BFCC-40 Tournament
The British Federation for Correspondence Chess this year celebrates its 40th birthday, and this is being marked by two tournaments, one postal and one email.
Organised CC in Britain dates back at least to 1907, when the British Correspondence Chess Association was founded, though even this date is long after the famous London-Edinburgh match played in the previous century. Another important milestone was the formation in 1932 of what eventually became the National Correspondence Chess Club by a group of friends living near Epping Forest. Around this time there was also founded the Postal Chess Club (PCC), which was run as a sideline of Baruch H. Wood's successful magazine "Chess". The Federation itself was inaugurated in 1962 under the name of British Postal Chess Federation (BPCF), and this was changed to the present designation in 1999. Also in 1962 the British Correspondence Chess Society was founded, originally for players with a particular interest in international play. The three major national CC organisations are affiliated to the Federation, as was PCC until its demise following the death of its founder, along with about a dozen other organisations and about four hundred direct individual vice-presidents.
The first president of the BFCC was T. Vaughan Williams, who has been followed by Baruch H. Wood, Keith B. Richardson, Peter C. Gibbs, Reg Gillman and Norman King; the current President is Keith Escott. Over the period the British game has been adorned by two truly outstanding players. CC and FIDE GM Dr Jonathan Penrose won the OTB British Championship many consecutive times before concentrating his chess attentions on the correspondence game. However, the world title eluded him when he took only third place in the 13th World Championship Final. CC GM Keith Richardson, who was the first British player to receive a recognised GM title for playing chess, took the bronze medal in the 7th World Championship Final to gain the GM title, and repeated the feat in the 10th World Championship Final.
A notable success story of the BFCC was the introduction of a continuous Cup tournament known as the BFCC Open, as an alternative to the cyclical British Correspondence Chess Championship. There have been well over three thousand entries to this in the few years it has been running. Currently the tenth final is in progress.
The BFCC selects England teams, as there is no longer a British team following the separate admission of Scotland and Wales to ICCF. The greatest team success was by Dr Jonathan Penrose, Adrian Hollis, Simon Webb, John Footner, John Toothill and Chris Shephard, who as Great Britain won the gold medals in Olympiad IX, and then as England in Olympiad X took the silver medal, a mere half point behind the victorious Soviet Union team.
The Reg Potter Memorial international CC tournament, in memory of the Federation's founding Secretary, began in 1974 with four GMs and nine IMs. As a result of it four new GM titles were conferred, including one for British player Adrian Hollis, who came first. There is a book of the tournament edited by Ken Messere, who also took part – we still have stocks of this book if anyone would like a free copy. A further GM invitation tournament was staged a few years later to mark the Federation's 25th anniversary, which was won by Dr Jonathan Penrose. In December 1999 a five section tournament started in memory of the late, great Reg Gillman. In May 2000 tournaments were started in memory of the late Pat Thorn and David Lodge, and two tournaments begin in May 2002 to mark the Federation's 40th anniversary. The Federation has also organised the 1st North Sea Team Tournament (1998-2002) and the 5th North Atlantic Team Tournament (start 2001), and is the host for ICCF World Cup XI
