The London Young Masters International Chess Tournament - Kickstarter Appeal

Indefatigable chess organiser Adam Raoof - most recently in action as an Arbiter at the London Candidates Tournament - has announced a new venture and he is looking for backers.

Adam Raoof - the smiling Arbiter

Photo © Ray Morris-Hill

''England has a bunch of young talented chess masters who need this event to become Grandmasters, the next Magnus Carlsen! 

A ten player all-play-all chess tournament featuring seven young International Masters and three Grandmasters. The money will be used to fund the venue, the accommodation costs of the players and appearance fees for the Grandmasters.

The main aim is to give our home nation players the chance to qualify as Grandmasters themselves by aiming for a final score of 6.5 or 7/9.  We don't have enough tournament opportunities like this for our young masters, and I hope that this event will be the first in a series of similar tournaments.''

The players in question include:

Jonathan Hawkins, Richard Palliser, Ameet Ghasi, Harriet Hunt, Richard Pert, Craig Hanley, Yang-Fan Zhou, Adam Hunt, Lawrence Trent, Jovanka Houska, Lorin D'Costa, Karl Mah, Mark Ferguson James Cobb, Leighton Williams, Andrew Greet and Eddie Dearing.
 

Jonathan Hawkins, demonstrating a victory over
GM Conquest at the 2nd Mike Closs Memorial event.

Lawrence Trent, playing an exhibition
game at the 2012 London Chess Classic

Adam has created a Kickstarter page for the project, which offers various rewards depending on the size of the donation. Simply head for the page for further details.

Kickstarter is an excellent way to proceed. It is becoming more popular with musicians seeking to fund their new releases. In recent times we have highlighted appeals by Amy Speace, The Two Man Gentleman Band, The Wiyos and a similar 'Pitch In' drive for Rachel Harrington. All four projects came to fruition. Hopefully Adam will receive support his plan deserves.