2009 Lidums Australian Junior Chess Championships Begin

The 2009 Lidums Australian Junior Chess Championships will be held at Saint Ignatius' College in Athelstone, Adelaide. The competition goes from the 2nd-13th of January and the Under 18 Open Division will be FIDE rated (for some reason). According to the list of entries, the top seeds are Yi Yuan and Yita Choong, both rated 2058, although it will be clearer when the 1st round is completed (if a higher-rated player turns up at the last moment).

This tournament also encompasses the Australian Juniors Rapid tournament, the Australian Juniors Lightning Championship (which I won U16 last year!) and a Problem Solving competition.

I may report halfway through this tournament and will have a full report at the end of the tournament.

2008 Canterbury Summer Swiss

The 2008 Canterbury Summer Swiss was held at Box Hill Chess Club (it seems everything is being held there) from the 27-30th of December. There were 8 rounds played over 4 days. The field is reasonably strong, with the top seed being Samuel Chow (2328).

Bobby Cheng (2085) came first with a stunning performance on 7/8. He was leading the tournament the whole way.

Samuel Chow (2328) took 2nd place with 6.5/8. 3rd-5th place was shared between Carl Gorka (2011), Eugene Schön (1931) and Cedric Antolis (1889).

The results can be found on the official Chess Victoria website, under CV-approved Tournaments.

Australian Schools Teams Championships 2008

The Australian Schools Teams Championships 2008 was held on the 6th-7th of December, 2008 at Rostrevor College, Woodforde, Adelaide, SA. This year's field was very strong, however Scotch College managed to pull off the feat of winning every game except one draw.

We stayed in the boarding house of Rostrevor College, which was exceedingly clean and well organised, although I could not find internet access at the venue. There was also opportunity to play table tennis and squash. The food was also quite good, especially the sausage sizzle on the first night. The playing hall was spacious, allowing lots of room to move around. The organisers did a very professional job, especially considering the sudden withdrawal of the NT team.

On the last day, we also went off to the beach and with the help of a four-man team, we dug a lake called "Lake Eugene". It was implied that Nicholas Liu (1464) went to KFC, after mentioning that he really wanted to go there multiple times.

The Scotch Team (VIC) consisted of:
1. Zhigen Lin (2104)
2. Eugene Schön (1931)
3. Derek Yu (1810)
4. Nicholas Liu (1464)
5. Richard Owen (unr)

I won't mention who drew the game which prevented a full score.

Here are the standings:

Secondary Open
1st Scotch College, VIC
2nd Sydney Grammar, NSW
3rd Hawker College, ACT

Secondary Girls
1st Somerset College, QLD
2nd North Sydney Girls High School, NSW
3rd-4th Presbyterian Ladies College, VIC (3rd on countback) and Daramalan College, ACT

Primary Open
1st Penshurst West Public, NSW
2nd Somerset College, QLD
3rd Greythorn Primary, VIC

Primary Girls
1st Somerville House, QLD
2nd-3rd Summer Hill Primary, NSW (2nd on countback) and Curtin Primary, ACT

Team standings and individual results can be found on the Australian Schools Teams Championships website.

Two New Chess Articles

There are two new chess articles on GeniusProphecy.com.

"Beginning Chess - Where to Start" talks about the need to study endgames and also includes some opening suggestions for beginners. Several chess books are also noted throughout the article. Click here to access the beginning chess article.

There is also an articled called "Secret of Chess". Here, I go through many secrets of chess such as "computers will solve the game of chess" or "Secret of Chess: Dress like a grandmaster and you start to play like one" (according to GM Nigel Short). Click here to access the Secret of Chess article.

2008 Dresden Chess Olympiad

In November, Australia sent a team to the Chess Olympiad in Dresden, Germany. Here are the teams, with actual ratings in brackets and beside them, their performance ratings.

Australian Open team:

Zhao (2567) 2645
Smerdon (2470) 2437
Solomon (2470) 2390
Johansen (2446) 2500
Xie (2403) 2167

Australian Womens team:

Caoili (2170) 2261
Nguyen (2101) 2155
Moylan (2114) 2081
Dekic (2103) 2078
Oliver (1942) 1917