John Barlow at 1994 Natal Open
John is in the middle, with Louis Courtois
on the left and Nico Gallo on the right

John Barlow played four times in the Durban championship. On debut in 1992 he finished second, just ½ point behind Keith Rust. He tied first in 1993 with 6½ out of 9, missed the 1994 event, and then won the event outright in 1995 with 6 out of 7. John finished third in 1996, again just ½ point behind the winners.

John is a civil engineer by profession. He was brought up in Johannesburg, then lived for many years in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) before moving from there to Namibia. Finally he settled in Durban in 1992, where he still lives. John has now given up over the board play, in favour of correspondence chess.

John is a prolific player of correspondence chess, both postal and by email. He became South African correspondence champion in 1969 after winning the 1967/69 SA championships with the fine score of 8 out of 10. The International Correspondence Chess Federation awarded John their International Master title in 1997 and their Grandmaster title in 2001. John is currently the only ICCF grandmaster in South Africa.

John reached a peak ICCF rating of 2527 in 2001 and is currently (October 2003) rated at 2456 by the ICCF.

John tied for 6th place in the 15th World Championship final (1996-2002) scoring 10 points from 15 games. That's right - the tournament took six years to complete! Due to lengthy postal delays most correspondence chess now takes place via email.