Grand Prix London 2018 - Welcome to the Fold

London has the largest Welcome to the Fold class ever with seventeen judges!

Chloé Beadell

Name: Chloé Beadell
Level: Level 1
Location: Bognor regis, United Kingdom
Region: United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa

Roisin Doyle

Name: Roisin Doyle
Level: Level 1
Location: Glasgow, United Kingdom
Region: United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa

Daniel Eggle

Name: Daniel Eggle
Level: Level 1
Location: Falmouth, United Kingdom
Region: United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa
Approximate date/month/year you started playing Magic: March 2001
L1 Certification Date: January 9, 2016
Favorite thing (e.g., card, deck, group of people) about Magic: Battle of wits, Angels and Stans games.
Random fact about yourself: I used to own a Gaming shop called Pigeon Games
Why did you become a judge?: My local area had loads of Judges then most of them left and my local store owner asked if i could become a Judge as i had taken my L1 some years before.
What excites you most about this event?: It will be the first time i get too see the inner working of a GP.
What worries you most about this event?: I suffer from anxiety and most of the time i can keep it in check but i hope i don’t get so overwhelmed.
What are you hoping to learn at this event?: If i want to be a OPs judge or a Floor Judge.
Who are your mentors?: Steve Fords Beard.
What challenges have you faced or are you facing to become a better judge?: I am trying too Become a L2 but i don’t test very well.
How have you worked to overcome those challenges?: I have signed up to try and do my L2 exam at the GP this was harder than it sounds for me.
What is the best part about your local Magic community?: Dawn from Stan’s Games, The Community is forever changing due to being reliant on Students and she always fights to keep magic alive even when numbers are low or things are not going so great.
What is your favorite Magic memory?: old UK nationals when it was a massive community thing and it didn’t matter if you qualified or not because you knew it was a chance to catch up with everyone or any time i played birthing pod.

David Fairweather

Name: David Fairweather
Level: Level 1
Location: Manchester, United Kingdom
Region: United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa
Approximate date/month/year you started playing Magic: 01.09.2007
L1 Certification Date: August 24, 2017
Favorite thing (e.g., card, deck, group of people) about Magic: The magic community
Occupation: Teacher
Random fact about yourself: I’ve had 6 heart attacks at the ripe young age of 27
Why did you become a judge?: To support my local community and see what I can give back.
What excites you most about this event?: It’s huge! Thousands of people all in a hall wanting to do the same thing… have fun playing/watching/judging magic!
What worries you most about this event?: Getting lost amongst a sea of people. Not making a correct ruling.
What are you hoping to learn at this event?: How to manage events (side events etc). And just to watch how the L2’s and L3’s do things
Who are your mentors?: Aaron Strawbridge, Jaspa Stritt (for GP London)
What challenges have you faced or are you facing to become a better judge?: I want to become a better judge, however being chosen to judge events/applying for events is difficult for an L1. Most PPTQs only require 1 level 2. Or have a store assigned helper/L1
How have you worked to overcome those challenges?: I have spoken to my Mentor about which PPTQ’s and which events I should apply to. I have also made contact with my LGS to see if they need a helping hand for their events.
What is the best part about your local Magic community?: They are the friendliest group of people ever. Whether you’re brand new to the game. Or a seasoned veteran looking for competitive magic they’ll still make you feel welcome.
What is your favorite Magic memory?: Playing a friend of mine in the final round of a last chance nationals qualifier. We needed to draw to both get in. So intentionally drew the game, and followed it up by playing ‘bad magic’ where each player MUST attempt to win (attacks must happen where possible), but may cast spells as they chose. Mana leaking your own splinter twin only to have your opponent spell pierce your mana leak was great fun!

Tom Hobman

Name: Tom Hobman
Level: Level 1
Location: Chester, United Kingdom
Region: United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa

Robert Hollinshead

Name: Robert Hollinshead
Level: Level 1
Location: Alsager, United Kingdom
Region: United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa

Rowan Kemp

Name: Rowan Kemp
Level: Level 1
Location: birmingham, United Kingdom
Region: United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa

Phil Lancaster

Name: Phil Lancaster
Level: Level 1
Location: Chester, United Kingdom
Region: United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa
Approximate date/month/year you started playing Magic: Oct 2009
L1 Certification Date: June 10, 2017
Favorite thing (e.g., card, deck, group of people) about Magic: Unnecessary puns
Occupation: Unemployed
Random fact about yourself: I have two hands
Why did you become a judge?: To continue to improve the local community. We get a lot of new players, and we’ve got a lot of judges, so there’s something for everyone!
What excites you most about this event?: Working with (even more) judges 🙂
What are you hoping to learn at this event?: More practical experience with the JAR.
What is the best part about your local Magic community?: So many crazy homebrews 🙂
What is your favorite Magic memory?: Probably Memory Plunder. Honourable mentions for Vanish into Memory, Memory Sluice and Shred Memory, though.

Josip Maleš

Name: Josip Maleš
Level: Level 2
Location: Split, Croatia
Region: Europe – East

Brett McKinney

Name: Brett McKinney
Level: Level 1
Location: Dover, United Kingdom
Region: United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa
Approximate date/month/year you started playing Magic: August 15
L1 Certification Date: November 4, 2016
Favorite thing (e.g., card, deck, group of people) about Magic: The community feel and spirit.
Occupation: Network Engineer
Random fact about yourself: Fooled myself into honking having a baby wouldn’t impact my ability to play magic 🙂
Why did you become a judge?: At the time, my local store had no judges. I was the defaqto judge. The store owner suggested that I would make a good judge due to my ability to explain interactions in a non confrontational and easy way for beginners to understand
What excites you most about this event?: This is my first large magic event I have attended as a player or judge. I am looking forward to seeing the masses of like minded jndividuals
What worries you most about this event?: I had worried that if I was to be judging the event I would make a mistake. But being on ops, I hope to learn from others and gain some confidence for future events
What are you hoping to learn at this event?: The way these events are run. What I can expect at future events
Who are your mentors?: Tim Hall. Local judge and store manager in my area
What challenges have you faced or are you facing to become a better judge?: Time. Since I’m now a father I am able to attend far less events
How have you worked to overcome those challenges?: There’s little I can do except keeping uk with current sets and events. I am hoping this improves in the future
What is the best part about your local Magic community?: No one takes things too seriously
What is your favorite Magic memory?: Pulling a Misty Rainforest expedition in my first pre release. Most beautiful card ever printed imho

Josh Pettit

Name: Josh Pettit
Level: Level 2
Location: Cambridge, United Kingdom
Region: United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa

Emma Shrimpton

Name: Emma Shrimpton
Level: Level 1
Location: Bristol, United Kingdom
Region: United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa
Approximate date/month/year you started playing Magic: September 2016 (Kaladesh)
L1 Certification Date: October 15, 2017
Favorite thing (e.g., card, deck, group of people) about Magic: Our amazing community at Excelsior! in Bristol.
Occupation: Nursing Assistant
Random fact about yourself: I started playing Magic almost by accident after a bad injury left me unable to walk for a few weeks. A good friend had bought me some cards for my birthday earlier that year which I truthfully hadn’t really looked at until I rediscovered them when bored from being stuck at home for days on end. A year later and I’m the one dragging the same friend to GPs!
Why did you become a judge?: I’d been running FNMs and other magic tournaments at our local store for about 6 months as an uncertified judge so it was a logical step for me both to improve my knowledge and formalise my position. I also like being able to give back to the community who were incredibly welcoming to me when I was that new player who didn’t know anyone when I rocked up for my first pre release, and I wanted to help ensure that that sense of community continued when the current judges stepped down.
What excites you most about this event?: What doesn’t excite me?! If I had to pick one it’s probably getting to know a lot of the international judges I’ve not had a chance to before, who I’ve only met in passing as a player.
What worries you most about this event?: Nothing specific actually, but possibly because I don’t know what I should be worrying about yet!
Who are your mentors?: My primary mentor is Guy Baldwin, our local area captain who even past my certification continues to help me develop as a better judge. He’s the master of “”curve ball”” scenarios that piqued my interest in the in depth rules of magic and also introduced me to the judge community. I’d also like to mention Sophie Hughes who gave me pre test scenarios and Nathan Hughes who initially asked me if I was interested in joining the judge programme and gave me loads of encouragement along the way.
What challenges have you faced or are you facing to become a better judge?: For me it’s the continuous challenge to learn cards and interactions particularly in Eternal formats. As I’ve only been playing for a short time myself it’s often the case that the local players know the older cards and their odd interactions better than me, I still have to look a lot of them up!
How have you worked to overcome those challenges?: Play more magic, study the cards and ask for help. I also challenge myself by volunteering to judge RegREL legacy events etc to put myself in the position to learn more.
What is the best part about your local Magic community?: We’re super lucky in Bristol to have 3 sanctioned stores so we have a huge and really sociable community. I think magic is offered somewhere everyday of the week except Weds. I’m most proud of how welcoming the community is to new players but it’s also great how well the stores coordinate to ensure pre releases don’t clash or they don’t run the same formats on the same FNMs so our players can play as much magic as possible and can play their favourite formats. I’m not sure about other countries, but I know in England at least it’s a pretty fortunate position.
What is your favorite Magic memory?: My first outing with Blue Moon at FNM. It was a long term project to build and took me nearly the whole of my first year in magic to trade for all the cards as I couldn’t afford to buy them as singles. I was getting a lot of joshing from Magic friends about how it wasn’t a very competitve deck but I just really enjoyed playing it. Then after I finally assembled it and tweaked it, I won its first FNM outing! It was such a good reward for all the effort but more importantly it was the first time I’d played an event with “”my deck”” rather than assembling other people’s lists or borrowed decks from other players.

Jerzy Sikorski

Name: Jerzy Sikorski
Level: Level 2
Location: Brodnica, Poland
Region: Europe – Central
Approximate date/month/year you started playing Magic: February 2010
L1 Certification Date: January 31, 2013
Favorite thing (e.g., card, deck, group of people) about Magic: Blue Black Control from Zendikar-Mirrodin
Occupation: Student
Random fact about yourself: I have got 6 orange hoodies
Why did you become a judge?: I want to check myself. Passing L1 exam was one of my greatest moment in recent 5 years.
What excites you most about this event?: This is my first GP as a judge, first travel by plane, first time in London 🙂
What worries you most about this event?: I am scared of being lonely on judge team.
What are you hoping to learn at this event?: I hope that I will learn how to work with different people .
Who are your mentors?: Witold Waczyński is my mentor in my home town.
What challenges have you faced or are you facing to become a better judge?: Mostly systematic work, it is hard to me to be up to date.
How have you worked to overcome those challenges?: I made workplan for myself. Also calendar become my close friend 🙂
What is the best part about your local Magic community?: Best part of my local community are poeple. I love Magic so much becouse of them. It won’t be the same game without my community.
What is your favorite Magic memory?: Pulling Jace, the Mind Sculptor from my very first booster pack 🙂

David Silva

Name: David Silva
Level: Level 2
Location: Leiria, Portugal
Region: Iberia
Approximate date/month/year you started playing Magic: March 2010
L1 Certification Date: May 21, 2016
Favorite thing (e.g., card, deck, group of people) about Magic: The Modern format
Occupation: Nurse
Random fact about yourself: I listen to both heavy metal and classic music. A LOT
Why did you become a judge?: There was not any certified judge in my town and I was that guy that usually took the calls, so I decided to make it official and become a judge. Now, we are three and a half judges (one of them is working in another country, but he goes to the LGS during his holidays), so I decided I could do more for the community as a whole, so I decided to level up.
What excites you most about this event?: Everything. It will be my first GP as a judge and my first time in London, so I don’t really know what to expect.
What worries you most about this event?: To fail or to not be up to the challenge. In every aspect of my life, I can say this is the only fear I have and it is always present, but I’m trying to overcome it.
What are you hoping to learn at this event?: It will be my first time at a GP, so I hope to learn some of the logistics behind it and the different roles judges have.
Who are your mentors?: Jorge Rua was my L1 mentor and Filipe Fernandes my L2 mentor and owe them a lot. They are awesome people to work with. Right now, I try to learn a bit with everyone, especially the other portuguese judges and the ones that are involved in projects with me and I consider them my mentors as well (you know who you are guys!)
What is your favorite Magic memory?: The day I certified for L2 is my favourite so far, but there are not interesting things to tell you about it. As a player, I can recall an Innistrad booster draft where I opened a Liliana of the Veil, a Garruk Relentless and a Snapcaster Mage (somebody also passed me a premium Champion of the Parish, that was worth some money too). There was also this time where I was playing a Rally mirror match during a Game Day final, that took over two and a half hours! I lost 2-1 but it was the most exciting match of my life.

Tony Tong

Name: Tony Tong
Level: Level 1
Location: Oxford, United Kingdom
Region: United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa
Approximate date/month/year you started playing Magic: 6 years
L1 Certification Date: June 25, 2017
Favorite thing (e.g., card, deck, group of people) about Magic: Control
Occupation: Student
Why did you become a judge?: Learn more about Magic (rather than just playing Magic as a player)
What excites you most about this event?: It’s my first GP
What worries you most about this event?: Cannot gain too much competitive judging experience
What are you hoping to learn at this event?: Learn how a big event is held
Who are your mentors?: James Winward-Stuart
What challenges have you faced or are you facing to become a better judge?: Memorizing MCR and IPG
How have you worked to overcome those challenges?: Do some exam questions and judge more events

Conner Tregilgas

Name: Conner Tregilgas
Level: Level 1
Location: Bedworth, United Kingdom
Region: United Kingdom, Ireland, and South Africa

Michiel Van den Bussche

Name: Michiel Van den Bussche
Level: Level 2
Location: Sinaai, Belgium
Region: BeNeLux
Approximate date/month/year you started playing Magic: September 2000
L1 Certification Date: September 28, 2015
Favorite thing (e.g., card, deck, group of people) about Magic: Definitely the community
Occupation: Teacher
Random fact about yourself: I love the number pi.
Why did you become a judge?: Our local gaming club started organizing sanctioned Magic so I took it upon myself to certify. Best decision of my life.
What excites you most about this event?: It took a lot of tries to finally get one, so I am anxious to share in this amazing experience.
What worries you most about this event?: Due to my teaching job, it’s impossible to get vacation time before and after a GP. I fear that I might enjoy this GP a lot, and the sad part is that I can hardly attend any.
What are you hoping to learn at this event?: I am hoping to learn about my flaws at this event, and establish a set of goals on how to improve myself in 2018 as a Judge and person.
Who are your mentors?: Jonas Drieghe, Niels Viaene and Richard Drijvers.
What challenges have you faced or are you facing to become a better judge?: I failed 2 L2 exams before finally getting there, so the road has been bumpy in the past. Nowadays it is mostly my Area Captain gig that throws me a curveball from time to time.
How have you worked to overcome those challenges?: I had to take a good look in the mirror and be completely honest with myself, find my shortcomings and worked on them a lot. Nowadays when I find myself in a difficult situation, I have a network of amazing Judges to fall back on.
What is the best part about your local Magic community?: I am inspired by the love that new and beginning players experience when learning the game. Without them I would have stopped playing already.
What is your favorite Magic memory?: I was recently playing in an FNM and saw a Judge that I certified mentoring a new candidate of mine. To see those lessons passed on was a beautiful moment for me.