by GM Keith Arkell :
2014 was Fenton Chess Club’s 20th anniversary.
At the Club’s AGM it was agreed that we should hold a special event to
celebrate this landmark. I offered to
explore various suggestions from the members. These included a chess
tournament, a guest lecture, a dinner etc. At this time GM Keith Arkell, one of
my chess heroes, was blazing a trail, winning the European Senior Championship
and eventually coming second in the World Senior Championship, albeit with the
same score as the winner. I also possessed his very telling and fascinating
autobiography, “Arkell’s Odyssey” which revealed a lot about Keith and also his
approach to chess.
It occurred to me that Keith might agree to give a
simultaneous display at the Club in 2015. I managed to track him down via email
when he was halfway through the World Senior Championships taking place in
Greece. He expressed an interest immediately and said he would like to take it
further after “this old gits’ tournament”. Keith’s words not mine!
We were fortunate when one of the Club’s members, Steven
Walley of Attingham Consulting Engineers, agreed to sponsor the proposed event.
This paved the way for me to agree fee, expenses and date with Keith; the plan
being that he would pop up to Fenton, give his grandmaster performance and then
return to sunny Paignton. It didn’t quite work out like that.
Firstly, Keith had anticipated there would be minimal
interest and he expected only a few participants, perhaps a maximum of 12 to 15
boards. However Fenton members had drummed up business and entries came in from
across Clubs in North Staffs and even one from Gateshead. In addition 2
non-attached chess-players entered. Mainly because of the room limit we closed
the entries at 28 boards. Keith was monitoring progress on the Fenton website, where Steve
Emmerton, our Secretary and Webmaster, had listed all the entrants. At this
stage I must pay tribute to Keith’s enthusiasm for the project. He confirmed he
was delighted that so many wished to take part and then, generously, suggested
White on alternate boards, no maximum grade limit and finally the introduction
of clocks at the point when only 3 boards were still playing. I doubt that many
GMs would be as accommodating as this.
Secondly, I had noticed that The Leek Rapidplay was
scheduled for the day before our own event and mentioned this to Keith. He duly
entered this competition and won it outright as a warm-up for the simul the
following day. As we were to find out, this achievement hadn’t drained his
energy for grinding out wins.
28 chess
enthusiasts, ranging from ungraded (2 players) to 190+, and fortified with
drinks from the bar and refreshments provided by several club members, set
about the task of trying to bring down a GM. The event started punctually at
7.30 pm and concluded well after midnight. The GM certainly earned every penny
for this event! Many of the games were exceedingly hard-fought, sadly not my
own thanks to a strategic blunder which left me grovelling before the
inevitable coup-de-grace. Keith remarked that several of the games had reached
a high standard. After about an hour Keith won his first game, after which
resignations came in quite regularly. By about 11.00 pm, Keith had conceded one
draw and was down to fewer than 10 opponents. Most of these remaining games
seemed to me to be either difficult, unfathomable middle-games or endgames
which looked balanced or dead drawn, at least they would have been at Club
level. However, Keith Arkell has a
richly deserved reputation for his endgame play and won several more games with
great technique and huge determination. As the numbers dwindled the GM conceded
2 more draws, at which point, just before midnight (!) the clocks were
introduced, 5 minutes each, for the blitz finish for the remaining 3 boards. It
was an awesome sight to see a GM
playing simultaneous blitz against good club players.. As his time ran down
Keith conceded his fourth draw. At the end of a very long, exhausting evening
and at approximately 10 minutes past midnight he defeated his final 2 opponents.
The final score: played 28, won 24, drawn 4. The duration
of the event: 5 hours! Many congratulations to Gerald Acey (Stafford), Roger
Edwards (Cheddleton), Karl Lockett (Crewe) and Glyn Valentine (Fenton) on
achieving draws with such an uncompromising GM. Keith himself commented that
their play had been of a high standard and well above what he had anticipated.
Special mentions too for 78 year-old Bill Noble (Gateshead), who held on for 4
hours only to be finally outplayed in a balanced Rook and 3 Pawns endgame, and
for Phil Cattermole (Macclesfield) who was last to finish and who eventually
fell in the blitz finish. Phil said afterwards that he had never before played
a blitz game!
Congratulations are due to Keith Arkell for the wonderful
effort he put into making our 20th anniversary such a memorable
success. He set out to win every game at all costs and provided us all with a
wonderful model of fighting chess. The event could not have happened without
our sponsor, or without the cooperation of our host venue, the Florence Tennis
and Bowling Club, who allowed the event to run well over its allotted time.
My own opinion? A
brilliant evening, a memorable event and I’m encouraged that we may be able to
host something similar in 2016. Certainly our sponsor is keen and I hope the
word gets round the GM circuit that this is one event to be welcomed, albeit
that the GM will well and truly have to earn his or her fee!!
Photos from the evening can be viewed here.
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| Keith Arkell with our sponsor Steven Walley |