I’m writing this on Monday morning and wow, what a weekend that was. The great and the good of the bridge world flocked to TGRs for its 4th Annual Auction Pairs. It’s the first time I’ve played in the event — and I felt like I’d died and gone to bridge heaven. Everywhere I looked
Just before the London Classic, Magnus Carlsen and Judith Polgar contested a four-game match under speed and blindfold conditions as part of the Gran Fiesta of chess at UNAM (Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico) in Mexico City. Supported by the enterprising Mexican Chess Federation, the festival’s highlight was this clash between the top-ranked player and
In Competition No. 2780 you were invited to write, in the spirit of Aesop or La Fontaine, a rhymed fable involving animals. Plato wrote in Phaedo that Socrates whiled away the hours in captivity turning some of Aesop’s Fables into verse. La Fontaine did the same, of course, though not from behind bars, some 2,000
The unclued lights (two of two words and the remainder when paired) are of a specific kind. Across 1 Kind, like 7A (11, hyphened) 7 Well-spaced to start with (3) 13 Mate with old cattle causing fuss (7) 15 Singer losing nothing in outskirts of Mellieha – here! (5) 17 Money expended swapping model
The unclued LIGHTS are LEADERS, verifiable under the entry for RULERS in Brewer. First prize Sandra Speak, Dursley, Glos Runners-up P. and R. Dacre, York; Norma Jacobs, Linton, Wetherby
Black to play. This is from Carlsen-Polgar, Mexico City 2012. Black’s minor pieces seem to be locked out of the game but Polgar’s next move showed that this was not the case and it led to an easily winning position. What did she play? Answers to me at The Spectator by Tuesday 22 January or
