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Richard Spencer, one of our members, played at the National Scrabble Championship over the weekend of June 11th-12th. Here is his report about how he got on.
I play competitive scrabble as a hobby and played at the UK scrabble championship on the weekend of 11-12th June. I have been a member of the East Berks Scrabble Club for 6 years and have played in regular tournaments across the UK but this was my first experience of playing in the biggest tournament in the UK calendar.
The tournament was held in a Bristol hotel with 16 games played over 2 days with a field of 80 players. Each player has 25 minutes on the clock to make all their moves. The standard was high with a World Champion, US champion and several UK champions playing and the Sunday Times were covering the event.
I played the defending champion in game 2 and lost but it was a good learning experience and I managed to win 7 games in all to finish mid table. The former world champion had a bad start losing 3 of his first 5 but won the tournament by winning his last 11 games to finish on 13 wins.
One highlight was playing against a blind girl who used an abacus to record all her scores and used braille tiles which were arranged in a tray. As well as laying her own tiles by touch she had to move her hands across the board to work out where I had played. She was also spot on with calculating all the scores for each of her moves and used less than half her time to complete her game–truly inspirational.
Included above is a photo of one of the boards of one of the more interesting games against a stronger opponent.
When you play all your tiles you get a bonus of 50 points to add to your score for that word. In this game I played three bonus words of SORDINI, DIVAGATE and REDOLENT while the opponent played BEETLED and AUTOGIRO.
I lost the game by 7 points as the opponent scored a few more points with some of his other words and played out first with SORTAL so had an extra turn than me. He pointed out that if I had blocked that move, he could have still gone out with TOLARS bottom right also making EWT.
All in all it was a challenging but very enjoyable experience meeting a lot of interesting and friendly people.
Richard Spencer
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A new word list came into effect on Tuesday 19 April 1922.
Known as CSW21, though it was actually published as a Collins book in 2022, it has no additions to the previous word-source.
However it contains a large number of deletions, primarily offensive terms for people. Examples include JEW, LEZ, DAGO and many more besides.
Please note that all articles, puzzles etc published on this website prior to 19 April 2022 will NOT be retrospectively changed to reflect the new word list.
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Happy New Year! Welcome back to Hepzi Rodrigues, Nina Thornhill, and Patrick Beatty. Best improver for this part of the year is Charles Parker, ahead of last quarter’s winner Joy Wade, and Sharon Hewitt.
High-scoring words:
· 185 COMMERCE Keith (a 9-timer)
· 106 CAMPSITE Graham
· 104 HUTTING Graham
· 102 HEARKEN Charles
· 102 CAVERNS Michael
· 100 FOLDERS Maureen
· 98 ENDORSE Maureen
· 96 BENEATH Martin
· 96 HERNIAS Graham
· 96 INKIEST Maureen
· 95 ACHIEST Richard
· 93 FAMINES Helen
· 93 WOOMERAS Graham
· 90 REGRETS Helen
· 90 ACQUIRE Maureen
· 88 ANGELIC Richard
· 86 ANDESITE Helen (a 4-timer)
· 85 VIRGINS Charles
Also: 82 CRAVINGS Maureen, 82 GOULASH Richard, 81 MATURER Keith, 80 BROOKING Charles, 80 SEDATING Graham, 80 ACACIAS Helen, 79 GUTTERS Maire, 79 UNLOADS Maureen, 79 LOERIES Helen, 79 STEELIE Richard, 78 INVITER Maureen, 77 VINTAGES Graham, 76 FEINTER Charles, 76 RETIRED Maire, 76 TALAQ Helen, 75 FLAUNTS Richard, 75 NECROSE Richard, 74 LASERING Richard, 74 WALTZES Charles, 72 VAUNTED Wanda, 72 UNSCREWS Charles, 72 REGISTER Charles, 72 ARRANGE Maire, 72 FLANK Wanda, 72 JADE Keith, 71 RUNNERS Keith, 69 SAUCIER Charles, 69 RETAINERS Maire, 69 SARDINE Maire, 67 DEALERS Maire, 65 ATTACKER Keith, 64 MEDDLING Maire, 64 SPLINTER Maire, 64 DOUANES Richard, 63 SHEARING Keith, 63 STUDIES Maire, 63 PRANCING Charles, 51 NAARTJIE Fiona, 50 FOEHN Helen
Many bonuses or high-scoring moves by one player in a game:
· ENTAILS 65 HANDIER 67 REPINES 80 AUNTIES 80 Wanda
· STROBED 76 OUTRIDE 68 DISTILL 65 SALICETS 88 Helen
· RETICLES 83 DISTHENE 89 RESILING 68 RELACING 65 Richard
· ERASION 75 FENDERS 76 ALIMENT 86 OUTSTARE 77 Graham
· TARRING 73 ORIGANE 69 IRISATE 70 LEANEST 66 Graham
· PETUNIA 74 SNOTTILY 80 EDIFIED 87 Fiona
· ANISEED 63 RETIMING 69 QUITTED 78 Tricia
· READMIT 75 OBVIATED 66 FANCIES 71 (consecutive moves) Helen
· FACTIONS 86 WHORLING 86 PSALTERS 90 Helen
· GUESTED 70 TAENIAS 78 PRATTLED 86 Helen
· DEMISES 90 EATERIE 73 INOSITE 72 Wanda
· NITRIDE 70 GARBLES 85 NOTABLE 75 Wanda
· LEANEST 70 SPURTLE 71 BOOSTER 77 (consecutive moves) Richard
· RESTATE 85 LEMONADE 83 ROUNCES 75 Richard
· GRASSED 78 SEMITIC 72 WAITRONS 83 Richard
(Richard got 3 bonuses in 4 other games, a selection of the words are above)
· EQUINES 88 BLOUSIER 74 GETTABLE 76 Graham
· ADRENAL 86 PIETIES 74 VERBOSE 84 Graham
· SPRAINT 69 STEDING 70 OBVIATED 78 Graham
(Graham got 3 bonuses in 2 other games, a selection of the words are above)
|
Name |
Old Rating |
New Rating |
Rating Change |
P |
W |
D |
L |
Average |
Highest score |
|
|
Charles Parker |
86 |
106 |
20 |
32 |
16 |
0 |
16 |
313.4 |
451 |
|
|
Joy Wade |
90 |
105 |
15 |
32 |
12 |
0 |
20 |
337.5 |
445 |
|
|
Sharon Hewitt |
129 |
141 |
12 |
13 |
7 |
0 |
6 |
371.5 |
478 |
|
|
Michael Spencer |
73 |
82 |
9 |
36 |
10 |
0 |
26 |
296.5 |
398 |
|
|
Tricia Walker |
130 |
132 |
2 |
15 |
8 |
0 |
7 |
371.3 |
448 |
|
|
Maureen Barlow |
142 |
144 |
2 |
38 |
23 |
0 |
15 |
364.1 |
487 |
|
|
Richard Spencer |
170 |
169 |
-1 |
34 |
24 |
0 |
10 |
427.5 |
593 |
|
|
Graham Harding |
183 |
181 |
-2 |
48 |
40 |
0 |
8 |
440.8 |
618 |
|
|
Maire Bennett |
72 |
69 |
-3 |
33 |
4 |
0 |
29 |
278.2 |
382 |
|
|
Hepzi Rodrigues |
139 |
136 |
-3 |
18 |
9 |
0 |
9 |
361.3 |
472 |
|
|
Wanda de Poitiers |
171 |
167 |
-4 |
34 |
24 |
0 |
10 |
417.7 |
544 |
|
|
Fiona Titcombe |
162 |
156 |
-6 |
28 |
16 |
0 |
12 |
383.4 |
475 |
|
|
Helen Harding |
172 |
166 |
-6 |
38 |
26 |
0 |
12 |
416.8 |
546 |
|
|
Keith Radbourn |
67 |
60 |
-7 |
32 |
1 |
0 |
31 |
287.8 |
371 |
|
|
Deborah Porter |
142 |
129 |
-13 |
15 |
6 |
0 |
9 |
358.9 |
492 |
|
|
Martin Stephens |
120 |
103 |
-17 |
18 |
6 |
0 |
12 |
339.1 |
473 |
|
|
Pat Llanwarne |
146 |
127 |
-19 |
14 |
6 |
0 |
8 |
348.9 |
436 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Insufficient games – a previous quarter’s results, or 13 games in a quarter, needed to qualify |
||||||||||
|
|
Nina Thornhill |
80 |
124 |
44 |
3 |
2 |
0 |
1 |
371.3 |
376 |
|
|
Anne Connolly |
133 |
172 |
39 |
4 |
2 |
0 |
2 |
376.3 |
424 |
|
|
Patrick Beatty |
112 |
132 |
20 |
3 |
3 |
0 |
0 |
404.7 |
447 |
|
|
Mary Twomey |
79 |
79 |
0 |
2 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
332.5 |
388 |
|
|
Jan Bailey |
131 |
131 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
|
0 |
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he Ilford tournament returned on the 3rd April for the first time since the start of the pandemic, and was attended by two club members, Richard Spencer and Fiona Titcombe. Eight games were played over the course of the day, Richard playing in division B and Fiona in division C.
Both players started well, winning their first few games. Richard's good run continued, and his six wins (+412 spread) were enough to secure him the third place prize for his division. Well done Richard! Fiona finished on four wins (+75 spread), a decent effort for her second tournament.
Aside from the scrabble, a definite highlight of the event was the excellent cakes kindly provided by Stella Burley! The next Ilford tournament is planned for the 26 June.
Thanks for Fiona for the above report - here is Richard receiving his prize.
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Over the weekend of 21-23 January 2022 five East Berks Scrabblers played in a 20 game tournament in Shanklin.
The five players were Helen, Graham, Wanda, Maureen and Richard.
The weekend was divided into two 10 game round-robin tournaments with promotion and relegation between the two events.
In the first event Richard and Graham played in Division A, a strong field featuring two grandmasters and a youth winner from Hong Kong! Richard finished in a commendable mid-table position. Unfortunately Graham finished in one of the relegation positions.
Helen, Maureen and Wanda all competed in Division B. This division was very competitive as one player was relegated with 4 wins from 10. Maureen won 5, but Helen and Wanda were vying for top positions entering the last game. Wanda won her game, finishing second in the division - Helen lost her game, missing out on promotion, and finished third with a small prize too.
In the second tournament. Helen, Graham and Maureen played in Division B. It quickly became a two-horse race between Graham and Helen as they held the top two positions for most of the tournament. Helen had three very large wins early on, and these were the decisive factor in her divisional win, and Graham finishing second.
Wanda joined Richard in Division A and continued her winning streak. She was the lowest rated in the division and won game after game after game. Eventually she finished third which again yielded her prize money. Well done Wanda!
A great event, and with the sea just yards from the hotel a great view to look at after a losing (or a winning) game!
Page 7 of 20
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