Camberley entered two teams in the latest in this series of Rapid tournaments, organised by Peter Hornsby in aid of Oxfam.  Once again, the event was hosted by Eton College in impressive and historic surroundings.  Our A team (Jon, Martin, Aditya and Steve) were the reigning champions from the last event in November 2025.

The format was 20/20 Rapid, which means 20 minutes plus no increment, which these days is unusual and proved quite a challenge for some of us. 

Overall our A team finished in third place (W4, D1, L1) and the B team were ninth (W2, D1, L3).  The winners were Maidenhead (W5, D0, L1) and second were Queen Mary’s University (W4, D1, L1).

The results can be seen here:  https://results.scorchapp.co.uk/t/20-20ChessMarch2026/standings/1

A team report (by Steve Harley)

As reigning champs we arrived in confident mood, with an unchanged team.  Maidenhead had entered only the evening before the event – it was clear when we arrived that they were taking it seriously with Andrew Smith and Bohdan Terler on boards 1 & 2.

Our first match was a fairly straightforward 4-0 victory against UK Armed Forces Chess association.  In round 2 we were straight into the serious stuff against Maidenhead.  Jon had a great win after a long battle against Andrew, but Martin succumbed to the excellent Bohdan (who scored 6/6 on the day).  Aditya and I won to secure an excellent 3-1 victory (against the eventual winners).

Another 3-1 win in round 3 against Reading Uni & Alumni put us in the lead.  In round 4 we played another team new to the event, Queen Mary’s University.  They looked pretty good, and so it proved in a 2-2 draw.  Martin and I both lost, me from a piece up.

Then came the big showdown – the Camberley A vs Camberley B “Derby”.  There was quite an upset on board 1 as Bob Smith beat Jon, who uncharacteristically “forgot that Knights move backwards”.  Martin and Aditya beat Jan and Tristan respectively, and it came down to me vs Warren on 4.  I was well on top a piece up for a long time but somehow managed to hang my queen very close the end of the time control – sadly for Warren, he missed it with only seconds left on his clock and lost the game, so the match ended 3-1.

Going into the final round we “only” needed to beat Sussex Juniors, who were mid-table having earlier been beaten 3-1 by Maidenhead and 4-0 by QMU.  However. The pesky kids played really well – Jon was down a pawn but managed to wriggle out for a win, I was completely outplayed as white in a Catalan.  Both Martin and Aditya tried to grind out wins from fairly even positions, but Aditya could not make progress and drew, and in the last game Martin over-pressed and lost a N and P ending, which his young opponent played very well indeed.  In the end it was a painful 1.5-2.5 defeat, but no hard luck stories – we just got outplayed by some good juniors.

Our individual scores were:

• Jon – 5/6 (one loss to Bob Smith, good win against Andrew Smith)
• Martin – 2/6 (not really his day, was up against some strong players on board 2)
• Aditya – 5.5/6 (brilliant MVP performance, continuing his great recent form and getting better and better in front of our eyes)
• Steve – 4/6 (the usual up and down stuff)

B team report (by Tristan Nowell)

Unlike the A team, we were unburdened by the weight of expectation entering the tournament so started the day in a jovial mood.

We got things off to an excellent start with back to back 4-0 thrashings of London women’s and Reading university B with clinical performances across all 4 boards. That put us at the top of the table and on top board. This was, in retrospect,a slight over-achievement, as we were promptly put back in our place with a 4-0 hammering from Queen’s University (highlight of this round was me playing a perfectly memorised 10 moves only to blunder mate in 2 straight after).

We then faced Eton college and managed a respectable 2-2 draw, although I again threw away a great position to squander a potential win for the team. This then saw us face off against our fellow club mates in Rd 5. We were unsurprisingly outplayed on boards 4-2 but with what might have been the biggest giant killing of the day – Bob Smith pulled off a dramatic upset to take a full point from FM Jon Ady.

We entered the final round with another extremely tough match up against eventual winners Maidenhead. In a reverse of the previous round we were conclusively beaten on boards 1-3 but Warren on board 4 pulled  off the most ruthless of swindles. Coming back from a time deficit and a full rook down he took advantage of an illegal move to level things on the clock and in true Warren style somehow salvaged the game.

Overall a great day with the team earning a respectable 2.5 out of 6 having faced all of the eventual top 3.

Final individual scores:

• Bob Smith: 3/6 (including an incredibly impressive win over Jon Ady)
• Jan Demjan: 3/6 (played solidly throughout putting up tough fights in every game)
• Tristan Nowell: 2/6 (not my day – had a mix of good games and some that I would like to forget!)
• Warren Wright: 4/6 (excellent dogged performance as always. Refusing to go quietly even when down material and earned himself a very respectable 4/6).