ECF Home Director Yuri Krylov reports on the recent 24 hour online Marathon in support of MacMillan Cancer, which took place on chess.com on the 18th and 19th April 2026. Following the deeply felt losses of IM Adam Hunt and GM Jonathan Haw...
In this week's blog ECF Director Yuri Krylov reports from his visit to the Speed Chess Championships in London. The Speed Chess Championship Finals by Yuri Krylov In early February Chess.com rolled into town to host the 2025 Speed Chess Champi...
In our last blog we featured Filip Kaczmarek's chess journey from beating his maths teacher to captaining his school team in the ECF schools team rapidplay competition. This week we feature Yury Krylov's report on this year's schools team rapidpla...
The English Chess Federation runs seven different Inter-Schools Chess Competitions for participating schools which you can see on the web page here: https://englishchess.org.uk/Schools/ - These generally include qualifying stages and f...
This week’s blog features the second in a series of Paul Littlewood’s articles on Tactics, which was originally published in the ECF’s monthly Magazine ChessMoves. In this article Paul looks at one of the basic tactic...
In this week’s blog, Maidenhead and Birmingham University Club player, Calvin Chris Biju takes us through his chess journey including joining Maidenhead Chess Club, reaching the final of the Club Championship, meeting a former British Prime ...
The finals of the UK Open Blitz Championships 2025 took place on Saturday 22nd November at the Woodland Grange Hotel near Leamington Spa in Warwickshire. There were separate Open and Women's finals with 16 of the top UK chess players in each. The ...
Sometimes you may reach an apparently lost position which contains a saving resource based on stalemate. In this week's blog (the first in a series on common tactical patterns) English IM Paul Littlewood provides us with some examples of stalem...
In this week’s blog we feature an article from Grace Wilde, one of a new generation of highly talented English junior players. Grace explains her chess journey including how she joined her first club and went on to play Over the Board game...
Manchester United football manager Sir Matt Busby is famously credited with coining the phrase ‘If you’re good enough your old enough', which is still displayed in the Old Trafford dressing room. Newly qualified ECF arbiter Alexander...
This weekend the English Chess Federation (ECF) are holding a 24-hour tournament on Chess.com to raise funds for DEC Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal via the British Red Cross. Please show your support by joining in even if it’s just by playi...
The ECF is delighted to announce the return of the British Chess Championships. Scuppered by Covid last year, this October will see the Championships take place once again over the board. Hull will host the Open and Women’s Championships, ...
