‘Twas a month before Christmas, the Söder boys were full of cheer,

The inaugural beer tasting competition kicked off the night,

Not a Spendrups, Pripps or Sofiero was in sight.

Fourteen questions were asked of each man,

A tie-break was required to split Iron Guts and Tarzan.

In the end it was Tarzan, or Ivan by birth,

Who took the prize and was full of mirth.”

Now onto the Chess.

A Söder record was up for grabs in the 4^th Annual Söder Chess Championship. No one had ever won the same Söder award 3 years in a row. Brissles had the chance to be the first if he could win the 2011 Chess Championship. A record of 19 participants competed and were randomly split into 4 groups with the winner of each group to advance to the semi-finals.

A ‘group of death’ emerged consisting of inaugural Champion Max, Paul, Hanky and 2 unknowns in the chess world – CAngus and Paz (known to some as Baz). The only group of 4 was an even competition and full of controversy between IGuts, Ivan, Bone Crusher and Johan.Group #3 was evenly contested between Tanka, Oscar, Perezmo, Cody and Kungen, while group 4 had 2-time champ Brissles, 2-time champ-board-owner Murph, Bobby Love, Big Blue and the old faithful Jordo.

Only 3 victories came from all games in group 1 – the rest of the games were draws – with Paz taking 2 victories to book his spot in the Semi. Group 2 had a 3-way tie between Johan, IGuts and Beer-Champ Ivan. After disagreements between who was sand-bagging for a draw between Ivan and Johan, the infamous ‘chess clock’ was brought in and Ivan won the game when Johan’s time expired creating a 3-way tie. The only way to split the 3 was by lucky draw which saw Iron Guts go through to the Semi. Cody booked a semi from group 3 with 2 wins and a draw, while Brissles claimed 4 wins in group 4 to advance.

The Semi’s saw 2 intense games where Paz was victorious over former 2-time finalist Iron Guts, and Brissles ended Cody’s night. The final was played between 2 players yet to lose on the night, newcomer Paz and record-seeking Brissles. The game was played with an intensity not seen since the inaugural final back in 2008 with all onlookers doing their best to make as much noise and distract both players. Having been in this situation before, Brissles was perhaps able to block the nonsense out better than Paz, who became distracted with some of the onlookers’ observations.

In the end, it was Brissles who took his 3^rd Söder Chess Championship in a row creating a new Söder record with a 3-peat of club awards.