tournament Archives - Page 4 of 29 - Menlo Park Chess Club

April 6, 2026April 6, 2026

Impromptu Blitz #59 Results & Updated Events Calendar

This past Thursday saw both an excellent lecture from Frisco Del Rosario as well as another strong showing for our free, unrated blitz tournament series, with four first-time visitors and three masters participating. After seven rounds of G/3+2 chess FIDE Master and former World Youth Under-12 Co-Champion Rayan Taghizadeh stood alone in first with 6.5 points, his lone draw ceded to our second place finisher at 5.5, NM Dmitry Dzhanhirov. Club stalwarts Hayden Brongersma, Nicholas Tan and Cameron Troy tied for third at 5.0 while Austin Chen was alone in sixth at 4.5. Full results are in the attached wall chart and I’ve also included the updated club blitz point totals and club blitz ratings, the eventual purpose of which remains embarrassingly unclear at this time.

In other chess news, our very own Lauren Goodkind enjoyed an excellent result at the XVII Campeonato Continental Femenino de Ajedrez de Las Américas 2026 (17th American Women’s Continental Championship 2026), with a score of 5.0 points out of nine games and the distinction of being the top untitled player. Well done, Lauren, and perhaps a FIDE title of your own is soon in the offing!

Lastly for now, the club’s Events page (https://menloparkchess.club/events/) has been updated through the beginning of May and, to summarize, we’ll have two more weeks of casual blitz events followed by Chess960 Draft on April 23rd and an A4c Variant tournament on the 30th, then I hope to begin our next rated event May 7th — more details about that will be shared soon. Regards,

Mark Drury

Copa Del Menlo, Round One

To honor the FIFA World Cup this summer we’ll hold our own Copa del Menlo during three Thursdays in September (10th, 17th, 24th), a dual-rated G/45;d5 event played in small Swiss sections of 6-8 players grouped by rating, with one game played per evening. With the World Cup in mind, this will also be a team event using the so-called “snake draft” to create teams of four or so players from each section in the tournament, with an added cash prize given to the top two teams based upon total team score (the sum or all team member scores).

Given the small sections and teams nature of this event it is paramount that players are able to play all three weeks of the tournament — no byes are available and we are not planning to hold a makeup round at this time, though that could change if sufficient people request it. Full details follow:

Format: Small Swiss sections (groups of 6-8 players) based upon rating
Rounds: September 10th, 17th and 24th with no makeup round planned for this event — games begin promptly at 7:00pm
Control: G/45;d5 (dual-rated games of 45 minutes per player plus a 5-second delay per move)
Entry Fee: $20; PayPal: mark@drury.com; Venmo: @Mark-Drury-12; Zelle: 650-400-6393; entire entry fee goes to the prize fund
Prizes: Based upon 32 entries and 8-player sections, each section will offer a $70 first, $40 second and $20 third prize with ties splitting the money while the top team will split $80 and the second-place team $40 (based on 4-person teams)
Byes: No byes are available for this event
Register: Registrations closed after round one
Equipment: Boards, sets, clocks, score sheets and pens will be provided by the Menlo Park Chess Club (bring a digital clock if you prefer your own)
Membership: All tournament participants must be current US Chess members for the duration of the event
Rules: Our tournament chess rules summary is mandatory reading if you’re new to tournament play
Info: For more information please send email to info@menloparkchess.club
Social: Join our Facebook group or Google group to stay abreast of club news, tournaments and events

A4c Variant Tournament #4

“A4c” or “The Clock (Almost) Never Stops” Variant

Background: One of the strongest blitz players in our club came up with this variant and, after hearing it described, we couldn’t resist holding three informal tournaments in 2024 and 2025 to give it a try. It proved very popular so we’re giving it another go—it involves a good deal of fast chess plus a game within a game (a metagame) centered around how best to manage one’s fixed time allotment over two or three games.

Concept: Players will play best of 3 games against the same opponent in each round with 10 minutes on their clocks, with no increment or delay. When a game ends, players pause the clock but do not reset the time. They reset the pieces then restart the clock for the next game with the times remaining from the prior game(s). If a player runs out of time they lose the match. If a player wins the majority of the points possible in the 3 games, they win the match (so if a player wins two games and still has time remaining on their clock they win the match). One player gets two games with the white pieces (first and third games) and the other gets preferred clock side for all games.

Oddities: Clock location does not change so one player always keeps it on their preferred side. Typically the players start the game by drawing for colors then whomever wins the draw chooses White or Clockside, but given we’ll be holding a Swiss system tournament the player assigned White in any round gets two whites and the player assigned Black gets to choose clockside. (We could also allow the player who is assigned White by the pairing software to choose color preference or clockside to further complicate the metagame).

Comments: I like the metagame aspect of this format because it incentivizes players to manage their clock across multiple games with tactical decisions (whether it is burning down an opponent’s time when they are ahead on time or resigning quickly to preserve more time for subsequent games). It also allows a stronger slower player to manage their time differently and take more time to win the majority of games (though this is risky if they go into a third game after budgeting time poorly).

Format: As mentioned above, we will play 3 games at Gs/10 over three or possibly four rounds, depending upon when we get started, and we may split players into groups of 8-12 by rating if the tournament doesn’t start very near 7pm (leaving time for just three rounds), so please arrive a little earlier if at all possible.

Prizes: Player scores from this event will be combined with those from the previous week’s Freestyle Chess tournament to determine the winners of some nice book prizes, donated by a former club member who left the Bay Area some time ago.

Freestyle Chess (Chess960) Draft Tournament

A number of people have requested that we revisit Chess960 or, as it’s now styled, Freestyle Chess in another casual tournament so that’s exactly what we’ll do in this event, again using a piece placement draft with the following format and rules:

A Swiss system tournament of 4 or 5 rounds at G/5;d3 in one or two sections
Registration will occur onsite–please try to arrive by 6:45pm
The games will be played with the normal Freestyle/Chess960 rules except for the use of a draft, wherein white starts black’s clock then black places the first piece on the back rank and starts white’s clock, white copies that move then places another piece of their own, black copies that placement then places a third piece, etc., until black places a final piece and white makes the first chess move of the game
It’s important to note that the draft phase covered above occurs while players’ clocks are running, just as in normal moves for the game
The king must be placed between the two rooks as in normal Freestyle/Chess960
More information about castling may be found in chess.com tutorials here and here
The bishops must be placed on opposite-colored squares
We will use clock move rather than touch move, as in our casual blitz tournaments
An illegal move pointed out by an opponent (no one else) immediately ends the game as a loss for the player who made the illegal move, though this does not apply during the draft/piece placement phase of the game
Each player’s score for this event will be combined with that from the A4c Variant tournament the following week to determine who wins nice book prizes, though one needn’t commit to playing in both events

Casual, Blitz, Lecture, Ladder Chess Evening

Our regular weekly club meeting occurs Thursday evenings from 6:00-9:00pm in the Oak Room of the Arrillaga Family Recreation Center. Casual, blitz, bughouse and ladder chess games as well as a lecture are in the offing and we will also play another free, unrated blitz tournament beginning round 7pm, given there appears to be a continuing appetite for same. Note that our free weekly lecture begins at 6:30pm and it remains one of the highlights of club attendance.

Casual, Blitz, Lecture, Ladder Chess Evening

March 1, 2026March 1, 2026

Impromptu Blitz #57 Results

We enjoyed another excellent turnout at the club this past Thursday and 29 people participated in seven rounds of G/3+2 blitz from 7:00-8:30pm. When all was said and done second-time visitor Thomas Allard stood alone atop the wall chart with 6 points out of 7, no surprise given he has a ~2300 blitz rating on chess.com. One half point behind Thomas in sole second was first-time visitor Dmitry Dzhanhirov, a National Master and very strong blitz player in his own right. Club stalwarts Pranav Jindal and Hayden Brongersma shared third at 5.0 while two of the strongest juniors in the club, Austin Chen and Caleb Leong, tied for fifth at 4.5. Full results as well as the latest club blitz ratings and blitz point totals may be seen in the attached images and thank you to everyone who joined us for this fun, free event!

As of this post we have four spots remaining in our March Quadness event beginning Thursday, March 5th. Please register asap if you wish to play as I plan to share the tentative quad groups Monday or Tuesday of this week. Note that we will not hold the unrated blitz tournaments while the quads are in progress but I anticipate we’ll pick that up again March 26th or April 2nd, at the latest, while our next rated event will likely begin in late April or early May—please let me know if you have any suggestions for that or other club events, as always. Regards,

Mark Drury

February 22, 2026February 23, 2026

Impromptu Blitz #56 Results

Twenty-six people joined our latest “impromptu” blitz tournament, with several first-time and returning visitors participating in seven rounds of G/3+2 chess over 90 or so minutes. Hayden Brongersma once again emerged victorious with 5.5 points out of 7, his lone loss coming in the final round against second-place finisher Yoyo He. Yoyo tied for second at 5 points with Austin Chen and newcomer Thomas Allard, Lauren Goodkind and the club’s house patzer tied for fifth at 4.5 and there followed a raft of strong players in the 4.0 scrum. Full results are in the attached image, along with the latest blitz point totals and club blitz ratings — thank you, as always, to everyone who joined us for this event.

One particularly interesting game between two veteran if cheeky players saw a speculative double under-promotion to two bishops (of opposite colors, thankfully), leaving the king and two prelates against lone king. In the ensuing endgame it became a little unclear if the bishopmonger would garner the full point, given mutual time trouble and a protracted dance around the board by all the pieces, but in the end ~~Hayden~~ the bishops prevailed in a nice demonstration of that mating pattern.

We’ll hold one more impromptu blitz tournament February 26th before beginning our “March Quadness” event on the 5th of next month. If you have not yet registered for the quads please do so asap. Regards,

Mark Drury

February 15, 2026February 15, 2026

“March Quadness” Registration Opens

With apologies to fans of NCAA Basketball, our next dual-rated quads tournament begins March 5th and runs three consecutive weeks, with a possible makeup round scheduled for March 26th if needed. More details and a registration link may be found here — please register asap if you wish to play in this event as we’re limiting the field to 28 players this time around (7 quads).

Relatedly, the results of our recently-concluded club survey may be seen below and made clear people prefer that our next rated event have a longer time control, so the quads will be played at G/45;d5, one game per evening. In addition to the data shared below we received a large number of helpful comments and suggestions so we’ll try to incorporate all that we can in upcoming events — thank you to those who took the time to complete the survey! Regards,

Mark Drury