Nairobi Chess League

Nairobi Chess League Rules(last modified 18th April 2009)

1 The Nairobi Chess League will be a team event with eight players per team. Matches will be played on four boards only. Matches will take place between January and May on a Saturday afternoon at a venue as notified to team captains. There will be two divisions, restricted to 11 teams per division. The event is open to all clubs.
2. Once a player has competed for a team in the League, that player cannot compete for another team in the same Division in the same season.
3. Board prizes will be awarded for the top players for boards 1 to 6 only. The minimum games played must be over 65% to qualify for board prizes. If 9 rounds are played then a minimum of 6 games must be played, if 10 rounds are played then 7 games
4. Prize for board 1 to 4 for ladies will be awarded based on the ratios mentioned in point 3 above. Prize for board 1 to 4 for junior player under the age of 18 will be awarded based on ratios mentioned in point 3 above.
5. A schedule will be sent to all competing teams on the Monday before the Saturday matches. The rate of play will be 45 minutes for all moves.
6.. Although the event is termed Nairobi Chess League, Rapidplay rules will apply. Except as modified by these rules, the normal FIDE Laws of chess will apply.
7. Scoring will be fully on game points. A won game will score one point, a drawn game half a point and a lost game zero points. Therefore, there are four points per team at stake on each afternoon of play. However if a team defaults for an afternoon their opponents will be awarded a 3 - 0 victory. This is to try and prevent default results having a distorting effect on the league placings. Any team defaulting on two or more afternoon matches may be expelled from the league and all their results annulled if they have played less than 50% of the games.
8. Any disputes will be settled by the organisers (or their representatives) whose decision is final. Teams are expected to compete in a spirit of fair play and cooperation. It is also hoped that the event will provide a more social opportunity than normally available through the Nairobi Chess League and that all involved will participate in making it an enjoyable event.

Sex Boycott

Kenyan women have decided to boycott sex for one week to push for reforms in the country! more

Chess Social Responsibility(CSR)

Recently the local chess community organized themselves to give back to society. The event dubbed the chess social responsibility or CSR. Purity Gachiga, Githinji Hinga and a few other chessers visited Kibera's LITTLE ROCK SCHOOL and made the children very happy. Here are a few photos of the event.

The deaf/dumb kids with their teacher(in red)


Gitinji giving the students their first chess lessons

Eldoret Chess Pictures

Geoffrey 'Eku' Dokoria emailed me this pictures of Eldoret open some time back but i have failed to post them. Enjoy


Ben Nguku relaxes when not playing and probably no blitzers were around.


George Mwangi in his usual concentrative style slugs out aganaist Magana

One of the many players who turned up to play

Chess Kenya Cancels National Championsips

By Mehul Gohil

CK have again for the millionth time not kept their word...they have postponed the national champs to December, and who knows if it will happen even then. Last year we had no national championships.

Plus, having rescheduled the first phase olympiad qualifier to the june Kenya Open event they have left those in the working class in an imbroglio...it's good to inform your HR department as to what your leave dates are. But CK's indecisiveness and disorganised timetable is of no help here. I will go for the June 1 event as I have applied for leave then but will most likely have no way to attend the 2nd part of the qualifiers. Plus, this much touted African Team Championships is in September...shouldn't the national team have been in place by now so that training can begin in earnest?? This dilly dalying will only make us weaker when the African champs arrives. Or maybe KCB team has already been designated as the national team..who knows?

I remember last week at checkmates I had a discussion with Peter Munyasi on the pros and cons of organising a parallel event over the may 1 holidays. I told him we should let CK have the benefit of the doubt and not 'sabotage' their May 1 event with a more lucrative parallel one. He expressed the opinion that CK may not even have an event. His hunch has turned out to be correct. Now all we get is a one day rapid thing. To me it's becoming apparent that when these public holidays come around we should not waste our time waiting for CK to organise something, they come up with BS time and again...we should take the matter into our own hands and organise our own stuff.

Like this December dates, I am prepared to get a tournament organised right on the same dates as this alleged Kenya champs. We can get the sponsors ourselves and have a lucrative enough prize fund. We should not waste time with CK. Next time I will listen to Peter Munyasi.

From chess Kenya to all players

> Rapid Individual/Team Chess Championship 2009
>
> Dates: 1st May
>
> Venue: West Breeze Hotel,Upperhill,Nairobi
>
> Registration fees: Kshs 500( free lunch for all players)
>
> Prize giving ceremony for the 2008/9 National Chess League will be
> held the same day at the same venue at 6pm.
>
> Entry form to follow shortly
>
> World Youth Under 16 Chess Olympiad Qualifiers/Junior
> Open
>
> Dates: April 25 & 26
>
> Venue: Oshwal Academy Nairobi Primary
>
> World Youth Chess Championship 2009 Final Qualifiers
>
> Dates: May 16 & 17
>
> CK Youth Committee to release info soon
>
> Kenya Open Chess Championship 2009
>
> Event will be used as the 1st phase Olympiad qualifier
>
> Dates: May 30,31 & June 1
>
> More information to follow soon
>
>
> Due to unavoidable circumstances,the National Chess Championships
> which were scheduled for the long Labour Day holiday have been moved
> to December.The revised calendar of events will be out before Monday
>
> Regards,
>
> CHESS KENYA SECRETARIAT

Rare Chess Stamp

Chess Leo says he has this stamp from the British virgin islands. Anyone out there with similar stamps depicting chess.

Nairobi Chess League

The Kim Bhari organized Nairobi Chess League has got underway with a great start. Here is the update.

By Kim Bhari

Still no draw. I guess I made a mistake to start with the Berger tables for only 7-8 players.

On Saturday 18 April 09 I had 8 teams and thought that was it and used 7-8 Berger tables to make a draw. Big mistake. I should have used the one for 9-10 players becasue on afternoon of 18 April I got team number 9 and then today afternoon I got team number 10!!!

You will notice the pattersn for the two tables are quite different. painful. At times the colours change for the team between tables. See team 5 and 8. the colour swaps round in the next table. My problem is that team 5 and 8 have already played. Do i make them play again??

Next complication is that we can only accomdate 8 teams per afternoon which means only 4 matches instead of 5 due to space and tables. So i have to prepare pairing cards and do the pairing for next two rounds considering the constraints. I have also asked two teams to rest tomorrow which is a third variable which means trying to go back to the berger tables is tough.

Lesson learnt

Always use a higher pairing table for league events. George Mwangi take note. I will retire soon.

7 & 8 Players

Round
1	1:8	2:7	3:6	4:5
2	8:5	6:4	7:3	1:2
3	2:8	3:1	4:7	5:6
4	8:6	7:5	1:4	2:3
5	3:8	4:2	5:1	6:7
6	8:7	1:6	2:5	3:4
7	4:8	5:3	6:2	7:1

9 & 10 Players

Round
1	1:10	2:9	3:8	4:7	5:6
2	10:6	7:5	8:4	9:3	1:2
3	2:10	3:1	4:9	5:8	6:7
4	10:7	8:6	9:5	1:4	2:3
5	3:10	4:2	5:1	6:9	7:8
6	10:8	9:7	1:6	2:5	3:4
7	4:10	5:3	6:2	7:1	8:9
8	10:9	1:8	2:7	3:6	4:5
9	5:10	6:4	7:3	8:2	9:1