A mid-season change of match venue from the Abbey Club – home for 13 years – to the Holiday Inn did not affect performances, as Kenilworth Chess Club continued to dominate the Leamington and District League.

For the sixth successive season the Kenilworth A team won Division 1 – eclipsing Olton's 25 year old record of five consecutive titles - this time finishing a full eight points clear of league debutants Warwick University, who just pipped Kenilworth's B team to second place on game points.

Kenilworth A only lost six individual games out of 64 and dropped just three match points in the entire 16 match season.

With Kenilworth's top player, FIDE Master Jude Shearsby, missing most of the season due to school commitments, the club's strength in depth was well illustrated as no fewer than 11 players appeared for the winning team.

Candidate Master Javier Valdepenas was the top performer with 6.5/7 on Board 1, while Keatan Patel also had a stellar season, scoring an unbeaten 9.5/11. 100% scores were recorded by Candidate Master Billy Fellowes (two games) and Club Secretary Mark Page (five games) amongst many strong supporting efforts.

With Javier returning to Spain after three and a half tremendous seasons for Kenilworth (during which he scored an amazing 39 points from 51 games) and Keatan university-bound, it will be quite a challenge to lift a seventh consecutive title, but the club will definitely give it a good go!

Meanwhile Kenilworth B made it three top three finishes in the last three seasons, registering several notable victories along the way – including home and away wins over both Warwick University and fourth placed Banbury A.

The all-conquering A team then made it another league and cup double, by taking the Open KO Cup with a comprehensive 4.5-0.5 triumph over Leamington in the final, after wins from Javier Valdepenas, Andrew Paterson, Bruce Baer and Mark Page. Banbury and Solihull had been beaten in earlier rounds.

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Unfortunately, the Kenilworth team in the final of the Intermediate Cup was defeated by Shirley, as it attempted to win that trophy for the fourth time in five years.

And in amongst all this top-level success, a remarkable new record was set as Anish Bijibilla, aged just six years 10 months, made a winning debut for the club's D team in a Division 3 match against Leamington C.

This saw him become the youngest-ever Kenilworth player to win a competitive game for the club, beating the record previously held by Jude Shearsby and Billy Fellowes, who have both subsequently gone on to achieve international titles.

Anish is currently ranked as the number one English under-seven player in standard, rapid and blitz chess and can hopefully follow the path of his illustrious predecessors.

In total Kenilworth teams have now won 17 Leamington League trophies in the last five seasons.

And there was also individual silverware for Mark Page, who defied considerable advancing years to win the league Blitz Championship, meaning the trophy returned to Kenilworth for the fourth year running, after recent wins for Javier Valdepenas and Bruce Baer.