The 4th Galway International Chess Congress, with a record €10,000 prize fund sponsored by Infopoint Systems, was held over the weekend of Oct 7-9th 2005 in the comfortable surroundings of the Corrib Great Southern Hotel.

220 players from all over Ireland, the UK, EU, USA, Russia and Israel competed over the weekend in the 4 separate tournaments, with the top players playing in the Masters section and the rest playing in the Challengers, Major and Minor sections.

Many of the top players commented on the relaxed atmosphere at the tournament – possibly related to the number of players availing of the local hospitality. Local were treated to the rare sight of speed chess being played over pints in the Roisin Dubh pub into the early hours after the tournament was over! One American tourist/patzer, wandering by, insisted on challenging Sam Collins for a game for a whiskey, probably figuring that the chances were pretty slim of meeting a chess IM in a Galway pub at 1am on a Sunday night/Monday morning!

The Masters section, which was the strongest in the short history of the tournament with 12 internationally-titled players including 4 GMs (chess Grandmasters), was won by Bartosz Socko of Poland on a tie-break from Gawain Jones, 17, from England but now living in Ennis. While Socko, as top seed, was expected to do well, this was an excellent performance from Gawain to finish ahead of GMs Baburin, Jonkman and Mikhalevski.

The Challengers section was won by Gerard MacElligott from Dublin, on a tie from Semyon Mkrtchyen from Dublin and DJ O’Donoghue from Cork.

The Major section was dominated by experience with Michael Burniston continuing his recent fine form to take the title on a tie-break from Clive Hutchby (US), Paul Ward (from the local Galway chess club) and Donal Burns from Cork.

The Minor section saw the only outright win of the weekend with Petie Collum from Longford winning in impressive fashion.

At the prize-giving, the tournament director Ronan Duke from Galway Chess Club singled out Aidan Joyce from Infopoint Systems for special thanks as the tournament would not have been possible without his sponsorship and vision.

Full details of the tournament are available on the Galway Chess Club website at www.galwaychess.com