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3 October 2026 81 chess players converged on the Polish Community Centre for this event, the latest in a long sequence of tournaments run by legendary chess organiser Ben Ogunshola, who also took part and achieved a high placing in the Open section. Local GM Peter Wells was also competing, along with Zack Norris who is rapidly making a name for himself with one tournament win after another. In the event Zack won with a perfect score including a win over Peter Wells, which cam

Bristol Leg 27 September 2026 This competition has been running for nearly ten years, and consists of 8 heats across the country with 16-player finals for the top male and female contestants. 58 players took part in the Bristol heat at our familiar venue of St Michael's Church Hall in Bradley Stoke, and the leading players had a wide open field as there were no grandmasters in the lineup this year. After 14 rounds Bristol Champion Zack Norris was half a point ahead and won hi

5 September 2026 The Stroud Rapids have been very successful and now they have created a blitz which was attended by 44 players. A quarter of the players were from Bristol and 5 made the prize list. The tournament was jointly won by Bristol Champion Zack Norris and Stroud player Indy Southcott-Moyers. There will be another Rapid tournament on Sat November 7th at the same venue. TOP BRISTOL RESULTS Zack Norris (Clifton) 1st= 13½/15 Wynn Davies (Grendel) 9 + Grading Prize Dillo

28-31 August 2026 A successful repeat of last year's tournament in the Railway Museum, this time with 179 players compared to 167 last time. Leading the line-up was local Grandmaster Peter Wells, and the top Bristol entrants were Bristol Champion Zack Norris, Clifton A's Michael Ashworth, and Grendel Board 1 Matt MacLachlan. Bath's Kas Conan put in a fine performance, beating former Bristol University player Lewis Matin in the final round, to finish half a point ahead of the

21-23 August 2026 Defending champion Aron Saunders who plays for Downend & Fishponds was back to see if he could retain his title, starting the event as top seed ahead of veteran Welsh FM Peter Varley, who comes from Chepstow and has in the past played Bristol League matches for Thornbury. The tournament finished better than could have been expected from Bristol's point of view, with first place in the Open and second in both of the other sections. TOP BRISTOL RESULTS (50% or

Warwick University, Coventry Sat Aug 1 to Sun Aug 9 2026 The British Championships consists of 33 events plus Rapid, Blitz and variants tournaments. This year is billed as the biggest ever, with 1970 entrants, which comes down to 1066 after players who are in more than one tournament are taken into account, but still way more than prior to the post-pandemic popularisation of the game. The Championship itself has been billed as an elite event for the last few years but is now

Or they could play casual games using pieces half as big as themselves The play at midday showed the famous game Anderssen-Kieserittsky from the 1851 London tournament After lunch International Master Chris Beaumont played four of the strongest players without ever looking at the pieces. In the background spectators are climbing up trees to get a better look. Portishead Chess Club run a variety of adult and junior events, including coaching and teams in the Bristol and Distri

27 June 2026 This tournament has been going for a couple of years now, and is becoming very popular with 72 contenders braving the extreme heat on this Saturday. Grandmaster Peter Wells was in the lineup, surprisingly ranked behind both Indy and Bristol Champion Zack. Most of the players come from North Gloucestershire but a strong showing from the Bristol League accounted for about a quarter of the entry. No 4 seed Kenneth Hobson FM ended up taking first place half a point a

23 – 25 May 2026 The traditional May Bank Holiday tournament was attended by 133 players, 24 from Bristol clubs. Top of the list were Oxfordshire players James Jackson IM and Kenneth Hobson, closely followed by reigning Bristol champion Zack Norris and Downend’s top player Oliver Stubbs. In the Major section three Bristol players Tommy Wilkins, Lawrence Northam and James Guest headed the field. The event finished in a clear win for James Jackson, who some will remember having

24 – 26 April 2026 This was the second part of this year’s Championships hosted at Bristol Bridge Club, comprising the Section 3 and 4 trophies, run as Under 1800 and Under 1600 in one section. As with the Open tournament last month the prizes were set with three main places for the tournament as a whole, and first and second prizes for the best Under 1600s, plus other grading and category prizes. [A report on the 1800+ tournament from last month can be found here] The event

27 – 29 March 2026 This year the championship was run as an elite tournament, with only players over 1800 qualifying to take part. It was held at the Bridge Club in Hotwells, home to Bristol & Clifton, which has capacity for 60 players. The range of the tournament was from 1802 to 2364, with Cornwall’s Rami Talab heading the event while Oliver Stubbs from Downend & Fishponds and Zack Norris from Bristol & Clifton shared the honour of being the highest rated Bristol contenders