We saw some exciting chess Thursday evening (and more than a few swindles) during the third and fourth rounds of our August Double-Round Quick-Rated Quads and Swisses, per the images below. Most of the group results are fairly even thus far, as was the hope given the tighter ratings distributions in these smaller sections, with the possible exception of young Austin Chen, who is pwning his Swiss two-thirds of the way through. We’ll play rounds five and six next Thursday then will hold a make-up round August 29th, for the one or two matches still outstanding. I will submit the sections for rating no later than Friday, August 30th. Once again, thank you to everyone who joined us for this fun event!
Twenty-two people participated in three sections of our second A4c Variant tournament this past Thursday, a three-round best-of-3-games-in-10-total-minutes affair which was again rife with surprises and a few upsets. When the final time scramble settled Yash Shah and Joey Lo reigned supreme over sections one and three, respectively, with perfect scores while youngsters Austin Chen and Hugo Pu shared first in section two with 2.5 points. Hugo had an interesting match in round two against Benjamin Chen wherein they split the first two games but Benjamin was left with a scant 13 seconds in the deciding third, and despite some very fast moves he succumbed on time, highlighting the game within a game aspect of this format, while in section one Andy Applebaum and Pranav Jindal split their first two games and drew the third in their round 2 encounter, securing one of just two drawn matches during the night.
Feedback about this variant was again positive (well, there was one half-hearted detractor but he bemoans all faster time controls) so we’ll hold another A4c tournament again soon, and thank you to everyone who joined us for this event.
In other tournament news, we have nine registrations for our double-round quick-rated event scheduled to begin this Thursday, which is insufficient for a number of reasons so I plan to cancel it, regrettably. Perhaps people are traveling in June and cannot commit to all three weeks, or they don’t like the double-round format or the faster quick-rated time control or I simply didn’t promote the event as much as I have others in the past. We typically end up with a waiting list for similar tournaments but there was clearly no risk of that this time around, so I’ll try to understand if this format doesn’t work for most of you (or if the timing was simply bad).
This Thursday we will likely hold free, unrated G/10;d3 Swiss sections of 6-8 players over three rounds, somewhat like last week but we’ll play just one game in that time control. If you’d like to play in that event please try to arrive at the club round 6:45 so we can begin the tournament at 7pm. Better yet, arrive shortly before 6:30 in case Frisco Del Rosario has another lecture on tap for us–if you’ve missed these in the past I highly recommend attending as Frisco’s chess insights are eminently worth your time.
We had another full house (and a considerable wait list—register early!) for our quick-rated, double-round quads plus Swiss which ran from August 10th – 24th, with clear winners in all sections save Quad 1, wherein Andy Applebaum and Pranav Jindal tied for 1st-2nd with 4 points apiece out of 6. Tobin Bennion took sole first in Quad 2 with 4.5 points while David Zhao had the only perfect score in the event with his impressive 6-0 in Quad 3. Kornel Csernai also tallied 4.5 to win Quad 4 and Umar Rasyid had perhaps our best junior showing with his excellent 5 points to take Quad 5.
Quad 6 was dangerously close to seeing a 4-way tie at 3 points until Michael Darr bested six-year-old phenom Rosalyn Chu (remember that name) in their final game to win outright with 4 points. In the Swiss event, Travis Torres-O’Callaghan, the front runner after four rounds, became ill and was unable to play rounds 5 and 6, regrettably, leaving Austin Chen and Victor Chen to square off atop that section. Austin prevailed over both games and claimed 1st with an admirable 5 points. The full results for this event may be found here.
Thank you to everyone who played in this fun event, please let me know if you have any feedback (good or bad) and congratulations to all of our prize winners–their winnings are given below and I’ll reach out to individuals via email about how they wish to be paid. Regards,
Mark Drury
Quad 1
1st-2nd: Andy Applebaum, Pranav Jindal, $20
Quad 2
1st: Tobin Bennion, $25 2nd: Triet Vo, $15
Quad 3
1st: David Zhao, $25 2nd: TBD (Cesar Tamondong and Michael Sherrard to play August 31st), $15
Fourteen club stalwarts and six new visitors played in our first Bughouse Swiss tournament this past Thursday and the fact that Robert’s team claimed first prize with a perfect 4-0 was a surprise to no one, given his strength in this format. Robert’s teammate, John Vitlacil, and I go way back to the Burlingame Chess Club circa the late 1980s, where we played a number of tournament games against one another, so it was great to see him again after so many decades. We also had four or five first-time visitors who played casual and blitz chess Thursday, opting not to play in the tournament, which is always an option if you’re not a fan of any specific format or variant.
Congratulations are also due to teams Amogh / Pranav and newcomers Nirvan / Rachel for their second-place tie at 3 points, ahead of four teams with 2 points. For my part, I weighed poor Andres down with moves like 2. f4 in my game against Kornél, when his teammate, Jerome, extracted a pawn to drop on my f2 square with check, leading to a very quick, instructional and most embarrassing forced mate several moves later. I have no future in bughouse but I’ll continue playing it for the humor value, alone.
As much fun as this bughouse tournament was, I think we’ll forego the second such event scheduled for April 13th, given the format (chiefly the makeup of the teams) still needs some thought to make it appealing to a larger swath of our regular players. Please let me know if you have any feedback, good or bad, thanks to all of you who played in this event and we’ll most likely try the format again in the near future.
Vlae Kershner of Climate Magazine in Redwood City visited the club several times, played in one of our blitz tournaments and wrote a very nice article about what we are doing and about chess in general, one which may be read via the link below. Thank you for joining us, Vlae, and we hope to see you at the club again soon!
We held our first blitz tournament of the year last night with 28 players participating in two sections. Section A, an 8-player round robin, was won by FM Shawnak Shivakumar with the statement score of 6.5 out of 7 points. Adithya Karavadi took second with 5 points and Alaric Stein rounded out the top three of this hard-fought group with 4.5 points.
Newcomer Samuel Agdamag won Section B, a 5-round Swiss event, with a score of 4.5 points, while Jörg Lamprecht, Kornél Csernaiand youthful Sahil Shivakumar tied for second with 4 points each. Congratulations to our winners—Shawnak and Samuel took home $25 Kepler’s Books gift certificates for their efforts—and thank you to everyone who joined us last night (including our five first-time visitors)!
I’ll send information later today or tomorrow about the USCF-rated tournament which begins next Thursday, a 4-round Swiss event in one section with a G/45 d/5 time control, and I hope many of you will be able to join us then. Regards,
Last night we held another single-section Swiss-system blitz tournament, a G/3+2 affair with 24 players and, as with last week, Kunal Modi mowed through the field for another perfect 5 of 5 result. Adam Stevens and Aaron Cho tied for second with 4 points and all three received $25 Kepler’s Books gift certificates for their exertions. Congratulations to our winners and thank you to everyone who participated in this event, our last of the year!
It’s hard to believe the club will observe its one year anniversary when we next meet January 5th and it has been far more successful than I would have imagined in January or February of this year. For my part, the greatest reward is meeting so many of you fine people, both at the club and online. Thank you for your participation and support over the course of the year, have a great Holiday season and a safe New Year and here’s hoping next year will be even better! Regards,
Twenty people joined us last night for a Swiss G/3+2 blitz tournament of five rounds, including several first-time visitors, among them first-place finisher Kunal Modi, who was a perfect 5 for 5 even though he faced stiff competition in Shahin Aghevli (2nd), Karim Seada (3rd) and a host of strong players tied for 4th at 3 points. Congratulations to Kunal, Shahin and Karim and thank you to everyone who played in this event!
We’ll hold another blitz event next week to close out the year (the club won’t meet December 21st or 28th), either another single-section Swiss tourney or 4- or 6-player round robins, depending upon turnout, with Kepler’s Books gift certificates serving as prizes. I’ll send an event invite for that tournament later today. Regards,
Wednesday’s final round of our club championship offered up yet more exciting chess and a number of time scrambles which impacted the standings, and when all was said and done unrated Adithya Karavadi (pictured below on the left) stood alone atop the wall chart with 4.5 out of 5 points. Adithya’s first provisional rating will likely be Expert level when this event is rated, which should occur no later than Monday or Tuesday. Five people tied for second place with 4 points: Pranav Jindal, Aaron Cho, Andy Shih, Daniel Francis and Cesar Tamondong. Well done, all of you!
Roshan Mahanth, Anton Bobkov and Peter Roumeliotis tied for the Under-1500 prize with 3 points apiece, while the Under-1000 prize also saw a 3-way tie between Oisin Harrington, Benjamin Sergeant and Banks Bennion, all at 2 points. The ties will be settled over the board next week with some friendly G/5+0 blitz to determine who takes home the remaining premium club set and board prizes, a spectacle which may alone merit attendance this coming Wednesday.
Congratulations to Adithya and a huge thank you to everyone who played in or stopped by to spectate our first club championship–hopefully we’ll hold the same event same time next year! Regards,
Yesterday evening we held a four-round double blitz G/3+2 tournament and twenty-nine people participated. In this particular event two games were contested in each round, one as white and one as black with the same opponent, which is relatively uncommon in Swiss system tournaments.
After three rounds no less than nine players had a reasonable chance at a prize, but after the dramatic fourth round concluded WFM Olivia Smith claimed sole first place with seven out of eight points and took home the $30 Kepler’s Books gift certificate.
The tie for second between blitz mavens Pranav Jindal, Alaric Stein and Andy Shih, each with 6.5 points, resulted in not one but two G/3+0 round robin playoffs for the remaining prizes, given the first ended in yet another three-way tie. Would that we had recorded these games as there was some very interesting chess, no matter the time control, including wild swings of fortune in a single game. Pranav proved victorious in the second playoff and collected the $20 gift certificate while Alaric pocketed $10 (Andy received a firm consolation handshake).
Blitz tournaments clearly bring the crowds to our club so we’ll continue holding at least one of these each month as our schedule and interest allow. As always, please let me know if you have suggestions for other chess activities and I hope to see you at the club soon!
