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By Garry Jones After the formation of the Worcester backgammon club over twelve years ago we wanted to get involved in promoting the game by helping to increase the number of tournaments. At the time, there was a perfect opening between Christmas and New Year, it was decided that this was a great time for a tournament that would attract a lot of people and was an opportunity for a fun, Christmas based, Charitable Tournament. The Turkey Tournament was run before the UKBGF Backgammon Tour was formed and was the last tournament on the Backgammon Tour when it was created. As it is a oneday tournament, when the Tour became defined it was dropped from the Tour, as it was not a two-day event. This could have been the end of the Turkey Tournament, but through the popularity of the dates and the vibe of the Tournament as a Christmas, Charitable tournament, people kept coming. For that we are truly grateful. To have almost one hundred people travel from all around for a one-day tournament is a fantastic indication of the fellowship and generosity within the backgammon community. People bring gifts they got for Christmas and they are rewrapped and a raffle is arranged. This year well over 60 Christmas gifts were regifted in the raffle. As well as some donations of gifts from Rowena Paliwoda who crafts goods related to backgammon. Please look at Rowena’s collection here: folksy.com/shops/butterfliesandboxes An ArtGammon backgammon board was raffled off and at £10 a chance to pick the name of a snowman, the winner would be going home with a brand new ArtGammon board. The winner of this was Leo (6 months old-Sean Jones' Grandson) - the future of backgammon is assured!!! When arranging this tournament, the idea is to work out ways of making the Charity as much money as is possible whilst playing some backgammon. One way this is achieved is keeping the registration fee low (£15). This is achieved through the generosity of one of our sponsors, Ian Gwynne, who provides a plentiful supply of Subway sandwiches for lunch as well as some tasty cookies and this year went all out providing Christmas Cake and a beautiful Chocolate cake. Tea and Coffee with milk and biscuits as well as a plentiful supply of sweets are supplied by Sean and Karen Jones to keep people hydrated during the day. This tournament has a lot of backgammon to play during the day and is both great fun and a bit of a slog! But it is becoming clear that the most sought-after award is Best Christmas Dress: This year there was a great selection of jumpers, but the winner was Alex Hannam who you can see in the picture with Sean Clennell as Alex was runner up in the main tournament. Thank you to all those involved, including Kevin Jones and Sarah Jolliff, Sean and Karen Jones (and Kerry) and for all the technical support, website work and keeping the desk going on the day, David Sanders. Thank you to Tony Taylor for doing the finish on the Trophies after Sean Jones was attacked by a Shark in Spain and lost a finger (or so it was said!!!). A big thank you to Michele De Havilland and the glorious Peter Hodson for donating some of their handcrafted beeswax tealight candles for the trophies, a wonderful addition. A special mention to Chloe Oldfield for being conscripted to help in the kitchen. Thank you to everyone who came yet again and made this tournament a wonderful success.
The most important information is how much did we make tor the Royal British Legion and The Poppy Appeal: £1,440 (at time of publication)
Thank you to all those who travelled to play in this Christmas Tournament, for without you there is no tournament and the fun and frustration, that is, backgammon.
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