The 1993 National Finals were held in August (earlier than usual) in Sheffield. There were 24 competitors. The tournament was to be a 9-round Swiss system, with 3 rounds played on the Saturday, after the hectic AGM, and 6 rounds on the Sunday. The top two players would then play a 1-game Grand Final, while if there was a tie for 3rd then there would also be a 1-game play-off for 3rd place -- important because the team for the World Championships consists of the top 3 players from the Nationals!
The first excitement came in Round 1, when Matthew Selby beat Joel Feinstein (Transcript 1). Feinstein tried to checkerboard Selby early on, but this did not really work, and he was forced to take a strange-looking edge to survive. This edge eventually killed him.
Round 2 saw another surprise, as Ian Turner drew with Graham Brightwell (Transcript 2). Brightwell, as Black, gave White two tempos, in return for White taking an edge. Throughout the midgame, it looked if though the poisoning effect of this edge would doom White, but Turner just managed to avoid collapsing, and skilfully used parity to get 32 discs!
Things started to hot up in Round 3. Imre Leader beat Guy Plowman, and Mike Handel beat Aubrey de Grey. Meanwhile, Brightwell lost to Garry Edmead in an amazing game (Transcript 3). Edmead, as Black, pulled hard to the edge, putting tremendous pressure on White. White was repeatedly removed from various key diagonals. However, Brightwell managed to hang on until the end, when parity would help him. But it was not quite enough, and Edmead won 33-31.
The only players now on 3/3 were Edmead, Handel and Leader. Leader beat Edmead
in Round 4, and Handel beat Plowman. Ken Stephenson scored a notable success
this round, beating Brightwell -- who had now scored only half a point from his
last 3 games!
So Handel played Leader in Round 5 (Transcript 4). Handel gradually took control in the midgame, and did not give up his grip on the game, winning comfortably at the end. Of particular interest is Handel's excellent board awareness in this game: he switches his play around between the different regions of the board to great effect. Thus Handel was now the only player on 5/5. Leader was on 4 points, as was Feinstein, who beat de Grey this round: Feinstein ran de Grey out of moves in the midgame, but still had to work quite hard to convert this into a win. Also on 4 points was Jeremy Das, who had just underlined his form by beating Edmead!
Round 6 saw Leader beating Das. Meanwhile, in the `battle of the clones',
Feinstein beat Handel in a very exciting game (Transcript 5).
Handel seemed to be ahead, but
things did not work out for him at the end, and, although White and having
control, he could not find a win. At the same time,
Brightwell lost to Plowman (Transcript 6), completing his
treatment at the hands of the Edmead-Plowman brat-pack.
This was almost the opposite of the
Edmead-Brightwell game -- Brightwell pulled very hard to the edge, and ran
Plowman fairly short of moves. But Plowman was never really in trouble, and
played carefully to win. There was now no unbeaten player: Feinstein, Handel
and Leader all had 5/6.
Since Handel had played both Feinstein and Leader, those two met in Round 7 (Transcript 7). The game swung up and down. After the opening, Feinstein was well ahead, but he let Leader get back into the game. Then, as the late midgame arrived, Leader began to move ahead, and seemed far ahead by the endgame: he had all the control. But he was unable to find a win, and Joel pulled through. Meanwhile, Handel beat Edmead. So Feinstein and Handel were on 6/7. On 5 points were Leader, Plowman and Das. It was beginning to look like a Feinstein-Handel Final, a repeat of 1992.
Feinstein beat Plowman in Round 8 in another very exciting game (Transcript 8). It seemed that Joel was dead, as he had sacrificed a huge amount in the midgame, but in fact the position was extremely complex. Joel played very well indeed to squeeze through 34-30. Meanwhile, Handel was playing John Lysons (Transcript 9). Handel, playing Black, got well ahead: he had control, and had created an odd region where Lysons could not play. He did some clever things to try to keep this parity, but nothing seemed to work out for him, and Lysons found a way to get parity back. Lysons won, thanks to his regaining parity! Also in this round, Das lost to de Grey.
So, with one round to go, Feinstein was in the lead with 7/8, followed by
Handel, Leader and Lysons on 6. Of these four, Leader and Handel had played all
the other three (Leader having beaten Lysons in Round 2), but Feinstein and
Lysons had not met. So it was Feinstein against Lysons in Round 9. Leader was
down-floated to play de Grey (who was on 5 points), and Handel received the
cruellest down-float of all: he had to play Brightwell (who was on 4.5
points).
Feinstein beat Lysons, and Leader beat de Grey: de Grey was ahead in the early 20s, but let Leader get back in the midgame. Handel played very well against Brightwell, and obtained complete control. But the position was full of hidden complications, and Handel could not find a way to make his control work. Graham ended up winning in a very exciting endgame (Transcript 10).
So the scores at the end of the Swiss part of the tournament were: Feinstein on 8 (he had thus won 8 in a row, after his first-round loss), Leader on 7, and four players on 6: Edmead, Handel, Lysons and Plowman. It turned out that Handel and Lysons had the best tie-breakers (just!), so these two played the 3rd/4th play-off game (Transcript 11). Lysons, playing Black, played nicely in the early midgame to build up a lead, and he did not relax, carrying on carefully to win and thus qualify for the World Championships.
In the Final (Transcript 12), Feinstein was Black. He was well ahead after the opening (which lasted until about move 25), but could not quite put Leader away. He did manage to create an odd region where Leader could not play, but there was one swindle he had to watch out for -- there was a region of two squares where Leader was threatening to take both moves. Around move 50, it became clear to both players that there was only one possible way for Feinstein to avoid the swindle. They counted out the line, and realised at almost the same instant that it was a draw! Feinstein said `Ah, a draw is good enough', and played his move. The players had indeed not miscounted: the game ended 32-32, which gave Feinstein the Championship, since he had done better than Leader in the Swiss.
Feinstein thus becomes the first player ever to win the Nationals 4 times. Also, not content with becoming in 1992 the first player ever to win the Nationals two years running, he is now the only player ever to win the Nationals three years running! He also won in 1989, making 4 of the last 5 years. Even more impressive is the end of another trend: it had been the case, until this year, that Feinstein peaked exactly for the Nationals, and nothing else. However, this year he also won the Copenhagen Open, so putting to rest his `Nationals-only' teasing!
The organiser, Robert Stanton, did an excellent job, arranging a very nice venue in a quiet hotel. Adelaide Carpenter refereed, and coped calmly with the usual crowd of players jostling her while she made the pairings!
The other tournament taking place on the Sunday was, of course, the Challengers' tournament -- the prize at stake being direct qualification for next year's National Finals. There were four players, so a six-round all-play-all-twice tournament was held. The winner was an interloper, Sophie Collay, who was visiting from France! She scored a perfect 6/6, and was followed by Myles Harvey on 4, Eileen Forsyth on 2, and Joan Stephenson, very kindly playing to keep the numbers even, on 0. Because Sophie cannot play in the Nationals (being from a rival country), the qualification place went instead to Myles Harvey.
The author wishes to point out that the large number of Feinstein wins in these transcripts is not a coincidence. He also wishes to point out that the large number of losses by Brightwell, Handel and Leader in the games selected is a coincidence.
For more comments on the British Championships Final Game from 1993 (transcript 12 above) by Champion Joel Feinstein see the article Feinstein vs Leader.