Happy New Year! With the turn of the year, it's awards time, so Wayne Kelly rounds up the award winners for 2019, covering titles awarded, highest rated player, most improved player, prospects for 2020 and a few other stats too!
Firstly, many thanks to Mike Whiteoak and Rachel Bingham for their parts in the maintenance of the ever-improving ratings database - I do wonder how we ever managed without it! This is my last year as Titles Registrar as Chris Hawkins will be handling the title data and updating the sheets, however I shall still announce the new titleholders and winners of other awards going forward - many thanks to Chris for taking over the nitty-gritty work!
At the start of the year, I saw the potential for one new GM (Grand Master) and one Expert and I am glad to announce that both have clinched their titles:
GM: Dave Koenig (3 190 ratings in a 5 year period)
Expert: Rafal Dominiczak (5 170 ratings in a 5 year period)
Congratulations to both Dave and Rafal, who have been added to the Titles & Awards page, along with all the other award winners for the year.
Looking ahead to this time next year, there are no potential GM awards, but there is one prospect for Expert status:
Expert prospect: Craig Solomons (requires 170, for 5 170 ratings in a 5 year period)
One other may have a chance but would need to do better than their current Personal Best. Only one person made their first foray into the 170+ ratings for the year: Olaiya Kabir (182)
The Highest Rated Player Award is given to the highest rated ABSP Member on January 1st of each year, provided that they have played at least 30 games in the previous year. The 2019 winner is ...
Highest Rated Player: Brett Smitheram (201)
David Eldar (205) and Nigel Richards (204) had higher ratings, but were not members.
The Most Improved Player award is given to the ABSP member at year end who had a full rating at the start of the calendar year, played at least 30 games throughout the year and improves their rating the most. The player's rating at the end of the year must be higher than any previous end-of-year full rating. And the winner is ...
Most Improved Player: Joseph Bennett (+34, 102 → 136)
Joseph has put a lot of effort into his game this year and has played up numerous times, taking the bull by the horns. The race to Most Improved Player was most surely a two-horse race and commiserations go to Rory Kemp for his impressive improvement of 33 from 90 to 123. Joseph pipped Rory during the final Ilford event. It is great to see youth players - and young players in general - achieve such improvement.
Four other players met the criteria for this award of improving by at least 15: Richard Spencer (+21, 120 → 141); Angie Brodie (+18, 110 → 128); Reuben Moisey (+17, 80 → 97); Paul Thomson (+15, 144 → 159)
Most games played:
Most games played - Colin Nicol (627)
Most prolific GM - Wayne Kelly (338)
Most prolific Expert - Simon Gillam (317)
Unweighted ratings for those with a rating over 150 plus details of highest games scores for 2019 can be found on the ABSP database website
Well done to all the winners - and those that missed out - keep trying!