UCU Children's Chess Event

Saturday saw another children's chess event run by Mark Newman of the Ulster Chess Union. As usual it was a fun filled day of chess puzzles and games. Adam Rushe was the winner of the Secondary School section, whilst Dexter Harris won the Primary School section. Full results will appear on the Ulster Chess Union website.

Funday Sunday at St Andrews

A rapidplay tournament has been organised for Sunday 1st October in St Andrew's College, Dublin. It's a 6 round tournament with entry open to players of all ages and abilities. Further details can be found on the Irish Chess Union website. It's a great opportunity for all our youngsters to test their skills against some new players!

Saint Petersburg - we lost the match but won some friends!

A number of our local players traveled to Russia on 18th August for a challenge match against Saint Petersburg. During the week long visit we saw some wonderful sights including -

The Winter Palace / Hermitage

Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood

Zenit Saint Petersburg football match

 

Museum of Music in the Sheremetev Palace

River cruise through Saint Petersburg

Korchnoi Memorial Tournament

Kalininsky Chess School

Roshchino Village Summer Chess Camp

Our hosts, the Kalininsky Chess School, were fantastic in every way, providing excellent accommodation, bus transfers in and out of the city, and amazing venues for us to play in. We received an incredibly warm reception from organisers and players alike. Their warmth, hard work and organisation turned the trip into an experience of a lifetime that none of those attending will ever forget. Special mention must all be made to Mikhail Pavlov and Brendan Jamison from the Ulster Chess Union for organising the trip on our side. They worked tirelessly before and during the event to ensure our stay was as enjoyable and fulfilling as possible.

The chess was of an incredibly high standard and proved an exciting challenge for all the players. The schedule included 4 classical games, a simultaneous exhibition against WGM Dina Belenkaya, a rapidplay tournament, and a blitz tournament. We had some notable successes on the trip -

1) Daniil Zelenchuk scored 4/4 in the classical matches

2) Ross Harris and Dmitry Zelenchuk scored 2.5/4 in the classical matches

3) Daniil Zelenchuk and Barney McGahan won in the simultaneous exhibition

4) Dexter Harris and Brendan Jamison drew in the simultaneous exhibition

5) Daniil Zelenchuk came 2nd in the blitz tournament scoring 7.5/9

6) Brendan Jamison and Daniil Zelenchuk came joint 2nd in the rapidplay tournament

Our youngest players Dexter Harris (8) and Adam Fitzsimons (8) performed incredibly well against much higher rated players. Both scored 2/5 in the rapidplay and 3/9 in the blitz.

Saint Petersburg is a beautiful, friendly city that everyone should take the opportunity to explore! Many thanks to our hosts for a wonderful experience and to Mikhail and Brendan for all their hard work!

Kalininsky Chess School have produced this wonderful video of our trip.

Robinson Cup Win

Daniil Zelenchuk continued his fine recent form by scoring 4/5 in the recent Robinson Cup. This fantastic effort helped the Irish team win the competition.

UCU Chess Summer School

Once again Mark Newman of the Ulster Chess Union staged a fantastic Summer Chess School! 3 days of puzzles, games, lectures and battle chess ensured that all the 12 young players came away with enhanced chess skills learnt in a fun and friendly environment. A full report and photos can be found on the UCU website. Hats off to Mark for his continued hard work in helping promote and develop children's chess locally.

Delancey Northern Giga Finals

Once again Wright Robinson College in Manchester was the host of the Delancey UK Schools Chess Challenge Northern Giga Final. The atmosphere in the venue was an incredible mixture of high tension and over excitement with approximately 1000 enthusiastic children (and their parents!) all chomping at the bit to start their games and earn a place in the much coveted Tera Finals in London.

12 of Northern Ireland's finest young chess players made the journey across to Manchester to test themselves against the top juniors in the UK. To attend the Giga Finals you must win a local qualifying tournament, so just reaching this stage is quite an achievement. All the players acquitted themselves very well against incredibly tough opposition - as an example there was a player rated over 2000 in the U9 boys section! Special mention must go to Daniil Zelenchuk (U14's) and Maxim Dobrynin (U11 boy's) who both scored a fantastic 4/6.

NAME	SECTION	SCORE
Adam Rushe	U16	3
Ciaran Rowan	U16	2
Daniil Zelenchuk	U14	4
Aditya Shah	U14	1.5
Calum Glendinning	U12 Boys	3
Maxim Dobrynin	U11 Boys	4
Rahul Shah	U10 Boys	2
Anjali Singh	U9 Girls	3
Dexter Harris	U9 Boys	3
Adam Fitzsimons	U8 Boys	3
Aaditya Singh	U7 Boys	3

Congratulations to all our local juniors who attended and many thanks to all at the Giga Finals for staging such a fantastic event!

End of Year Chess Awards

Once again the end of year children's chess awards were held at Parliament Buildings, Stormont. The day involves a mini tournament, tour of Stormont, and finally the prize giving. Many thanks to Mark Newman for organising the fantastic event and for all his efforts throughout the year in running the UCU children's chess events. The photo below shows all the winners.