The second WA junior chess camp was held at the at Oberthur Primary School on 8th and 9th of April. The chess camp was run to promote and encourage junior chess activities in WA. This event could not be possible without the tremendous help from WA's active chess community, in particular Jeng Kong and Joli Mendez, whose hard work and dedication ensured this was a very successful Junior Chess camp. Over 60 junior chess players of different levels enjoyed learning from various chess coaches, participating in puzzle competitions and playing against each other. It was great to see so many new faces that are interested in either learning chess or wanting to improve their game! We were very happy to see both Australian Chess Champion GM Temur Kuybokarov and WA State Chess Champion FM Patrick Gong participating in the chess camp. At Friday lunchtime all participants were presented with a Certificate of Attendance and a magnetic chess set. On Friday afternoon the beginners played a Novice Tournament, were they learnt the basic rules of tournament play, including the use of clocks and basic strategies. At the same time, we were very fortunate to have GM Temur Kuybokarov to hold a simultaneous exhibition with 32 enthusiastic young chess players. The simul went for almost three hours and Temur won all the games. Results of the various competitions: Advanced Puzzle Class 1st: Daren Vinod, 2nd: Dillon Vinod Intermediate Puzzle Class 1st: Catherine Nguyen, 2nd: Arissa Wang Novice Puzzle Class 1st: Chelsea Wu, 2nd: Leah Qui Best Simultaneous Game against Grandmaster Temur Kuybokarov Angus Chen Novice Tournament 1st: Jo Gao, 2nd: Jeremy Li, 3rd: Charis Ong, =4th: Yong Wen Tan and Chelsea Wu We want to say a huge THANKS to: l Oberthur Primary School for hosting the event. l The chess coaches: Sri Krishna Dharmapuri, Dennis Holland, David King, Norbert Muller, FM Patrick Gong, and Alan Wolstencroft. l Assistant coaches: Oscar Gao, Iker Hernandez Mendez and Celine Ong. l Paul Harris for running the Novice Tournament. l Temur Kuybokarov for presenting the certificates and chess sets and the Simultaneous Exhibition. l Organisers and volunteers: Richard Chen, Jeng Kong, Joli Mendez, John Pimenov and Alan Wolstencroft. l John Pimenov for the Facebook poster for the camp. Report kindly provided by Alan Wolstencroft. |