Updated July 15

Club Monthly crossword winner Congratulations to Jason James, the £100 prize winner of the June Club Monthly exclusive crossword, No. 20093.

Updated July 8

Race the Clock cheats: Tony Sever, the club member who records the league table of Race the Clockers, has e-mailed the following message:

"It will probably come as no surprise to regular Race The Clock competitors that I propose to disqualify madhibbie for cheating and to exclude him from future statistics. I am prepared to consider an appeal (tony@sevspc.demon.co.uk), but he will have to explain how, having otherwise recorded only slow times (never under five minutes as far as I'm aware, and sometimes well over ten), he suddenly managed to achieve two first places last month and four first places in succession at the start of this month - and it would have been five if he hadn't been thwarted on Saturday by ace typist Heyesey who entered again as Algernon.

"To those who are tempted to use RTC simply as a test of their typing skill, I would say: 'Please don't!' This request applies both to deliberate cheats like madhibbie and to casual opportunists like pat33 who, because of the inadequacies of the Time Online system, sometimes finds that she's entered as Patricia, but then can't resist entering again under her normal player name.

"As far as any crossword competition can be regarded as serious, RTC is a serious competition, and those who compete regularly include some 'serious' solvers, including a seven-times winner of the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament and four winners of the Times Crossword Championship (including two people who've won it twice)."

Now working: Sunday Times 4284 The interactive version and submission of ST 4284 (July 6) are now working. Our apologies for the inconvenience this has caused. You may need to click on the refresh button.

Times Crossword Championship 2008 Solution to final qualifier | Full entry details and links.

Updated July 3

New Crossword Club site project: Getting it right for the future, Update 3: Peter Biddlecombe has written to ask about the progress of the Crossword Club's new site. The answer is that the project continues to go through its many stages. In sum, since March a document detailing the requirements of the Times Crossword Club Project was prepared in consultation with all parties involved at The Times. Then outside companies were asked to respond to the proposals in the document. The responses have now been received and the first of the presentations of the companies takes place this afternoon.

Updated July 1 / corrected July 8

Results of June Clue Challenge Congratulations to Callum Robertson for supplying the best clue for the word HEX. A prize of £50 is winging its way to him. Read crossword compiler Roger Phillips' analysis of the 60-plus entries and have a go at creating a clue for his July word, PIG'S EAR. More ...

Race the Clock, June league table Thank you to Tony Sever for his latest report. Congratulations to hjseidman for leading the field this month by a substantial margin. Magoo improved significantly on last month's performance, though Jason managed to overtake him on the final day of the month to take second place. Shaun (who is often absent from RTC for several days at a time, which accounts for his fluctuating scores), aphisinoz, John Young and Tony Sever all regained places in the top 10. More ...

Updated June 27

Crossword compiler's obituary and favourite clues remembered Kenneth Cain, a former Times crossword compiler, died on May 28, aged 88. His grandson, Mark Tippins, has sent us a cutting from The Times 2002 written by the newspaper's then crossword editor, Brian Greer, which sums up Ken's contribution to the world of crosswords and includes favourite clues compiled by others and himself. He supplied crosswords exclusively to The Times for more than 13 years and was proud that he was still doing so in his eighties. More on Kenneth Cain...

Updated June 11

Times Archive 1785-1985 If they'd had crosswords in 1785, you would be able to access them now online. But the history of The Times Crossword is a 145 years shorter than that. To go to an archive collection of Times stories about the early days of the publication of the crossword in 1930, click here - the link will also enable you to gain access to the rest of the archive or go direct to the archive by clicking on Times Archive. A button to the archive has been installed permanently beneath the Times Online title above, in the horizontal light grey index bar.

Bulletin board - Have Your Say information

Crossword Club members who wish to join in the dialogue should send their questions, replies and comments on the Have Your Say form at the bottom of this page.

Note that we will not print queries/discussion of prize puzzles until after the deadline for receipt of entries. We do not publish comments retrospectively so If you want to discuss specific clues, send your comment after the competition has closed and include the crossword number and type (and even quote the clue to save us all having to look it up), thank you.

Please continue to use the e-mail address xcomments@thetimes.co.uk for comments or enquiries not intended for publication.

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