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Written by HG

Category: News

Published: 16 June 2022

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Richard Spencer, one of our members, played at the National Scrabble Championship over the weekend of June 11^th-12^th.   Here is his report about how he got on.

I play competitive scrabble as a hobby and played at the UK scrabble championship on the weekend of 11-12th June.  I have been a member of the East Berks Scrabble Club for 6 years and have played in regular tournaments across the UK but this was my first experience of playing in the biggest tournament in the UK calendar.

The tournament was held in a Bristol hotel with 16 games played over 2 days with a field of 80 players. Each player has 25 minutes on the clock to make all their moves.  The standard was high with a World Champion, US champion and several UK champions playing and the Sunday Times were covering the event.

I played the defending champion in game 2 and lost but it was a good learning experience and I managed to win 7 games in all to finish mid table.  The former world champion had a bad start losing 3 of his first 5 but won the tournament by winning his last 11 games to finish on 13 wins.

One highlight was playing against a blind girl who used an abacus to record all her scores and used braille tiles which were arranged in a tray. As well as laying her own tiles by touch she had to move her hands across the board to work out where I had played. She was also spot on with calculating all the scores for each of her moves and used less than half her time to complete her game–truly inspirational. 

Included above is a photo of one of the boards of one of the more interesting games against a stronger opponent.

When you play all your tiles you get a bonus of 50 points to add to your score for that word.  In this game I played three bonus words of SORDINI, DIVAGATE and REDOLENT while the opponent played BEETLED and AUTOGIRO.

I lost the game by 7 points as the opponent scored a few more points with some of his other words and played out first with SORTAL so had an extra turn than me. He pointed out that if I had blocked that move, he could have still gone out with TOLARS bottom right also making EWT.

All in all it was a challenging but very enjoyable experience meeting a lot of interesting and friendly people.

Richard Spencer

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Written by HG

Category: News

Published: 21 April 2022

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A new word list came into effect on Tuesday 19 April 1922.

Known as CSW21, though it was actually published as a Collins book in 2022, it has no additions to the previous word-source.

However it contains a large number of deletions, primarily offensive terms for people. Examples include JEW, LEZ, DAGO and many more besides.

Please note that all articles, puzzles etc published on this website prior to 19 April 2022 will NOT be retrospectively changed to reflect the new word list. 

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Written by HG

Category: News

Published: 08 April 2022

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Happy New Year!   Welcome back to Hepzi Rodrigues, Nina Thornhill, and Patrick Beatty.   Best improver for this part of the year is Charles Parker, ahead of last quarter’s winner Joy Wade, and Sharon Hewitt. 

High-scoring words:

·       185       COMMERCE                Keith                 (a 9-timer)

·       106       CAMPSITE                   Graham

·       104       HUTTING                     Graham

·       102       HEARKEN                    Charles

·       102       CAVERNS                    Michael

·       100       FOLDERS                     Maureen

·       98        ENDORSE                    Maureen

·       96        BENEATH                     Martin

·       96        HERNIAS                      Graham

·       96        INKIEST                       Maureen

·       95        ACHIEST                      Richard

·       93        FAMINES                     Helen

·       93        WOOMERAS                Graham

·       90        REGRETS                    Helen

·       90        ACQUIRE                     Maureen

·       88        ANGELIC                      Richard

·       86        ANDESITE                    Helen                (a 4-timer)

·       85        VIRGINS                      Charles

Also: 82 CRAVINGS Maureen, 82 GOULASH Richard, 81 MATURER Keith, 80 BROOKING Charles, 80 SEDATING          Graham, 80 ACACIAS Helen, 79 GUTTERS Maire, 79 UNLOADS Maureen, 79 LOERIES Helen, 79 STEELIE Richard, 78 INVITER Maureen, 77 VINTAGES Graham, 76 FEINTER Charles, 76 RETIRED Maire, 76 TALAQ Helen, 75 FLAUNTS Richard, 75 NECROSE Richard, 74 LASERING Richard, 74 WALTZES Charles, 72 VAUNTED Wanda, 72 UNSCREWS Charles, 72 REGISTER Charles, 72 ARRANGE Maire, 72 FLANK Wanda, 72 JADE Keith, 71 RUNNERS Keith, 69 SAUCIER Charles, 69 RETAINERS Maire, 69 SARDINE Maire, 67 DEALERS Maire, 65 ATTACKER Keith, 64 MEDDLING Maire, 64 SPLINTER Maire, 64 DOUANES Richard, 63 SHEARING Keith, 63 STUDIES Maire, 63 PRANCING Charles, 51 NAARTJIE Fiona, 50 FOEHN Helen

Many bonuses or high-scoring moves by one player in a game:

·       ENTAILS 65 HANDIER 67 REPINES 80 AUNTIES 80                 Wanda

·       STROBED 76 OUTRIDE 68 DISTILL 65 SALICETS 88               Helen

·       RETICLES 83 DISTHENE 89 RESILING 68 RELACING 65            Richard

·       ERASION 75 FENDERS 76 ALIMENT 86 OUTSTARE 77            Graham

·       TARRING 73 ORIGANE 69 IRISATE 70 LEANEST 66                Graham

·       PETUNIA 74 SNOTTILY 80 EDIFIED 87                                     Fiona

·       ANISEED 63 RETIMING 69 QUITTED 78                                   Tricia

·       READMIT 75 OBVIATED 66 FANCIES 71 (consecutive moves)            Helen

·       FACTIONS 86 WHORLING 86 PSALTERS 90                            Helen

·       GUESTED 70 TAENIAS 78 PRATTLED 86                                 Helen

·       DEMISES 90 EATERIE 73 INOSITE 72                                      Wanda

·       NITRIDE 70 GARBLES 85 NOTABLE 75                                    Wanda

·       LEANEST 70 SPURTLE 71 BOOSTER 77 (consecutive moves)            Richard

·       RESTATE 85 LEMONADE 83 ROUNCES 75                              Richard

·       GRASSED 78 SEMITIC 72 WAITRONS 83                                 Richard
(Richard got 3 bonuses in 4 other games, a selection of the words are above)

·       EQUINES 88 BLOUSIER 74 GETTABLE 76                               Graham

·       ADRENAL 86 PIETIES 74 VERBOSE 84                                    Graham

·       SPRAINT 69 STEDING 70 OBVIATED 78                                  Graham
(Graham got 3 bonuses in 2 other games, a selection of the words are above)

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Written by HG

Category: News

Published: 07 April 2022

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he Ilford tournament returned on the 3rd April for the first time since the start of the pandemic, and was attended by two club members, Richard Spencer and Fiona Titcombe.  Eight games were played over the course of the day, Richard playing in division B and Fiona in division C.

Both players started well, winning their first few games.  Richard's good run continued, and his six wins (+412 spread) were enough to secure him the third place prize for his division.  Well done Richard!  Fiona finished on four wins (+75 spread), a decent effort for her second tournament.

Aside from the scrabble, a definite highlight of the event was the excellent cakes kindly provided by Stella Burley! The next Ilford tournament is planned for the 26 June.

Thanks for Fiona for the above report - here is Richard receiving his prize.