Thirty-three competitors found their way to Hobart Chess Club’s temporary home a pair of math’s classrooms at Guildford Young College (GYC) in West Hobart.

Travis Liddell of Launceston Chess Club (LCC) was the field’s youngest player at 10 years old. While David Ratkowsky 88, of Hobart Chess Club (HCC) was the oldest.

Travis’s family having recently moved to Tasmania from South Africa, promptly enrolled him in his local chess club. Travis’s mum Lauren Liddell was quoted by The Mercury as saying, ‘he has found his people [at LCC]’. I was told that while joining the chess club has solved one issue the search for a suitable rugby club in the area is ongoing.

David, like Travis, is new to competitive over the board chess. Having joined Hobart Chess Club this year. David’s background is in academia as a Microbiologist, amongst many scientific papers and citations he has also co-authored a popular local book ‘A field Guide to Tasmanian Fungi’ with Genevieve Gates.

The two newbies to tournament chess representing different ends of the age spectrum and the State’s traditional geographic north, south rivalry, met in round three with the win going to the older player.

Another outstanding performance was recorded by a competitor one year older than Travis. From Melbourne, Ariana Fais just 11 years of age and playing in her second rated tournament, recorded a score of 3.5 (a tournament performance rating of 1447). Ariana’s performance was enough to take a well-deserved share of the best junior prize with Esteban Prieto.

The tension was high going into the last round on Monday morning. A win on board one would give the victor the outright title. The (board one) clash between two HCC member’s Will Rumley and Zach Lim ended in a draw after just 19 moves. Possibly because the two players know each other’s game so well?! That result left both Will and Zach with a final score of 5/6.

The draw on the top board meant that Will and Zach would have to further share the title if there was a decisive result on board two between Fabian Ivancic (LCC) and James Briant (HCC). And, with Carl Gorka (LCC) if he could overcome Ian Rout on board three. Indeed, in the end the title was a four-way tie. After Fabian defeated James in the longest game of the tournament (4 hours and 28 minutes) and Carl defeated Ian in a tense game on board three. I understand that none of the four winners have taken out the Tasmanian Open title before.

The full prize list: -

1st Will Rumley, Zach Lim, Carl Gorka, Fabian Ivancic
Top under 1650 rating: Kam Lee
Top under 1500 rating: Thomas Powell-Davies
Best Juniors: Esteban Prieto, Ariana Fais

Full results can be found on ChessChat here: chesschat.org/2023-Tasmanian-Open

One unfortunate side effect of hosting the tournament in classrooms (a temporary arrangement while the campus library is upgraded) was during Monday morning’s final round the classroom public address system sprung into life to unexpectedly play several classic pop songs. The third (and thankfully last) being Don Maclean’s Vincent leading to play being temporarily suspended as the tournament was still being decided on the top boards.

As Kevin Bonham wrote on ChessChat – ‘A Mr W. Joel and a Mr B. Springsteen (edit: also Mr D. Maclean) have been noted by the DOP for disrupting the games. It is possible that Mr Joel's line "Son can you play me a memory? I'm not really sure how it goes" was referencing his trouble remembering opening theory and also seeking outside assistance. It is believed he is a Guioco Piano man.’