Many congratulations to two local junior chess players who competed in the first round of Delancey UK Chess Challenge Gigafinals this weekend (3rd and 4th July) and qualified for the next stage of the tournament, the Terafinal Preliminaries.

Well done to Jamie Doyle and Merlin Cork.

In the U14 Mixed section, Dorset junior chess player Jamie Doyle scored 5 points out of 7 to reach the very demanding qualifying threshold against extremely tough competition. In doing so, Jamie achieved a performance rating of 2191, nearly 100 points higher than his actual rating and a fantastic win rate of 71%, triumphing over opponents rated 2219 and 2193 in the process.

In the U18 Mixed section, Ringwood junior player Merlin Cork (rated 2019) also qualified with a score of 4.5 out 7 points, having played opponents with an average rating of 2121 and clocking up a performance rating of a massive 2267, beating players rated 2199 (a Candidate Master) and 2178.

Other Dorset junior players, Florence, Larissa, Zander, Leo and Jack were also in action in the Gigafinals this weekend. In the U12 Girls, Larissa and Florence were 10th and 20th respectively, both with really good performances, narrowly missing the 5.5 points out of 7 required. Larissa had a performance rating of 1799, well above her own rating. In the U10 Boys, Zander and Leo both performed exceptionally well and above their own ratings, with Leo winning against one opponent rated 2297, an enormous 411 rating points above him. Sadly, both Leo and Zander just missed out, each scoring 5 points against a target of 5.5 out of 7. To illustrate how hard the competition was, only 17 out of 212 reached 5.5 points in the U10 Boys and just 4 out of 53 in the U12 Girls.

We congratulate all of the players for their hard work and excellent play against really tough opponents, and wish good luck to all those playing in Gigafinal No. 2 on 17th and 18th July.