Hendon’s own Tomer Eden and Jonathan Landau shared top place in the July Blitz ahead of a strong field, including a contingent of chess boxers!
Report by Adam Raoof
21 players (and one supersub in Mike Bennett) turned out on this balmy July evening for the latest in the series of ‘First Thursday’ blitz tournaments hosted by Hendon Chess Club.
The strongest player in the field was Hendon’s Tomer Eden, but he faced serious competition from in-form Salvatore Pepe and Jonathan Landau, and welcome visitor Rajko Vujatovic, who saw the event mentioned on the English Chess Federation website.
Rajko was a strong 180+ player a few years ago before he put chess aside for a career in finance, and nowadays is better known for being the arbiter at the extraordinary event that is chessboxing! He speculated that he might be a bit rusty to play at his former strength, but, as he showed, the rust wasn’t too deep! He also brought us guests Tim Woolgar – Mr ChessBoxing himself, and boxer Hubert van Melick.
Salvatore and Rajko both took half points off Tomer, but only Jonathan Landau could keep up, eventually tying for first place with 5/6. Salvatore Pepe won £10 for being the highest Hendon player.
Also appearing at the event were, straight from the airport, Mr Roland Ketszcher from USG Chemnitz in Germany and several new members – Raza Habib and Reino Viljoen, and Jamie Njoko-Goodwin from Barnet. Welcome!
Top standings: