Bristol League Championship

Jerry Humphreys
May 7
2 min read

Updated: May 15

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.

The format of the tournament is that the top scoring Bristol player gets the title of Bristol Champion, and the best player rated under 2000 gets the Major trophy. With that in mind the prizes were set with three main places for the tournament as a whole, and first and second prizes for the best Under 2000s, plus other grading and category prizes.

The event finished in a five-way tie, as Rami drew with the experienced Clifton player Colin Davis in the final round to finish on 4/5, leaving three others to catch up. Rami’s score was enough to achieve his FM title. The Bristol trophy was awarded to Zack on tiebreak. In the Under 2000 part of the competition Leon Nelson from Wells was the leading player and Kas Coman from Bath took the title of Bristol Major Champion.