In the previous issue we congratulated Henry Tanner, who turned 60 in April, and in a way this celebration continues. On the cover we have a photo of Henry and Harri Hurme enjoying the Finnish summer. The main reason for this photo is the 70th birthday of Harri Hurme on June 2, 2015. In addition, it is appropriate to have also Henry on the cover because of his win in the seniors section in the European Chess Solving Championship. Congratulations! Incidentally, in ECSC 2014, Harri Hurme was the best senior solver.
The report on Iasi ECSC is on pp. 52–59 and pp. 61–62. We had only three solvers in our team, a fourth solver would surely have been useful for the team result. Taking this into account the eight place was a reasonable achievement. The event was well organised and the competitions went smoothly.
On pp. 59–61 we have an article by Mikael Grönroos with nine of his original compositions. All are with neutral pieces and seven also have Circe, making them a bit harder to solve than other problems in this magazine – or perhaps not?
On p. 63 we have dedication compositions to Henry Tanner and Ilkka Sarén, who recently turned 75. Ilkka has been a high-class OTB player and since that an excellent helpmates composer. His output is not very large, but the quality is high. On the same page we have Neal Turner´s solving challenge: Paha pähkinä, A Tough Nut to Crack.
Harri Hurme is certainly familiar to most of our readers, either personally or via his compositions and writings. We have a short article on him on pp. 64–65 with three examples of his compositions. Harri has international titles both as a solver (IM) and as a composer (FM). In addition, he is a FIDE master in OTB chess, confirming his status as a versatile and successful chess personality. On pp. 65–66 we have dedication problems to him and on p. 66 we announce Harri Hurme 70 JT, an international composing competition with the theme ”Rose, twin”. Any stipulation and any kind of twinning are allowed. Please, feel free to share this competition on different forums.
Our new helpmate editor Harry Fougiaxis has actively searched for judges for past years, which have passed without a nominated judge. The first award with a recently appointed judge is now ready. Mario Parrinello finished speedily his award for h#2s, published in our magazine in 2011–2012. See pp. 67–74.
Several years ago we published on a regular basis recently awarded Finnish compositions. Now, after a long absence, this tradition makes a comeback, see pp. 75–76! Our best composer is, of course, GM Unto Heinonen and it is no surprise to see many of his compositions. But we are glad to have also Jorma Pitkänen, Olli Heimo and Harri Hurme among successful Finnish composers. There is more to follow, we hope.
The originals sections start on pp. 77 and offer a wide selection of enjoyable compositions. Please, contribute to our originals sections! Finally, on p. 83, we have the announcement for Emmanuel Manolas 65 JT and a short note on the topical 10th WCCT.
The next issue is due to appear in the autumn of 2015 after the Ostróda WCCC.
Published 8 th June 2015