Scrabble

The final game of the UK National Scrabble Championship was played between two former champions, Paul Allan and Allan Simmons. This time, Paul Allan clinched the title with the play of “bandura” (which is a Ukrainian lute) for a triple-word bingo worth 86 points. (For those trying to figure out how “bandura” is worth 86, the “d” was a blank, the “r” finished “tar”, and the final “a” was placed on the triple-word space and also finished “ta”.)

Chess

Chess continues to be played while the World Championship is underway…

In fact, other matches being played in India to celebrate the Championship included one for blind players, which was won by 16 year-old Sai Krishna, and the Women Grandmaster Tournament.

Ryan Harper of Trinidad & Tobago won the Umada Cup in Aruba.

FIDE selected 13th-ranked Peter Svidler for the open slot in the next Candidates Tournament, bypassing higher ranked players such as Alexander Grischuk (ranked 5th) and Hikaru Nakamura (ranked 4th).

While the FIDE Presidential Board approved plans for six Grand Prix events in 2014, agreements for only four have been signed so far. If the remaining two end up not happening, the two spots reserved in the next Candidates Tournament for Grand Prix winners will instead be selected one from the World Cup and one from the ratings list.

Backgammon

In the open section of the Capital Classic Backgammon Championships in Herndon, Virginia, the winner was Greg Merriman of Michigan.

At the Merit Open International Backgammon Championship in Cyprus, Sergey Erokhin of Russia took home the masters trophy and the team of Haris Christidis and Konstantinos Mitrelis from Greece the doubles trophy.

Collectible Card and Miniatures Games

Fantasy Flight Games’ World Championship Weekend was held in Roseville, Minnesota, where Alvaro Rodriguez of Spain claimed the title of Joust World Champion for A Game of Thrones: The Card Game. Ryan Jones, though, was crowned Melee World Champion and Overall World Champion. In the Android: Netrunner tournament, the winner was Jens Erickson. Jeremy Zwirn, the 2012 champion of Netrunner and Warhammer: Invasion, this year won at Call of Cthulhu: The Card Game. Dennis Harlien triumphed in the tiebreaker for Star Wars: The Card Game. Oliver Franke of Germany moved up from his second place finish last year in the Warhammer: Invasion championship. And in the final game of the Star Wars: X-Wing Miniatures Game tournament, Paul Heaver battled back from a two-ship deficit and eliminated his opponent’s last ship with only one hull point to spare.

Rookie and new hometown hero, Luis Navas, won Magic: The Gathering Grand Prix Santiago.

Samuel Marti of Switzerland claimed victory with a blue-green deck at Magic: The Gathering Grand Prix Valencia.

At the Legend of the Five Rings Pacific Rim Championships, Edward Bareng claimed victory for Lion. Alexander Iarstev, playing Scorpion, was the winner at the Legend of the Five Rings South American Championships.

Go

For the fifth year in a row, a Korean team has won the International Amateur Pair Go Championship in Tokyo.

Draughts

The winner of the European Draughts Championship was Peter van der Stap of the Netherlands.

The winner of the Portugal Open was Guntis Valneris.

Other Games

The winner of the 24th World Perudo Championships in London (the game is also known as Liar’s Dice) was Dan Reade.

From a touring series, 14 youngsters were invited to participate in the UK Lego Chima Challenge Championship, where Reggie Pegrum (age 9, from Waltham Abbey, Essex) was declared the winner.

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Chess

Manoj Kumar won the Fiji Bitter Chess Championship. After a tie-break game, Kabrina Terubea took the title in the women’s section.

High school student, Tanraj Sohal is the youngest player ever to win the British Columbia Closed Chess Championship.

Grandmaster Alex Shabalov of Pennsylvania won the 4th Continental Class Championships in Arlington, Virginia. After defeating his chief rivals in rounds four and five, he coasted through the remaining two.

It was upset city at the National Challenger Chess tournament in New Delhi. None of the top four seeded players finished high enough to qualify for the first National Champioinship event scheduled for December. Instead, 20th seeded M.S. Thejkumar finished in first. While the first nine players from this tournament are guaranteed spots in the National Championship, since current World Champion Viswanathan Anand is not expected to participate, 10th place finisher, B. Adhiban should also qualify.

It was an underdog also that took the top position in the European Chess Club Cup, Czech G-Team Novy Bor.

At the Asian Cities Chess Team Championship, Tagaytay City (Philippines) finished in first place with 17 points. China’s Shanghai and Wuxi both ended with 15 points but Shanghai edged out Wuxi in the tiebreaker to claim second. From the Tagaytay team, grandmaster John Paul Gomez finished ahead of all others to win the individual competition, the Dubai Cup.

Looking forward, the 2014 Candidates Tournament has been scheduled for March 30th in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia.

Backgammon

Malcolm David of Texas won the Florida State Backgammon Championship, Alex Zamanian the Connecticut State Backgammon Championship, Kenji Shimodaira the 19th Japan Backgammon Open, and Minakami Tsuyoshi of Japan the Chicago Backgammon Open.

The inaugural Gibraltar Backgammon Festival featured elite and novice sections. Two former world champions participated, along with representatives of 15 countries. The winner was Tilman Sohnchon of Germany.

Subbuteo

At the Subbuteo Challenge Cup in Manchester, Brian Dailey was the winner in the senior category and Kye Arnold the winner in the junior league.

Magic: The Gathering

At Grand Prix Antwerp, Patrick Dickmann, twin brother of another Grand Prix champion, bested a field of 1,600 to come in first place.

Monoblack Devotion carried Brian Braun-Duin to victory at Grand Prix Louisville.

At Grand Prix Hong Kong, Shuhei Nakamura claimed the sixth title of his career.

Other Collectible Card Games

Jacek Jachymowski of Poland was the winner of the 2013 European Championship for Legend of the Five Rings.

Draughts

Jean Marc Ndjofang of Cameroon endured a rising room temperature on the final day of the ADG Amersfoort Open Championship (Netherlands), yet managed to maintain his lead and take home the trophy.

In Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, the World Women’s Championship was won by Zoja Golubeva of Latvia, the World Blitz Championship by Matrena Nogovitsyna of Russia, and the World Rapid Championship by Darya Tkachenko of Ukraine.

Go

Despite a majority of European players, the 8th Korea Prime Minister Cup International Amateur Baduk Championship was dominated by Chinese and Koreans. At the top was Park Jaegeun of Korea, followed in second by Fu Li of China.

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Artist Alexandra Llewellyn had-paints Backgammon boards. A variety of styles are in-stock at £2,100. However, custom sets are also available with personalized engravings or pieces made with semi-precious stones.

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Board Games

Matthew Pierce was the winner of the Catan North America Championship at Gen Con.

At Gen Con, Mayfair also organized a world record game of Settlers of Catan with 922 players.

Dominoes

Sixty divers of the British Sub-Aqua Club set a record for the largest underwater Dominoes game.

Backgammon

A team of Israeli seniors won the 38th Backgammon World Championship.

Magic: The Gathering

Grand Prix Warsaw’s Standard format was dominated by Red-Green and won by Wenzel Krautmann of Germany.

At Grand Prix Kitakyushu (also Standard), Raymond Tan of Malaysia earned the trophy after mulliganing down to four cards but still coming out ahead in game two of the final round.

Grand Prix Oakland was a Sealed/Booster Draft event and conquered by Hall of Fame player William Jensen.

Another Sealed/Booster Draft event, Grand Prix Prague was won by Anatoly Chuhwichov of Russia.

Other Card Games

After taking fist place in the Melee event (four-player games) and second in Joust (one-on-one games), Steve Simoni was declared North American Champion for A Game of Thrones: The Card Game at Gen Con.

The 2013 World Champion for the Legend of the Five Rings CCG was also at declared at Gen Con. His name, Tom Kirchgesner.

Bobby Drake won the first Kaijudo Summer Championship in Seattle. During the weekend event, the invited competitors also spent time with Wizards of the Coast’s Kaijudo R&D team to help develop future cards.

Chess

Vladimir Kramnik has taken the 2013 FIDE World Cup, though he won only one game in the final match with Dmitry Andreikin. The other three games were a draw.

At the always outdoors Moscow Blitz Championship contestants prepared for the cold and wet weather had an advantage. In the main competition, top-10 FIDE ranked player, Sergey Karjakin, was victorious. In the women’s division, Daria Charochkina bested her nearest competitor by 2.5 points. The veteran men’s division was led by Vladimir Voevodin and the veteran women’s division (first time at the tournament) by Galina Strutinskaya. junior championships were won by Stanislav Romanov won the boys’ junior division and Anna Vasenina won the girls’ junior division.

Alex Lenderman won the Atlantic Open.

Awonder Liang is the youngest Chess master in the United States. At 10 years old, his rating is 2,220.

Scrabble

The Guyana Association of Scrabble Player’s Open tournament was won by the organization’s president, Leon Belony.

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Magic: The Gathering

At the only Modern Masters limited event and largest Magic tournament ever held (4,500 players), Grand Prix Las Vegas, Neal Oliver lost his first game but none of the next 17 to take home the trophy and a $3,500 prize.

Meanwhile, in Return to Ravnica block play, Patriawan Kurniadi was the winner at Grand Prix Bangkok, Oscar Christensen at Grand Prix Gothenburg, Andres Martinez at Grand Prix Guadalajara, and Andrew Longo, Eric Phillipps, and Eric Berger in the team matches at Grand Prix Providence.

Scrabble

The Gulf Scrabble Championship concluded June 1st, with Mohammed Suleiman, a Canadian-Pakistani national representing the UAE, taking the top position. Suleiman won 15 out of 20 games played. Ralph Lobo scored 44 bingos in 20 games played at the tournament, while Ronald Credo, 2012 Champion, scored the highest game (640 points) and Selwyn Lobo achieved the highest score for an individual word (176 for “Cracking”).

At the Canadian National Scrabble Championship, Adam Logan was the winner. Logan won three straight games in the best-of-five final series, scoring words such as “Gardyloo” (68), “Eglomise” (65) and “Zoecia” (34).

Chess

The World Rapid & Blitz Chess Championships took place in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia. Shakhriyar Mamedyarov of Azerbaijan was declared the World Rapid Chess Champion and Le Quang of Vietnam the World Blitz Chess Champion. A total of $400,000 in prize money was handed out.

The latest ratings from FIDE show Magnus Carlsen of Norway ranked #1 (at 2864), followed by Levon Aronian of Armenia (2813) and Vladimir Kramnik of Russia (2803). The current World Champion, Viswanathan Anand of India, is actually ranked fourth at a rating of 2786.

Even Anand’s fourth-place rating will probably not hold up, though, after tying for eighth in the Tal Memorial tournament. That one was won by Boris Gelfand of Israel. Carlsen came in second, while Shakhriyar Mamedyarov of Azerbaijan, Dmitry Andreikin of Russia, and Fabiano Caruana of Italy all tied for third.

The winner of the 2013 U.S. Junior Closed Championship was Daniel Naroditsky, 17 and an International Master. At the Asian Youth Chess Championship, gold medals were awarded to Indian girls B. Pratusha (under-18 section), S. Riya (under-14), R.B. Vaishalai (under-12), D. Divya (under-8), and Savithrishri (under-6). International Master (IM) Jan Emmanuel Garcia of Manila took home gold in under-18 Blitz and Standard.

If you’re keeping track of the young Chess prodigies, though, watch out for Sparsh Bisht, a tournament player in India who’s only 4 years old!

Chess player, Quang Liem, is recognized as the richest athlete in Vietnam.

Dominoes

The X FID Domino World Championship just concluded in Orlando. Leading the individual results with a record of 9-0 was Daniel Diaz of the United States. Also with a record of 9-0, Gabriel Sitton and Rafael Villareal of Panama topped the team competition.

Headquarters teams retained their titles in the Guyana Police Force Inter-Division Dominoes Tournament.

A 6-year-old won the Brian Bainbridge Memorial Dominoes Tournament, which was named in memory of his grandfather.

Backgammon

At the 2nd Giants of Backgammon Invitational, first place was secured by Petko Kostadinov of the United States and second place by Tsuyoshi Minakami of Japan. Masayuki Mochizuki of Japan took first place in the coincident 33rd Chicago Open Backgammon Tournament, while tying for third in the Invitational.

At the Los Angeles Backgammon Open, the first place winner was Ed O’Laughlin and the second place winner, Malcolm Davis.

Raj Jansari of England won the 2013 London Open Backgammon Tournament and was also runner-up in the associated Professionals’ Tournament. The winner of the Professionals’ Tournament was Fabio Gullotta of Italy.

Marbles

The Toy and Miniature Museum of Kansas City failed in its effort to retake the world record for largest marble tournament. Only 300 people showed up when they needed 877. The museum had previously set a record with 677 in 2007 but lost it to the Boy Scouts in 2010.

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