HCC 2024 Fall Calendar

The Hemmingford Chess Club (HCC) is back from its summer holidays and we are excited for the 2024 Fall season. Thanks to those of you who have shared ideas and suggestions for activities, they have all been really helpful.

Here are the current plans :

• The core of HCC events for the last couple of years has been the 'quad' tournament. These are all-play-all tournaments organized in sections of four to eight players grouped by rating. The round-robin format seems to help participants connect better to each other and the grouping by rating ensures that games are competitive and interesting for everyone. Our first tournament of the season will start the week of September 9th and run to the end of October (details here: https://lichess.org/@/datasmith/blog/hcc-fall-quads-2024/gJsOBPFY) while the second will begin shortly afterwards and wrap up before the end of the year. Watch your lichess inbox for invitations to sign up to these in the coming weeks.
• HCC participants come from around the world and so we are hoping to do a real-time event at the end of October to give us the chance to be together at the same time. This will probably take the form of a casual tournament, perhaps Chess960 or some other variant, paired with a live meeting in which we will be able to chat.
• Last year we invited International Master Dave Ross to take on ten of HCC's best in a simultaneous exhibition. We had a lot of fun with that event and are hoping to organize something similar in the form of another simul or perhaps a lecture. More news on this as soon as we have it.
• Tournament round reports in the form of blog posts or videos have always been a part of our tradition and we plan to continue these. We are always looking for people willing to participate by writing a blog post, analysing a game or agreeing to be interviewed. If you would like to be a part of this please contact me directly.
• We plan to continue to experiment with livestreaming HCC games and events. You will be unsurprised if I tell you that HCC streams could easily become as popular and of as high quality as those of players such as Hikaru Nakamura, Levy Rozman (GothamChess) or Daniel Naroditsky. When we announce these events, please join us if you can.

Thanks to everyone who has been involved in the organisation and promotion of all these events and to all of you who support us with your participation. We are looking forward to a lot of good chess and fun times together.

David (@datasmith)