Going on Hiatus

The Australian Chess News blog will be going on hiatus for at least the next few months so that I can focus on other endeavours. In the meantime, take a look at the following websites.

Chess club/coaching service run by my long-time chess coach FM Geoff Saw:
Dark Horse Chess Club

Australian blogs:
Checkmate Ends The Game
Chessexpress
David Cordover's Blog
Dozy's Inferno
GM Smerdon's Blog
Gorka's Coffee House
Lousy At Chess
The Closet Grandmaster (possibly the most renowned)

Australian forums:
Chess Chat
OzChess

Other websites by me:
GeniusProphecy Chess - My instructional chess website

GeniusProphecy Chess Blog - The blog that gives updates on GeniusProphecy Chess

2010 CV Interschool Championships

The 2010 Chess Victoria Interschool Championships was a 7-round tournament held at Balwyn High School on Monday the 11th of October. The tournament was organised by IM Leonid Sandler and the winner would be recognised as the Victorian State Champions. At the top, it was a close battle between Scotch College and Balwyn High School, arguably the two strongest secondary schools in Australia (both of which are incidentally in Victoria). Before the penultimate round, Balwyn was leading by 2 points. Going into the last round, Scotch had overtaken Balwyn and was half a point ahead. Ironically, the tournament concluded with both schools on an equal amount of points. Due to disputes over tie-break rules, a decision was made to ask the junior federation whether both schools could attend the national championships.

Here are the final results
1st/2nd Balwyn High School {FM Bobby Cheng (2227), Samuel Dalton (1996), Jonathan Tang (1645) and Zhong Hao Gan (1483)}, Scotch College {Eugene Schön (2160), Zhigen Lin (2200), Nicholas Liu (1643) and Richard Owen}
3rd Glen Waverley Secondary College

Here are the individual results
1st/2nd Samuel Dalton, Zhigen Lin with 6.5/7
3rd Allen Yu (1631), Eugene Schön, Jonathan Tang (1645), Yilun Ding (1941), Deniz Tuncer (1487) with 6/7

ACF Ratings

2010 ANU Open

...late by a few months but better late than never. The ANU Chess Open was played from the 24th-25th of July at the Canberra School of Art. The top seed was GM Zong-Yuan Zhao (2585).

Here are the final results

1st IM Andras Toth (2332) with 6/7
2nd-3rd GM Zong-Yuan Zhao, FM Junta Ikeda with 5.5/7

Click here to see the final standings for the 2010 ANU Open.

2010 Victorian Championship

The 2010 Victorian Championship was a tournament running from the 15th of July to the 28th of August. It was an 11 round robin with top seed being IM Igor Goldenberg (2386). Ratings are using the FIDE system.

1st-2nd Christopher Wallis (2237), Dusan Stojic (2238) with 8.5/9
3rd-4th IM Mirko Rujevic (2259), IM Igor Goldenberg with 8/9

Click here for the final standings for the 2010 Victorian Championship.

Coming Australian Grand Prix Events

The following events are coming soon. These events are part of the 2010 Yulgilbar-Think Big Grand Prix, a large chess competition with prizes. All strong events are normally part of the grand prix. The column on the far right denotes what grand prix class the tournament is.

		ANU Open	ACT	Canberra	24/07/10	25/07/10	4
		ANU U1600	ACT	Canberra	24/07/10	25/07/10	4
		Hobart Weekender	TAS	Hobart	14/08/10	15/08/10	1
		Bundaberg Weekender	QLD	Bundaberg	21/08/10	22/08/10	2
		The Best in the West	VIC	Melbourne	21/08/10	22/08/10	1
		Blayney Open	NSW	Blayney	11/09/10	12/09/10	2
		Nell Van De Graaff Classic	QLD	Gold Coast	18/09/10	19/09/10	3
		Ranges Spring Break	VIC	Upwey	18/09/10	19/09/10	1
		Ryde-Eastwood Open	NSW	Sydney	02/10/10	04/10/10	4
		Labour Day Weekend	SA	Adelaide	02/10/10	03/10/10	1
		Guy West Classic	VIC	Melbourne	02/10/10	03/10/10	1
		Wlletton Open	WA	Perth	02/10/10	03/10/10	1
		Wendy Terry Memorial	QLD	Brisbane	09/10/10	10/10/10	1
		Gosford Open	NSW	Gosford	16/10/10	17/10/10	1
		Burnie Shines	TAS	Burnie	23/10/10	24/10/10	1
		Melbourne Cup Weekender	VIC	Melbourne	29/10/10	02/11/10	1
		Fisher's Ghost Open	NSW	Sydney	06/11/10	07/11/10	3
		Vikings Weekender	ACT	Canberra	20/11/10	21/11/10	1
		Christmas Open	WA	Perth	27/11/10	28/11/10	1
		Gold Coast International	QLD	Surfers Paradise	26/12/10	30/01/10	3
		Canterbury Summer Swiss	VIC	Melbourne	27/12/10	29/12/10	2

Click here to see the full list of this year's Yulgilbar-Think Big Grand Prix events.