The British On-Line Rapidplay Championship was run on 02/01/2021, starting at 10.00. Early recourse to the pairings and results, shortly after the start, revealed that an apparently tame early draw had been agreed on top board. That result was

(W) FM Harry Grieve ½‑½ GM Matthew Turner (B).

Was this due to a flashy drawing line in the opening, which GM Turner had not seen before? Would you not expect Turner, who was top-ranked in the tournament, to be making an all-out attempt to win? A possible explanation for the fast daw became apparent on sight of the pairings for round 8 of the main long-play championship, scheduled for the evening of the same day. There, the second-board pairing was:

(W) FM Harry Grieve v GM Matthew Turner (B).

It may have been that neither player wished to reveal any preparation made for that second game to be played later in the day!

(Postscript: in the event, that later Open game was in fact a tame 10-move draw.)

A potentially interesting entrant to watch was 64-year-old former Sheffield University student, IM Pete Large, who after leaving university (many years ago) was a frequent winner of rapid-play events in the London area. How would he fare in this mini-event of 21 players of whom he was ranked 4th at the start? (6 of the 28 listed entrants seemingly withdrew before the start, and one of those paired did not play, leaving only 21 in round 2.) After 3 rounds Large was the only player left on 100%, then playing Chopra Tanmay of India, who in round 3 had taken a second half-point off Matthew Turner. Tanmay won that game, so becoming sole leader on 3½, with 5 players on 3 (including Turner and Large).

Round 5 saw Yichen Han with white upfloated to play Chopra Tanmay on board 1 (combined ages about 29), with Large getting white against Turner on board 2 (combined ages about 109). Han and Turner emerged winners of these games, meaning these two went into the joints lead, along with Harry Grieve, on 4 out of 5.

Top two boards in round 6 were Matthew Turner (W) v Yichen Han, and Richard Pert (W) v Harry Grieve. The first was drawn and Harry Grieve won the second, pushing into the sole lead on 5 out of 6, followed by Turner and Han on 4½.

Top pairings in the final round were Grieve on 5 (W) v Han on 4½, and Aaravamudhan Balaji on 4 (W) v Turner 4½. It was in fact some time before the final round pairings were published, perhaps due to problems with producing satisfactory pairings arising from the small number of players, though modern pairing software is presumably on top of this sort of problem. Maybe somebody just forgot to upload the pairings to Chess-Results.com. Pairings were finally uploaded, with the results, about 33 minutes after the advertised start of the round.

Grieve v Han was a draw, while Balaji v Turner was a win for the latter, meaning final top places were:

1-2	Harry Grieve	5½
1-2	Matthew Turner	5½
3	Yichen Han	5

Pete Large had lost in rounds 4 to 6, then drawn in round 7, to end on only 3½.