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Peter Stuart, RIP

Peter's funeral will be held at Forrest's Funeral Chapel, 8 Glen Road Browns Bay, Monday 19th February at 11am.

It is with great sadness that we have learned of the death of our friend and colleague Peter Stuart. We offer our condolences to all his family and friends. Peter's contribution to NZCF and New Zealand chess has been immense.
Please see www.newzealandchess.nz for more information.

Looking for a Christmas present?

FM Martin Dreyer has written a book which might be just the thing for your friends and relatives: The 100 Greatest Sportspeople of All Time. Does it have any chessplayers in it? You'll have to check that yourself!
Buy it at http://www.worldsports100.co.nz/

IM norms for New Zealand

FM Bruce Watson picked up a medal and an IM norm in the Seniors and FM Ewen Green did the same in the Veterans. Hopefully, the first of many!
For full results see our Results page.

GM and GM-elect

IM Mahmood Lodhi (right) from Pakistan won the Asian Seniors 50+, collecting his 3rd and final GM norm. He has already made the required 2500 rating, so his GM title should be in the post soon. He will become Pakistan's first grandmaster. Here he is pictured with New Zealand's first (and only) GM, Murray Chandler. For full results see our Results page.

images/2017/DSC01701.JPG Eugene Torre & Paul Spiller @HAsian Senior Championships, Auckland Download full details here (pdf document). All queries/entries should be addressed to Organiser IO Paul Spiller

• paulsspiller@outlook.com.
  Follow the events on Vega:
  Asian Seniors 50+
  Asian Veterans 65+

Pictured: GM Eugenio Torre, top seed in the Veterans, with organiser (and player) Paul Spiller.

Straight A's for Alphaeus Ang

Six NZCF Championships were held over a period of two weeks in July - and in every event, CM Alphaeus Ang was winner or joint winner:
NZ Junior Championship;
NZ Junior Rapid;
NZ Junior Blitz (joint champion with FM Daniel Gong)
North Island Championship
NI Rapid (joint champion with FM Ben Hague)
NI Blitz Championship
Full results, links, and more photos can be found on our Results Page.

40th Trusts Open

John Francis (left) and FM Bob Smith, organisers of the Trusts Open, are shown cutting the cake to celebrate the 40th edition of this event. Winners included FM Ben Hague & IM Russell Dive (A-Grade), WCM Vyanla Punsalan (B-Grade), Sean Myers & Hugh Gao (C-Grade) and Abraham Deng (Junior).
Full results and more photos can be found on our Results Page.

2017 Asian Seniors - Auckland

NZCF is delighted to announce that living legend GM Eugene Torre will be taking part in the Asian Seniors event to be held in Auckland in October. Torre became Asia's first grandmaster in 1974 and has remained one of the Philippines' strongest players ever since. At his 23rd Olympiad in Baku last year, GM Torre made it quite clear that he is still right at the top of his game, by scoring 10/11 and winning the bronze medal for board 3. He currently holds the record for the most games played in Olympiads (270). Recently, he was honoured by the Philippine Sportswriters Association with their Lifetime Achievement Award.
The photo was taken in the late 1970s at an event in New Zealand.

MillenniumHotels.com New Zealand Open Championship

Mark Noble, chief organiser of the 125th NZ Congress in Palmerston North, has confirmed that he has already lined up two GMs to play. They are Adrien Demuth (left) and Fabien Libiszewski, both from France.

Congress will take place from 1st to 12th January at the Copthorne Hotel in Palmerston North. Full details of all events can be found on our dedicated webpage: New Zealand Open 2018.

2017 Latvian Rapid

This year's Latvian Rapid, sponsored by D&D Financial Consultants, broke all previous records with 115 players. The sponsor, Martin Dreyer, is seen here with the A-Grade trophy, which was shared by FM Alexei Kulashko (left) and FM Ben Hague.
Full details and many photos can be found via our Results Page.

NZ success at the Oceania Zonal Championships

New Zealand achieved some excellent results at the Zonal Championships: IM Antony Ker finished 2nd= in the Open, CM Daniel Gong upgraded his title to FM, and WFM Layla Timergazi won the Women's event in fine style to gain the WIM title and a place in the next stage of the Women's World Championship cycle.
Pictured: Oceania Zone President and tournament organiser Paul Spiller (right) presents a kiwi to Hisham Al-Tahir, General Secretary of the Asian Chess Federation.

The Oceania Zonal Championships are Ready to Go

The Oceania Zonal Championships, being held at the Waipuna Conference Centre in Auckland, are already a success for Chief Organiser and Zonal President Paul Spiller with a with a record 140 entries. In the Open, the top seed is young IM Anton Smirnov, who is followed by two fellow Australians in the second and third places, newly crowned Australian Open Champion GM Max Illingworth and IM Gary Lane. New Zealand Champion, FM Scott Wastney, is the fourth seed, while recent New Zealand Open winner IM Ari Dale is seeded eight. The Women's Championship has New Zealand's WFM Layla Timergazi as the top two seed.
Pictured: the arbiters (from left) Brian Jones, Bob Gibbons, Ying Wang, Keong Ang and Craig Hall, and Organiser Paul Spiller on the right.

Ari Dale Wins NZ Open; Wastney is NZ Champion

The final round of the NZ Open proved stress-free for the leader, Australian IM Ari Dale (left), a point clear of the field and playing New Zealand junior CM Daniel Gong of Auckland. Early leader FM Bob Smith was beaten in round 7 by Dale. However, there was some serious fighting on the lower boards, as the title of New Zealand Champion was still undecided. FM Scott Wastney (pictured right) made up for a couple of earlier losses by defeating fellow Wellingtonian CM Bill Forster who had aspired to the title. Wastney then had to wait some considerable time to see if Smith could triumph over fellow FM Tim Reilly and in the end that game was drawn, leaving Wastney the outright winner of the title.

Murray Chandler becomes a Member of the NZ Order of Merit

In the 2017 New Year Honours list, the Queen has appointed Murray as a Member of the NZ Order of Merit, in recognition of his services to chess.
Pictured: another great occasion for Murray, when he led the NZ team to victory over Bosnia/Herzegovina at the Dresden Olympiad 2008 by beating Nikolic. (Left to right: Dive, Lukey, Nokes and Chandler).