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Gipf® News
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Updated 27 December 1999
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| GIPF is an MSO medal event and the brainchild of abstract games inventor Kris Burm. It is the first game of an ongoing, interlinked project - to learn more visit www.gipf.com. |
Ruyters & Ruyters dominate 3rd Open GIPF
DECEMBER 5? BAD TIMING! December 6, Saint Nicolas’ birthday, fell on a Monday this
year, which meant that 1/2 of Belgium (and 3/4 of The Netherlands) were going to
celebrate the holy man one day earlier, i.e. the day of the 3rd Open GIPF Tournament.
About 15 people were so kind to let me know that they could not be there because of
family obligations. First things first, right. Bad timing happens when somebody - like
myself - forgets about daily life because of compulsive GIPF- behavior.
Nevertheless, 47 people did not feel close enough to Saint Nicolas to stay home and
ring bells and blow horns. 47 players, that already represents a bit of weight.
At the last moment the tournament got what was lacking up to that point: international
input. First Ralf Friedrich (D) signed in, and next Christophe Weimann (F). With the 3
registered Dutchmen (Koen De Jongh, Fred Kok en Teun De Lange), that brought the
total up to 5 players from across the Belgian borders.
The morning of the tournament 3 players called off because of more urgent obligations.
Two simply didn’t show up, which meant that the number of participants dropped back
to 42 - still enough weight, I thought. Per category that was: 14 players in category 1
(1500 Elo points or more), 22 in category 2 (no Elo points yet or maximally 1499), and 6
in category 3 (under 14).
Felix Vermeulen (age 10) appeared to be the strongest in category 3. He won 5 out of
5 games and made clear that he rules amongst the players under 14 year. However,
Margo De Lange (age 10), is somebody to keep an eye on. She scored 4 wins. When
playing against Felix, she was clearly in the lead at a certain moment and Felix wasn’t
able to take over until Margo had, let’s say, a bad idea… Anyway, a remarkable fact is
that they both scored higher than their 12 year old opponents. Sten Dielen (12) took the
3rd place and tied on the 4th place were Anton De Lange (12), Tina Van Hoof (12) and
Dries Burm (9).
As could be assumed in advance, category 2 was the largest group. Although it
concerned beginners and occasional players, the level of play was most certainly higher
than expected. The best proof of that point is that some of the favorites (i.e. the more
regular players) had to bite the dust more than once.
Fred Kok didn’t appear to be in his best shape. Since he regained his world title LAO
during the last MSO, he had hardly played a game of GIPF, meaning that he couldn’t
find his rhythm in Antwerp.
Back to the favorites: Werner Hanzen took off with 2 wins. Next he beat top-favorite
André De Laet in the 3rd round but then lost his concentration and gave away 2 games.
Luc Dielen and Jeroen Weyn remained unbeaten with 4 straight wins each, but Luc
couldn’t take the measure of André De Laet in the 5th round and Jeroen Weyn lost
against Johan Beersman. That brought everything back together at the top of the
standings with one more round to go.
Luc and Jeroen kept their nerves under control
and won their last game - and so, out of the blue, did Christophe Weimann. Christophe
had lost against Teun De Lange in the 2nd round, but then fought his way back to the
top with 4 wins in a row. Luc Dielen won the title with 5 wins out of 6 games, sharing 1st place with Jeroen and Christophe.
AND NOW CATEGORY 1, the category of the rulers. All of the strong Belgians were present.
A true pity that the high ranked foreigners could not participate. Yoshi “Octopus” Ikkai
(J), Stephen “Taff” Tavener (GB), Jochen Berensdorfer (D) and Hans Decker (D) were
unable to come over. Luckily there was a dude named Koen De Jongh (NL), the winner
of the previous Open GIPF, so that, somehow, it was still possible to have the idea of an international GIPF confrontation.
It was going to be a war of attrition: 7 rounds to be played in 8 hours and all games were bound to be tough. Favorites? Not really. Ronny
Van Hoof was the only one to whom I gave little chance to become the winner, for the
simple reason that he hadn’t played GIPF since November last year (i.e. since the
previous Open GIPF).
Then again, he certainly was a strong player, so he was not to be underestimated. I, personally, would have given two players slightly better odds
because of their consistency: Kurt Vandenbranden and Aksel De Meester. And maybe
Werner Dupont, too, because he showed up again out of nothing last summer, to
become the winner of the MSO GIPF Championship. But that didn’t mean I would have
dared to bet my money on one of them.
I hadn't seen Dirk Monsieur and Walter Jacobs playing for a long while, nor the cousins Raf and Romeo Ruyters, so hard to predict in what shape they were going to be - but they are always dangerous. And there was Koen De Jong, the winner
of the previous Open GIPF, probably the most natural player, but you
never know whether he will make things happen or not.
The same goes for Mozes De Bruyn, the most unpredictable player
amongst the Gipfers known to me, the man of huge risks and incredible sacrifices, the opponent against whom you never know for sure whether he made a terrible mistake or set a trap that will cost you the game - a hard boiled all-or-nothing-man.
And then there were also Rita Pauwels, Karel Daelemans and Maurice Engelaer,
capable of beating the very best players, but so far they haven't succeeded in
producing their best play round after round during a tournament. And, last but not least, there was the special case Patrick Van de Perre, also know as Le Maître de Points.
Patrick is a consistent player - that is, when he's not playing in the Open GIPF. He
looks at it as at a Monstrous Black Beast. Unfortunately, he has every reason to look at it that way, because this year, again, he lost his 3 first games…
On the other hand, Kurt Vandenbranden, Raf Ruyters and Karel
Daelemans started well; they won their first 2 games. That resulted in a first thriller in
the 3rd round: Raf versus Kurt. A tight game, that went all the way and could have gone
to either player. Both got into time trouble; Raf succeeded in getting the upper-hand,
went 3 pieces ahead, but made a mistake and let Kurt back into the game with only
seconds to play.
At that point Raf's hands started to tremble so hard that executing a move in itself, i.e.
putting a piece on the board and pushing into the game, became a bigger problem to
deal with than Kurt's resistance. In the end Raf won the game, but he had to dig deep…
After having won that game, it looked as if Raf Ruyters - the winner of the 1st Open
GIPF - had a good chance of obtaining a second title. He was one win ahead
and didn't have too many problems with his 4th round match against Dirk Monsieur. But then his candle started to sputter. Maybe he had to dig too deep against Kurt? He lost
in the 5th round against Werner Dupont and in the next round his cousin Romeo wiped
him off the board in what must have been the shortest of all the games played in
category 1.
That win meant that Romeo had taken over the lead with 5 wins, having 5 players at his tail with 4 wins: Raf to start with, further Werner Dupont and Kurt
Vandenbranden, but also Aksel De Meester and Koen De Jongh, who both had won
their last 3 games.
The key game of the 7th round was Romeo versus Aksel. A 6th win for Romeo would
have given him the needed extra point to become the undisputed winner - but Aksel
beat him. And also Koen and Kurt won their last game against, respectively, Werner
Dupont and Walter Jacobs, which resulted in final standings that show how close the
competion was:
| Place |
Name |
Score |
Prize |
| 1= |
Ruyters, Romeo |
5/7 |
9250 BEF |
| 1= |
De Meester, Aksel |
5 |
9250 BEF |
| 1= |
Van Den Branden, Kurt |
5 |
9250 BEF |
| 1= |
De Jongh, Koen (NL) |
5 |
9250 BEF |
| 5= |
Dupont, Werner |
4 |
2000 BEF |
| 5= |
Daelemans, Karel |
4 |
2000 BEF |
| 5= |
Ruyters, Raf |
4 |
2000 BEF |
| 5= |
Pauwels, Rita |
4 |
2000 BEF |
| 9= |
Jacobs, Walter |
3 |
|
| 9= |
Engelaer, Maurice |
3 |
|
| 9= |
Monsieur, Dirk |
3 |
|
| 9= |
Van De Perre, Patrick |
3 |
|
| 13 |
De Bruyn, Mozes |
1 |
|
| 14 |
Van Hoof, Ronny |
0 |
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Romeo Ruyters, the highest ranked player who attended, ran a more difficult program
than the players with whom he was sharing the 1st place. So, after having obtained a 4th
and 7th place in the 2 previous tournaments, he now became the well
deserved winner of the 3rd edition.
In due time some of the played games will be added to the archives on the GIPF-site,
but that won't be until, we may say 2000, instead of the archaic 1999.
- Report from GIPF inventor, mover and shaker, Kris Burm
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